biology

History of the horse in Britain

History of the horse in Britain is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand History of the horse in Britain rather than just read about it. In short: The known history of the horse in Britain starts with horse remains found in Pakefield, Suffolk, dating from 700,000 BC, and in Boxgrove, West Sussex, dating from 500,000 BC. Early humans were active hunters of horses, and finds from the Ice Age have been recovered from many sites.

Key takeaways

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Reference excerpt

The known history of the horse in Britain starts with horse remains found in Pakefield, Suffolk, dating from 700,000 BC, and in Boxgrove, West Sussex, dating from 500,000 BC. Early humans were active hunters of horses, and finds from the Ice Age have been recovered from many sites. At that time, land which now forms the British Isles was part of a peninsula attached to continental Europe by a low-lying area now known as "Doggerland", and land animals could migrate freely between what is now island Britain and continental Europe. The domestication of horses, and their use to pull vehicles, had begun in Britain by 2500 BC; by the time of the Roman conquest of Britain, British tribes could assemble armies which included thousands of chariots. Horse improvement as a goal, and horse breeding as an enterprise, date to medieval times; King John imported a hundred Flemish stallions, Edward III imported fifty Spanish stallions, and various priories and abbeys owned stud farms. Laws were passed restricting and prohibiting horse exports and for the culling of horses considered undesirable in type. By the 17th century, specific horse breeds were being recorded as suitable for specific purposes, and new horse-drawn agricultural machinery was being designed. Fast coaches pulled by teams of horses with Thoroughbred blood could make use of improved roads, and coaching inn proprietors owned hundreds of horses to support the trade. Steam power took over the role of horses in agriculture from the mid-19th century, but horses continued to be used in warfare for almost another 100 years, as their speed and agility over rough terrain remained unequalled. Working horses had all but disappeared from Britain by the 1980s, and today horses in Britain are kept almost wholly for recreational purposes.

Pleistocene epoch

The earliest horse remains found in the area now covered by Britain and Ireland date to the Middle Pleistocene. Two species of horses have been identified from remains at Pakefield, East Anglia, dating back to 700,000 BC. Spear damage on a horse shoulder bone discovered at Eartham Pit, Boxgrove, dated 500,000 BC, showed that early hominids were hunting horses in the area at that time. The land the British Isles now comprise was periodically joined to continental Europe by a land bridge, extending from approximately the current coast of North Yorkshire to the English Channel, most recently until about 9,000 years ago. Dependent on the rise and fall of sea levels associated with advancing and retreating ice ages, this allowed humans and fauna to migrate between these areas; as the climate fluctuated, hunters could follow their prey, including equids. Although much of Britain from this time is now beneath the sea, remains have been discovered on land that show horses were present, and being hunted, in this period. Significant finds include a horse tooth dating from between 55,000 and 47,000 BC and horse bones dating from between 50,000 and 45,000 BC, recovered from Pin Hole Cave, in the Creswell Crags ravine in the North Midlands; further horse remains from the same era have been recovered from Kent's Cavern. In Robin Hood Cave, also in Creswell Crags, a horse tooth was recovered dating from between 32,000 and 24,000 BC; this cave has also preserved one of the earliest examples of prehistoric artwork in Britain – an engraving of a horse, on a piece of horse bone. A goddess figurine carved from horse bone and dating from around 23,000 BC has been recovered from Paviland Cave in South Wales. Horse remains dating to the later part of this period – roughly coinciding with the end of the last glacial period – have been found at Farndon Fields, Nottinghamshire, dating from around 12,000 BC. Mother Grundy's Parlour, also in Creswell Crags, contains horse remains showing cut marks indicating that hunting of horses occurred there around 10,000 BC. A study of Victoria Cave in North Yorkshire produced a horse bone showing cut marks dating from about the same time.

Holocene period The Holocene period began around 11,700 years ago and continues to the present. Identified with the current warm period, known as "Marine Isotope Stage 1", or MIS 1, the Holocene is considered an interglacial period in the current Ice Age. Horse remains dating from the Mesolithic period, or Middle Stone Age, early in the Holocene, have been found in Britain, though much of Mesolithic Britain now lies under the North Sea, the Irish Sea and the English Channel, and material which may include archaeological evidence for the presence of the horse in Britain continues to be washed into the sea, by rivers and coastal erosion.

During the Devensian glaciation, the northernmost part of the peninsula from which Britain was formed was covered with glacial ice, and the sea level was about 120 metres (390 ft) lower than it is today. This glacial ice advanced and retreated several times during this period, and much of what is now the North Sea and the English Channel was an expanse of low-lying tundra, which, around 12,000 BC, extended northwards to a point roughly parallel with Aberdeenshire, in eastern Scotland. In 1998, archaeologist B.J. Coles named this low-lying area "Doggerland", in which the River Thames flowed somewhat to the north of its current route, joining the Rhine to flow west to the Atlantic Ocean along the line of what is now the English Channel. Human hunters roamed this land, which, by about 8000 BC, had a varied coastline of lagoons, salt marshes, mudflats, beaches, inland streams, rivers, marshes, and included lakes. It may have been the richest hunting, fowling and fishing ground available to the people of Mesolithic Europe. Horse remains dating from 10,500 to 8,000 BC have been recovered from Sewell's Cave, Flixton, Seamer Carr, Uxbridge and Thatcham. Remains dating from around 7,000 BC have been found in Gough's Cave in Cheddar. Although there is an apparent absence of horse remains between 7000 BC and 3500 BC, there is evidence that wild horses remained in Britain after it became an island separate from Europe by about 5,500 BC. Pre-domestication wild horse bones have been found in Neolithic tombs of the Severn-Cotswold type, dating from around 3500 BC.

Domestication in pre-Roman times

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Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with History of the horse in Britain

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what History of the horse in Britain claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to History of the horse in Britain before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about History of the horse in Britain ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of History of the horse in Britain

In research: History of the horse in Britain appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses History of the horse in Britain in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: History of the horse in Britain is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics History of the British Isles, Horse history and evolution, Horses in the United Kingdom, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for History of the horse in Britain outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study History of the horse in Britain in 20 minutes

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Frequently asked questions

What is History of the horse in Britain in simple terms?

Why does History of the horse in Britain matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study History of the horse in Britain?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on History of the horse in Britain.