Reproductive System.—The testes are situated in a distinct sessile or slightly pedunculated scrotum, into which they descend from the sixth to the tenth month after birth. The accessory generative glands are the two vesiculae seminales, with the median third vesicle, or uterus masculinus, lying between them, the single bilobed prostate, and a pair of globular Cowper’s glands. The penis is very large, cylindrical, with a truncated, expanded, flattened termination. When in a state of repose it is retracted, by a muscle arising from the sacrum, within the prepuce, a cutaneous fold attached below the symphysis pubis.
The uterus is bicornuate. The vagina is often partially divided by a membraneous septum or hymen. The teats are two, inguinally placed. The surface of the chorion is covered evenly with minute villi, constituting a diffuse non-deciduate placenta. The period of gestation is eleven months.
Authorities.—R. I. Pocock, “The Species and Subspecies of Zebras,” Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. ser. 6, vol. xx., 1897, and “A New Arrangement of the Existing Species of Equidae,” Op. cit. ser. 7, vol. x., 1902; R. Lydekker, “Notes on the specimens of Wild Asses in English Collections,” Novitates Zoologicae, vol. xi., 1904; B. Salensky, “On Equus przewalskii,” Mém. Acad. St Pétersburg, 1902; M. S. Arloing, “Organisation du pied chez le cheval,” Ann. Sci. Nat., 1867, viii. 55-81; H. Burmeister, Los caballos fosiles de la Pampa Argentina (Buenos Aires, 1875); Chauveau and Arloing, Traité d’anatomie comparée des animaux domestiques (Paris, 1871), and English edition by G. Fleming (1873); A. Ecker, “Das Europäische Wildpferd und dessen Beziehungen zum domesticirten Pferd,” Globus, Bd. xxxiv. (Brunswick, 1878); Major Forsyth, “Beiträge zur Geschichte der fossilen Pferde besonders Italiens,” Abh. Schw. Pal. Ges. iv. 1-16, pt. iv.; George, “Études zool. sur les Hémiones et quelques autres espèces chevalines,” Ann. Sci. Nat., 1869, xii. 5; E. F. Gurlt, Anatomische Abbildungen der Haussäugethiere (1824), and Hand. der vergleich. Anat. der Haussäugethiere (2 vols., 1822); Huet, “Croisement des diverses espèces du genre cheval,” Nouv. Archives du Muséum, 2nd ser., tom. ii. p. 46, 1879; Leisering, Atlas der Anatomie des Pferdes (Leipzig, 1861); O. C. Marsh, “Notice of New Equine Mammals from the Tertiary Formation,” Am. Journ. of Science and Arts, vol. vii., March 1874; Id., “Fossil Horses in America,” Amer. Naturalist, vol. viii., May 1874; Id., “Polydactyle Horses,” Am. Journ. Sci. and Arts, vol. xvii., June 1879; Franz Müller, Lehrbuch der Anatomie des Pferdes (Vienna, 1853); R. Owen, “Equine Remains in Cavern of Bruniquel,” Phil. Trans. vol. clix., 1870, p. 535; W. Percivall, The Anatomy of the Horse (1832); G. Stubbs, Anatomy of the Horse (1766); W. H. Flower, The Horse (London, 1891); Ridgeway, Origin of the Thoroughbred Horse (1905).
(W. H. F; R. L.*)
History
From the evidence of philology it appears that the horse was already known to the Aryans before the period of their dispersion.[1]
The first mention of the British horse occurs in the well-known passages in Caesar (B.G. iv. 24. 33, v. 15. 16; cf. Pomp. Mela iii. 6), in which he mentions the native “essedarii” and the skill with which they handled their war chariots. We are left quite in the dark as to the character of the animal thus employed; but there would appear to be much probability in the surmise of W. Youatt, who conjectures the horse to have been, “then as ever, the creature of the country in which he lived. With short fare, and exposed to the rigour of the seasons, he was probably the little hardy thing we yet see him; but in the marshes of the Nen and the Witham, and on the borders of the Tees and the Clyde, there would be as much proportionate development of frame and strength as we find at the present day.” After the occupation of the country by the Romans, it appears that the horses of their cavalry were crossed with the native mares, and thus there was infused into the breed new blood, consisting probably of strains from every quarter from which Roman remounts were procured. As to the effect of this cross we are not, however, in a position to judge. We are also quite uncertain as to the extent to which the Jutes and Saxons may in their turn have again introduced a new breed of horses into England; and even to the close of the Anglo-Saxon period of English history allusions to the horse are still very infrequent. The horsthegn we know, however, was from an early period a high court official; and from such a law as that of Athelstan prohibiting the exportation of horses except as presents, it may be inferred that the English breed was not only much valued at home but also in great request abroad.[2]
The period of the Norman Conquest marks an important stage in the history of the British horse. William the Conqueror’s own horse was of the Spanish breed, and others of the same kind were introduced by the barons on their estates. But the Norman horses included many varieties, and there is no doubt that to the Conquest the inhabitants of Britain were indebted for a decided improvement in the native horse, as well as for the introduction of several varieties previously unknown. According to Giraldus Cambrensis, Roger de Bellesme, a follower of William I., afterwards created earl of Shrewsbury, imported some stallions from Spain into England; their produce was celebrated by Drayton the poet. It is curious to notice that agriculture seems to be the last use to which the horse has been put. The earliest suggestion that horses were used in agriculture is derived from a piece of the Bayeux tapestry, where a horse is represented as drawing a harrow. This, however, must have been an exceptional case, for we know that oxen were used until a comparatively late time, and that in Wales a law existed forbidding horses to be used for ploughing.
In 1121 two Eastern horses are said to have been imported,—one of them remaining in England, and the other being sent as a present by King Alexander I. to the church of St Andrews, in Scotland. It has been alleged that these horses were Barbs from Morocco, but a still more likely theory is that they existed only in name, and never reached either England or Scotland. The crusades were probably the means of introducing fresh strains of blood into England, and of giving opportunity for fresh crossings. The Spanish jennet was brought over about 1182. King John gave great encouragement to horse-breeding: one of his earliest efforts was to import a hundred Flemish stallions, and, having thus paved the way for improving the breed of agricultural horses, he set about acquiring a valuable stud for his own use.
Edward III. was likewise an admirer of the horse; he procured fifty Spanish horses, probably jennets. At this time there was evidently a tendency to breed a somewhat lighter and speedier horse; but, while the introduction of a more active animal would soon have led to the displacement of the ponderous but powerful cavalry horse then in use, the substituted variety would have been unable to carry the weight of armour with which horse and rider were alike protected; and so in the end the old breed was kept up for a time. With the object of preserving to England whatever advantages might accrue from her care and skill in breeding an improved stamp of horses, Edward III. forbade their exportation; they consequently improved so rapidly in value that Richard II. compelled dealers to limit their prices to a fixed maximum. In the ninth year of his reign, Edward received from the king of Navarre a present of two running horses, supposed to have been valuable. The wars of 1346 checked the improvement of horses, and undid much of what had been previously accomplished, for we read that the cavalry taken into France by Edward III. were but indifferently mounted, and that in consequence he had to purchase large numbers of foreign horses from Hainault and elsewhere for remounts. The reign of Richard III. does not seem to have been remarkable for the furtherance of horse-breeding; but it was then that post-horses and stages were introduced.