286 THE HORSES OF PREHISTORIC [CH. 



swift steed of Adrastus that sprang from the gods." A line 

 in the lost epic called Thehais told how "Adrastus fled from 

 Thebes wearing sorry garments, and with him dark-maned 

 Arion." According to Antimachus Adrastus "was the first of the 

 Danaans that drove two high-praised steeds, fleet Caerus and 

 Thelpusian Arion, whom, near the Oncean grove of Apollo, 

 Earth herself brought forth a wonder for mortals to see^" 

 According to another statement Poseidon himself was the 

 father of Arion, which is not without significance, as we shall 

 soon find the same god as the father of Pegasus by the Gorgon 

 Medusa. 



According to these stories it was only in the days of 

 Adrastus — about 1350 B.C., if we follow the traditional chrono- 

 logy — that the horse and chariot first got into Peloponnesus. 

 The fact that a divine origin is ascribed to Arion seems to 

 indicate that the horse had hitherto been as unfamiliar to the 

 people of Argolis as it was to the Aztecs when Cortes landed 

 with his Spaniards and his horses in Mexico. Arion is described 

 as ' dark-maned,' which indicates that his body colour was 

 lighter than his mane and tail, a feature common both to the 

 dun-coloured horses of Europe and Asia and to the bay horses 

 of North Africa. 



It is worthy of notice that the wheels of the chariots on the 

 Mycenean grave-stones (which may be assigned to the four- 

 teenth century B.C.) have only four spokes like the chariot 

 found in a tomb at Egyptian Thebes (p. 225) said to be about 

 the same period, and in this respect they stand in contrast to 

 the Homeric chariot with its eight-spoked wheels. 



Centuries before the planting of Cyrene the Greeks had 

 a firm belief that by the side of the Atlantic were bred steeds 

 of surpassing swiftness. Already we have read in Homer of 

 swift horses begotten by the west wind and foaled by a harpy 

 beside the stream of Ocean. But still more significant is one 

 of the most familiar of Greek legends, the myth of Pegasus, the 

 first of all horses that bore a rider on his back. The renowned 

 winged steed, begotten by Poseidon himself on the Gorgon 



1 Paus. VIII. 25. 7. 



