[1] Compare Sans, açva, Zendish and Old Persian açpa, Lithuanian aszva (mare), Prussian asvinan (mare’s milk), O.H. Ger. ehu, A.S. eoh, Icel. iör, Gothic aihos, aihous (?), Old Irish ech, Old Cambrian and Gaelic ep (as in Epona, the horse goddess), Lat. equus, Gr. ἴππος or ἴκκος. The word seems, however, to have disappeared from the Slavonic languages. The root is probably ak, with the idea of sharpness or swiftness (ἄκρος, ὠκύς, acus, ocior). See Pott, Etym. Forsch, ii. 256, and Hehn, Kulturpflanzen u. Hausthiere in ihrem Ueber gang aus Asien nach Griechenland u. Italien sowie in das übrige Europa (3rd ed., 1877), p. 38. The last-named author, who points out the absence of the horse from the Egyptian monuments prior to the beginning of the 18th century B.C., and the fact that the earliest references to this animal in Hebrew literature (Judges v. 22, 28; cf. Josh, xi. 4) do not carry us any farther back, is of opinion that the Semitic peoples as a whole were indebted for the horse to the lands of Iran. He also shows that literature affords no trace of the horse as indigenous to Arabia prior to about the beginning of the 5th century A.D., although references abound in the pre-Islamitic poetry. Horses were not numerous even in Mahomet’s time (Sprenger, Leb. Moh. iii. 139, 140). Compare Ignazio Guidi’s paper “Della sede primitiva dei popoli Semitici” in the Transactions of the Accademia dei Lincei (1878-1879), Professor W. Ridgeway, in his Origin and Influence of the Thoroughbred Horse (1905), reinvestigated the historical mystery as to the Arab breed, and its connexion with the English thoroughbred stock, but his conclusions have been hotly controverted; archaeology and biology are in fact still in the dark on the subject, but see the section on “Species” above. According to Ridgeway, the original source of the finest equine blood is Africa, still the home of the largest variety of wild Equidae; he concludes that thence it passed into Europe at an early time, to be blended with that of the indigenous Celtic species, and thence into western Asia into the veins of an indigenous Mongolian species, still represented by “Przewalski’s horse”; not till a comparatively late period did it reach Arabia, though the “Arab” now represents the purest form of the Libyan blood. The controversy depends upon the consideration of a wealth of detail, which should be studied in Ridgeway’s book; but zoological authorities are sceptical as to the suggested species, Equus caballus libycus.
[2] Some fragments of legislation relating to the horse about this period may be gleaned from Ancient Laws and Institutes of England (fol., London, 1840), and Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales (fol., London, 1841).
HORSE LATITUDES, the belts of calms and variable breezes at the polar edge of the N.E. and S.E. trades. According to the New English Dictionary two explanations have been given of the origin of the name: one that the calm kills horses on a sailing ship, the other that the name signifies the unruly and boisterous nature of these winds compared with the pleasant trades. The name is commonly applied to the permanent belt of high atmospheric pressure which encircles the globe in 30° to 35° from the equator.
HORSE-MACKEREL, the name applied to a genus of fishes (Caranx) found in abundance in almost all temperate and especially in tropical seas. The designation “cavalli,” given to them by the early Portuguese navigators, and often met with in the accounts of the adventures of the buccaneers, is still in frequent use among the sailors of all nations. Some ninety different kinds are known—the majority being wholesome food, and some of the species attaining a length of 3 ft. and more. The fish to which the name horse-mackerel is applied in Great Britain is Caranx trachurus, distinguished by having the lateral line in its whole length armed with large but narrow bony plates. Horse-mackerel are found singly on the coast all the year round, but sometimes they congregate in shoals of many thousands. Although well-flavoured, they are much more frequently used for bait than for food. This species has a most extraordinary range, being found almost everywhere within the temperate and tropical zones of the northern and southern hemispheres.
HORSEMANSHIP, the art of managing the horse from his back and controlling his paces and the direction and speed of his movement. The ordinary procedure is dealt with in the articles on [Riding] and cognate subjects (see also [Horse]: section Management). A special kind of skill is, however, needed in breaking, training, bitting and schooling horses for a game like polo, or for the evolutions of what is known as the haute école. It is with the latter, or “school” riding, that we deal here. The middle ages had seen chivalry developed into a social distinction, and horsemanship into a form of knightly prowess. The Renaissance introduced the cultivation of horsemanship as an art, with regular conditions and rules, instead of merely its skilful practice for utility and exercise. In Italy in the 16th century schools of horsemanship were established at Naples, Rome and other chief cities; thither flocked the nobility of France, Spain and Germany; and Henry VIII. of England and other monarchs of his time had Italians for their masters of the horse. The academy of Pignatelli at Naples was the most famous of the schools in the middle of the 16th century, but a score of other less renowned masters devoted themselves to teaching the riders and training the horses. Trappings of all sorts multiplied; the prescribed tricks, feats and postures involved considerable dexterity; they were fatiguing to both man and beast, and were really useless except for show. This elaborate art, enthusiastically followed among the Romance nations, was the parent of later developments of the haute école, and of the circus-performances of modern days. In England, however, the continental style did not find favour for long. The duke of Newcastle’s Méthode nouvelle de dresser les chevaux (1648) was the leading text-book of the day, and in 1761 the earl of Pembroke published his Manual of Cavalry Horsemanship. In France a simplification was introduced in the early part of the 18th century by La Guérinière (École de cavalerie) and others. The French military school thus became the model for Europe, though the English style remained in opposition, forming a sort of compromise with the ordinary method of riding across country. In more modern times France again came to the front in regard to the haute école, through the innovations of the vicomte d’Aure (1798-1863) and François Baucher (1796-1873). Baucher was a circus-rider who became the greatest master of his art, and who had an elaborate theory of the principles involved in training a horse. His system was carried on, with modifications, by masters and theorists like Captain Raabe, M. Barroil and M. Fillis. In more recent times the style of the haute école has also been cultivated by various masters in the United States, such as H. L. de Bussigny at Boston.
See d’Aure, Traité d’équitation (1847); Hundersdorf, Équitation allemande (Bruxelles, 1843); Baucher, Passe-temps équestres (1840), Méthode d’équitation (1867); Raabe, Méthode de haute école d’équitation (1863); Barroil, Art équestre; Fillis, Principes de dressage; Hayes, Riding on the flat, &c. (1882).