EQUESTRIAN FIGURE IN TILTING ARMOUR; Sixteenth Century.
QUEEN ELIZABETH’S TIME.
Holinshed gives a valuable account of the heavy horses of Queen Elizabeth’s time (1558-1603). From his record we gather that at this period the Great Horse was no longer reserved exclusively for military purposes, but was in general use for farm and draught work. Holinshed’s reference to the transport required by the Queen’s retinue when she made her frequent progresses through the kingdom is testimony to her inordinate love of pageantry and display. Coaches, according to Stowe, had been introduced into England by FitzAlan, Earl of Arundel, 1580 (though Queen Mary had had one built for herself in 1556), but this mode of conveyance does not appear to have commended itself to Queen Elizabeth. She was, as history tells us, an admirable horsewoman, and we know that she rode behind her Master of Horse when she went in state to St. Paul’s. The following passage from Ralph Holinshed’s Chronicle will be found in book ii., chapter i. of the folio edition printed in London, 1587:—
“Our horses, moreover, are high, and, although not commonlie of such huge greatnesse as in other places of the maine, yet, if you respect the easinesse of their pase, it is hard to saie where their like are to be had. Our cart or plough horses (for we use them indifferently), are commonlie so strong that five or six of them (at most), will draw three thousand weight of the greatest tale with ease for a long journeie—although it be not a load of common usage—which consisted onlie of two thousand, or fiftie foot of timber, fortie bushels of white salt, or six and thirtie of baie, or five quarters of wheat—experience dailie teacheth, and [as] I have elsewhere remembered. Such as are kept for burden, will carie four hundred weight commonlie, without any hurt or hinderance. This furthermore is to be noted, that our princes and nobilitie have their carriage commonlie made by carts; whereby it commeth to passe, that when the queenes majestie dooth remove from anie one place to another, there are vsuallie 400 carewares, which amount to the summe of 2,400 horses, appointed out of the countries adioining, whereby her cariage is conveied vnto the appointed place. Hereby, also, the ancient vse of somers and sumpter horsses is in a maner vtterlie relinquished; which causes the traines of our princes in their progresses to shew far lesse than those of the kings of other nations.”
The loads so respectfully described by Holinshed do not at first sight appear to indicate any very remarkable draught power on the part of a team of five or six horses; rather the contrary. In regard to this, however, we must bear in mind that three hundred years ago the roads were so bad and rutty that an empty waggon would be harder to draw in those days than a heavily loaded wain on a modern road.
The accompanying portrait of Sir Walter Hungerford, Knight, of Farley Castle, Heytesbury, is engraved from a picture in the possession of Sir R. Hungerford Pollen, Bart., at Rodbourne, Malmesbury. Sir Walter was the eldest son of Baron Hungerford, who was beheaded July 28th, 1541. Upon the accession of Queen Mary, Walter Hungerford obtained a reversal of the attainder imposed on his father, and recovered the family estates; but the peerage was not revived. Sir Walter retired from political life and court intrigue, and, choosing for his motto, Amicis Amicissimus, devoted himself entirely to country pursuits. He became widely known for the excellence of his stud; and the picture here engraved bears the following inscription, “Sir Walter Hungerford, Knight, had in Queene Elizabeth’s tyme, the Second of her Raine, for foure yere together, a baye horse, a blacke greyhounde, a lanerett.[A] This offer was for foure yere together, to all Eynglande, not above his betters, he that shoulde showe the best horse for a man of armes, a greyhounde for a hare, a haucke for the reyver, to wine III hundred poundes, that was a hundery the poundes apese. Also he had a gerfalcon for the herne in Her Majesty’s tyme, that he kept XVIII. yere; and offered the lyke to flye for a hundred pounde, and were refused for all.”
This offer of Sir Walter’s gives us the right to assume that the type here represented was the one acknowledged at the date to be that most approved in the English Great Horse; whilst the special function of that horse was, still, to carry “a man of armes.” It can be seen that—though the hair, both of the mane and legs, has been manipulated to suit the fashion—the tail still shows the characteristic abundance. Sir Walter Hungerford’s horse is certainly of the type of Albert Dürer’s Great White Horse, though it shows more evidence of spirit and high action.
Instructive particulars concerning the horses of this period are to be found in a curious little black letter volume, entitled, The Art of Ryding and Breaking Greate Horses, written by Thomas Blundeville of Newton Flotman in Norfolk, and published in 1566; a second edition of which, “newlie corrected and amended of manie faults escaped in the first printing” was issued in 1580; the latter including chapters on breeding
