296 THE HORSES OF PREHISTORIC [CH. 



riding on an Aetnaean steed, a breed which only became 

 famous after Hiero of Syracuse (b.c. 478 — 467) had founded 

 the city of Aetna, we may confidently assume that in his 

 account of the chariot-race and horses he is simply describing 

 those of his own time. There were ten entries for the race, 

 one Achean, one Spartan, two Libyans, Orestes with a team 

 of Thessalian mares, an Aetolian with dun-coloured mares, a 

 Thessalian from Magnesia, an Aenian (also from Thessaly) who 

 had a team of white horses, an Athenian, and the tenth was 

 a Boeotian. It is unfortunate that, though he introduces two 

 Libyan charioteers, he does not tell us the colour of their horses. 

 Yet, since he specially mentions both the Avhite team from 

 Thessaly and the dun-coloured from Aetolia, it is probable that 

 the Libyan horses were neither of these colours, but were bay 

 or some other dark hue. 



In his comedy of the Clouds (B.C. 423) Aristophanes intro- 

 duces a young spendthrift, who by his passion for horse-racing 

 has overwhelmed his father in debt. The latter is sued by 

 Pasion the money-lender for a sum of twelve minae, which he 

 had borrowed to purchase for his son a ' starling-coloured ' 

 {yfrap6<i) horsed We have found a similar epithet {viro-^apo'^) 

 applied by Strabo to the horses of the Parthians and to those 

 of northern Spain. The excessive price paid for the horse 

 (which was four times the amount of the normal ransom of 

 the heavy-armed soldier during the Peloponnesian War) shows 

 that the animal was plainly first-rate according to the Greek 

 standard of that day ; but as ' starling-coloured ' means that 

 the animal was a bluish-black with light-coloured speckles all 

 over, in other words, iron-grey, and as we have found this and 

 other shades of grey to be the regular outcome of crossing the 

 Asiatic-European horse with Libyan blood, we may safely con- 

 clude that the best horses of the day were the result of crossing 

 the old dun horses of Greece with the blood imported from 

 Libya. The literary evidence is amply corroborated by the 



^ Nuh. 1225; Aristotle [H. A. viii. 18) says 6 5e \papb% icrrl ttoikLXos. In the 

 Nubes we read of other horses, such as KoiriraTias (branded with a 9). but it is 

 possible that it might refer to a blaze down a horse's face ; also of a <7a/n(p6pas 

 (branded with the letter San), but this also might mean some kind of blaze. 



J 



