Our next piece of evidence comes, not from the writer but from the artist, if he may be called so; not from without the shores of Britain but from within. For some historical purposes coins serve a purpose as valuable as pictures, and the present is a case in point. The coins of which illustrations are here given are among the very earliest known to have been struck in this island. They date from the age of Cunobelin (the First century), and are therefore the production of a period when neither Art nor Agriculture had place in the country; they are relics of a time when the conditions of life required only the herdsman and the soldier. With these facts in mind we may examine these coins and see what we can gather from them. The fact that the device on each is a horse suggests at once that this animal played a most important part in the social economy of the people who struck the coins. They were among those found on the borders of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, and are believed to have been circulated in the interest of the Iceni, a tribe which distinguished itself above all others by its resolute resistance to the Roman troops.
The head and front of the power of resistance displayed by the Iceni lay in their skilful employment of the war-chariot as a means of attack—in other words, in the efficiency of their powerful and disciplined horses. There was no agriculture among these people, and the importance of the horse which led to the adoption of its figure as a numismatic device was due to the part it played in war. Now these quaintly archaic designs must not be compared with the works of art by which Greek and Roman civilisation was made famous, and laughed aside as contemptible. The true standard of comparison is found in the rude figures in rock inscriptions, and in the ornamentation on the weapons and tools of what we now call savage races. Measured by this standard these designs boast merit, for the artist has succeeded in conveying an impression of the character of his ideal horse. His ideal was clearly one of deep-carcased, wide-buttocked breed, with profuse mane and tail; a horse, in fact, which possessed some of the prominent characteristics of the modern Shire horse. Thus we have pictorial evidence to confirm the written testimony of Julius Cæsar, that twenty centuries ago there existed in Britain a breed of horses having cardinal points in common with those massive animals seen to-day, known as Shires, Clydesdales and Suffolks, and held in the highest esteem.
Parenthetically, it is worth noticing that while a large proportion of the few coins known to be British bear the effigy of a horse, not one of the Roman coins figured in Camden’s Britannia bear such a device; nor do the coins of Saxon origin. To a horse-loving people this proof of the esteem in which their forefathers held the animal is particularly interesting. A large white horse is stated by Mr. Walker, Camden’s collaborator, to have been the ensign of Hengist and Horsa, who landed in Britain in A.D. 449, and this seems to be the only instance in which the figure of a horse was employed as an emblem by others than the Britons.
Mr. Walker, whom Camden introduces as the great expert of the day, remarks, apropos of the coins figured in the Britannia, that in ancient times special value attached to white horses; in this respect, however, horses were not singular, white animals of all domesticated species being regarded with peculiar favour, and commonly selected as gifts to Royalty, and as ceremonial tribute when state or tribe was required to acknowledge suzerainty. Mr. Walker asserts also, that only men of the highest rank were permitted to ride white horses on state occasions. That the use of a white steed implied dignity is well shown by the treatment accorded John of France by Edward the Black Prince when he conducted the French King to London. Anxious that the captive should appear not as a prisoner but as a royal guest, John “was clad in royal robes, and was mounted on a white steed, distinguished by its beauty and size; whilst the conqueror, in meaner attire, was carried by his side on a black palfrey.” Richard Berenger, gentleman of the horse to George III., who wrote The History and Art of Horsemanship, published 1771, observes that “The King of Naples at this day pays an annual fief of a white horse to the See of Rome as acknowledgment for the kingdom which he holds from the Pope.” Thus we see that the ceremonial value of the white horse was both ancient and lasting. We must not, however, allow this point to detain us.
FROM THE SEVENTH CENTURY TO THE CONQUEST.
The Venerable Bede says that the English did not commonly use saddle horses until about A.D. 631. At this period, which marks the dawn of the Christian era in Britain, preaching monks travelled the country, and it was considered a mark of humility for these early missionaries to travel on foot. Prelates and churchmen of rank were allowed by law to ride, but were counselled to use mares, in order to spare the horses for military purposes. It is to be observed that, although cavalry as a fighting arm was unknown in Britain for the first thousand years of the Christian era, horses of a sturdy and enduring stamp were as essential to the efficiency of troops, as they became at a later date when armoured horsemen formed perhaps the most formidable part of an army. Until they acquired the knowledge from their Norman conquerors, the inhabitants of this country knew nothing of the art of fighting on horseback, but at the same time the “theigns and hus-carles”—picked household troops, generally consisting of big men—employed horses to carry them from place to place, and as these wore chain mail, and had to accomplish long arduous marches over roadless country, a big and powerful stamp of horse was just as necessary to them as it would have been had actual fighting in the saddle been the profession of the riders.
