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SEPTEMBER 2006 • VOLUME 13 • © Copyright HORSES For LIFE™ Publications
Translated by Philippe Harary 2004 HISTORY OF EQUITATION From "Equitation" by P. Chambry Translated by Philippe Harary 2004 During millenniums, the horse was nothing but a game, hunt and tracked down as other animals as food for the prehistoric man. His velocity didn't allow killing him with primitive weapons, so it was by means of trickery, with traps or gigantic beats. (Note: in french: "battues" a hunt where the animals are chased from behind by men called "rabatteurs" toward the hunters – Note P.H.), as in Solutré, that the herds fell under the blows of the hunters. Then, came an era of lull: the nomad man became sedentary, shepherd and farmer and the horse seem, in our countries, have an eclipse. He doesn't completely disappear, but the herds decrease in big proportions, for unknown reasons, as the living conditions would have improved with climatic changes. Suddenly, in the beginning of the Bronze Age, one saw the horse reappear, but his relations with the man have changed: he is no longer a food, he is an ally, a friend, the man has made him his noblest conquest and has domesticated him. Where and how has this major event for the mankind's history appeared? Nobody knows. The majority of authors admit that it was not in Europe. The harnessed horse would have been introduced from some oriental country, where artists, painters and sculptors had been many to represent riders in action. Very few are the authors who have written about the Equitation in ancient times. "THE EQUESTRIAN ART" from Xenophon seems to be the oldest book known for now; it has two parts: Hipparque and Hippiatric, successively written around 365 BC. It speaks about the management of the Cavalry, and about Equitation, but refers to an older book, of which fragments have been found again in the Cambridge Library: L'EQUITATION from Simon of Athens would be the first book of the rider. But many authors, without writing an equestrian book, have spoken about horses and cavalry, well before Xenophon.
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