322 THE HORSES OF PREHISTORIC [CH. 



The original Libyan blood thus obtained is supposed by French 

 writers to have been augmented by the establishment of the 

 colony of Julia (circ. 24 B.C.), and later at the time of the Saracen 

 occupation of Provence (730 A.D.), and later still at the time of 

 the Crusades. The Camargue is a small horse (1"32 — 34 m. 

 = 13"1 hands). His head is a little big, but well set on. His 

 feet are large and often flat ; his coat is always grey. His head 

 and feet point clearly to his European ancestry, whilst the 

 modification of his colour points equally clearly as in the horses 

 of Northern Spain, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Asia Minor, to his 

 Libyan blood. 



As we have shown that not only were Gallic chieftains 

 importing horses across the Alps long before the Roman 

 occupation of Provence, but that the Celtiberians by the 

 beginning of the first century B.C., and we know not how 

 much earlier, possessed a breed of grey horses, it is more than 

 probable that Libyan blood had been introduced into the region 

 of the Rhone at a time long anterior to 125 B.C. Again, as 

 we have seen that the osseous remains of the horses used by 

 the Helvetians in the first century B.C. (p. 93) are declared 

 by Dr Marek to agree in their fundamental characters, size 

 excepted, with the so-called Oriental races of horses, whose 

 typical representative is the 'Arab,' and as this Hel veto-Gallic 

 horse was l'3o to 1"41 m. in height, almost the same as that of 

 the modern Camargue, we are led to conclude that the Ligurian 

 giniii of Strabo's day were not only the ancestors of the modern 

 Camargue but were the same breed as the horses whose bones 

 have been found in the settlements of the La Tene period. 



The crossing of the Camargue with the Arab in modern 

 times has given excellent results ^ 



The Basses Pyrenees and the Hautes Pyrenees are the seat 

 of an ancient breed known variously as that of Navarre, Tarbes, 

 or Bigourdan^. It was derived from Andalusia according to 

 some at a period later than the Arab conquest of Spain, accord- 

 ing to others at the same time, but from what we have already 

 seen it is probable that it had imbibed much Libyan blood 



1 Cuyer and Alix, Le Cheval, p. 613. ^ Cuyer and Alix, op. cit. p. 609. 