It is conjectured that this early “mounted infantry” system was copied from the Danes, who used horses, acquired locally, in this fashion when they made their descents upon the east coast of England; this, however by the way. The first mention in history of a Master of the Horse occurs in King Alfred’s reign (871-901) His Hors-Theign was named Ecquef. The bare fact that such an office existed is worth mention, as showing the existence of a royal stud in those days. Richard Berenger gives particulars of the curious and interesting laws framed in the tenth century by Howel Dda, the “Good” Welsh Prince. Space considerations forbid their inclusion here; it must suffice to say that these laws prove how great was the importance attached to possession of horses. The first piece of legislation that points to foreign appreciation of English-bred horses occurs in the reign of Athelstan (925-940). That monarch made a law forbidding the export of horses for sale, a circumstance which indicates that the horse trade with the Continent was even then considerable, and that ample use could be found at home for animals of good stamp. King Athelstan had probably interested himself in the improvement of the breed, for in his will, quoted by Berenger, he bequeaths the horses given him by Thurbrand, together with the white horses given him by Liefbrand. These donors were Saxons, so it is only reasonable to suppose that the animals they gave were representative samples of the Saxon breed, which was one of the Great Horse type.
FROM THE CONQUEST TO THE REIGN OF KING JOHN.
For six centuries after the Norman conquest the use of armour was universal. True mail of interlinked rings was generally adopted about the time of the Crusades (1190-94) and its use continued until the fourteenth century; but from about 1300 the practice of protecting the more exposed parts of the body with plates of iron instead of chain mail began to extend, and the character of personal armour gradually changed until it became a complete panoply of plates. The authorities give the period of mixed chain and plate armour as from 1300 to 1410. By the latter date this had disappeared in favour of complete armour of plate, the use of which continued until the beginning of the seventeenth century, growing heavier and stronger in ratio with the increasing efficacy of offensive weapons. We need not follow the decadence of armour through the age when buff coats and jerkins, under “demi-suits of plate,” were in vogue, to its final disappearance far on in the seventeenth century. Our concern lies with those ages during which heavy armour was in use; for this was the long period when the development of the Great Horse was continuously the anxious care of kings and parliaments. The steady increase in the weight of armour is a factor of the first importance in our present investigation; for therein we find the sufficient motive which impelled our ancestors to develop to the utmost the size and strength of the only breed of horse which could carry a man-at-arms. When we find that the weight a horse might be called upon to bear amounted to 4 cwt.—32 stone—at the period when plate armour reached its maximum strength, no further stress need be laid on the power of the animal required. We may find opportunity later on to consider in minuter detail the weight of armour.
At an early date we find the chroniclers speaking of the horse used in warfare as Dextrarius or Magnus Equus; later on the English terms “War Horse” or “Great Horse” are used indifferently as the equivalents of the Latin. The history of the period between Henry II.’s accession (1154) until the reign of Elizabeth (1538-1603) shows that it was the constant aim of the Legislature to increase and improve the stock of these horses in England. In Henry II.’s reign several foreign horses were imported (A.D. 1160); but there is nothing to show to what breed these belonged. Maddox’s History of the Exchequer contains mention of disbursements “for the subsistence of the King’s horses that were lately brought from beyond the sea;” but unfortunately we are not informed for what special purpose they were procured. It is more than probable that they were Norman horses suitable for breeding stock to carry men-at-arms; for the first years of Henry’s reign were spent in evolving order from the anarchy which England had endured under his predecessor Stephen—a task which implied forcible measures. The earliest mention of “Cart Horses” that we have found is made by one William Stephanides, a Canterbury monk born in London, who wrote in the year of Henry II.’s accession:—