PICTISH CAVALRY: GOOD BREEDING:

 

The Torrs Horns and Torrs Pony-cap, found in a peat bog near Castle Douglas in Galloway, Scotland, as displayed in 2011, by Johnbod - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15618477


In addition to the procurement of specific breeds, Irene Hughson believes that the Picts effected and maintained a calculated and skilled horse-breeding and selection program. She says,

 

It is absurd to imagine a Celtic warlord commissioning beautiful, expensive horse gear, like, for example, the Torrs pony-cap, on the off chance of lassoing a passing Shetland pony and pressing it into service… A reliable working animal is the product of sensible breeding, careful feeding, sensitive handling and sympathetic training. The training must include exercise to build up the physique that makes a horse physically capable of carrying weight and must establish a horse/human relationship that makes the horse willing to pull or carry.

            

            I would add to this assessment the realities of the harsh Scottish terrain – impassible swamps; sharp, rocky outcroppings and mountains; and the roads…or lack thereof. The Romans never penetrated further north than the Antonine Wall, so their roads did not extend into the Highlands. Neither did their bridges. Rivers – wide, cold, swift-flowing, awash with strong currents – were crossed at fords. Bogs and swamps abounded.

(Marshes, by the way, should not be taken lightly. While fighting under Robert the Bruce in the Scottish Wars of Independence, the Scots used to their advantage the knowledge of the marshy terrain around the Firth of Forth, luring the Brits into the swamps. Consequently, many English knights and their mounts, felled in their heavy armor, drowned facedown in the sucking Scottish mud. Sure, the Scottish swamps are a weapon in their own right…but a double-edged one. If the pass through the marches is not well-known by the rider beforehand and not undertaken on a sure-footed mount, it can become a death-trap).

Even in the south, where the Romans erected bridges and established roads – parts of which hardy features can still be viewed to this day – those crafty innovators were gone by around 410 AD. In that year, the Romans pulled the bulk of their legions out of Britain to fight in Africa. Once the Roman military might was gone, the British landowners, power-hungry and resentful of the loss of their slave-force as Roman auxiliaries, kicked out the remaining Roman military and administration. With them went their architects and bridge-builders.

This meant that, once something – a fort, a bridge, or a road – fell into disrepair, it stayed that way. Norma Lorre Goodrich cites the Latin origin of the city of Pontefract – ad pontem fractum, “at the broken bridge” – as linguistic evidence of this state of affairs.

So – on journeys, hunts, and military campaigns – the Pictish mounts would have been constantly subjected to the harsh, uncivilized terrain of the Scottish countryside. These realities would have made a Pictish horse breeding and training program all the more vital.

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Hughson, Irene. “Pictish Horse Carvings.” Glasgow Archaeological Journal, vol. 17, no. 17, 1991, pp. 53–62., doi:10.3366/gas.1991.17.17.53.

Karunanithy, David. “War Dogs among the Early Irish.” History Ireland, 9 May 2013, www.historyireland.com/uncategorized/war-dogs-among-the-early-irish-2/.

Unknown, Wikipedia. “Hilton of Cadboll Stone.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 13 Jan. 2019, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilton_of_Cadboll_Stone.

Wagner, Paul. “Pictish Heroic Society.” Pictish Warrior, AD 297-841, by Paul Wagner, Osprey Pub., 2002, pp. 14–21.

 

PHOTOS:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HiltonofCadboll01.JPG

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Meigle_2.jpg

Simon Burchell [<a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>], <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Meigle_2.jpg">via Wikimedia Commons</a>

 

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