372 | ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1944 
of Egypt. The Scythians then disappeared from history—probably 
absorbed. But note the evolutionary steps. A horde of nomads had 
left the steppes, harried the plateau. They tarried for a few gen- 
erations. Almost surely their numbers increased, and they mustered 
strength in that land of better pastures and scattered oases. They 
then moved on to a career of conquest and rapine in the fat lands and 
rich cities of the plain. Then the melting pot absorbed them. That 
is the cycle. It occurs and recurs through nearly 3,000 years B. C. 
and plenty of times later. 
The exploits of the Medes and Persians and of the Macedonians, 
conquerors all of Babylonia, fit closely into this pattern. The horse, 
the most spectacular contribution of the steppes, has played a curious 
and striking part in man’s affairs in Eurasia. Bishop thinks that the 
Scythians may have been the first effective cavalrymen. Armed with 
a compound bow, which seems to have been an invention of the 
north, a cavalryman could ride circles around a charioteer. Hence, 
the use of chariots in war declined in the Near East after the Assyr- 
ians, in the ninth century B. C., adopted cavalry from their enemies, 
the Scythians. 
Man’s experience in learning to use the horse serves to illustrate the 
stupidity of man rather than his cleverness. Perhaps most persons 
have thought of the horse in ancient history as a beast of burden, 
drawing the plow, the cart and the wagon with supplies for home or 
the army, with gentlemen and generals riding on comfortable saddles. 
Not so. It is now known that the first important use of horse in 
harness in the Near East was a thousand years at the war chariot. 
For this service it was speed that counted, not ability to draw heavy 
loads. 
The chariot was distributed to Ireland and Korea between 2500 and 
1000 B. C. After centuries of using the chariot as an instrument of 
warfare men began to fight from the back of the horse. But it was 
more centuries before the stirrup was invented. Moreover, man used 
the horse in harness for more than 3,000 years before a method was 
devised whereby a horse was fastened to a wagon by means of traces. 
Only then could a horse pull with more than a small fraction of its 
strength. 
The shoulders of the ox and donkey are higher than are the necks. 
These beasts with yokes upon their shoulders or upon the head of the 
ox, pulled the plows and wagons of antiquity. The anatomy of the 
horse does not encourage yoking. Nevertheless the ancients fastened 
the yoke to a band around the neck of the horse. If the horse pulled 
with a considerable fraction of his strength the band pressed upon 
the windpipe and jugular vein and choked him down. This harness 
also held his head high, but when a horse pulls a load he puts his 
