328 THE HOESES OF PREHISTORIC [CH. 



common soldier. "He happened to be riding at that moment 

 a horse well tried in war and who knew well how to carry his 

 rider through in safety. All his body was dark-coloured, but his 

 face from the top of his head to the nose was pure white. Such 

 a horse the Greeks called phalios ('bald') and the barbarians 

 balas ('bald'). This horse was recognised by deserters from Beli- 

 sarius, who had joined the Goths, and they immediately shouted 

 out, "Strike the bald-faced horse." Nothing but the devotion 

 of his body-guard saved Belisarius and his noble charger^ 



The gallant war-horse here described must have ditfered 

 essentially from the ordinary post-horses of the day, which were 

 kept at the public expense along the great roads of the Empire, 

 and on which Belisarius himself once made a memorable journey, 

 when Justinian, on hearing that the Persians had invaded his 

 dominions, sent Belisarius to oppose them. " Riding on the 

 public horses which are commonly known as veredi (German 

 Pfercl), inasmuch as he had no army with him, with great 

 speed he reached Euphratesia ^" 



As we may assume that Belisarius' well-tried charger is 

 a fair representative of the best war-horse of the time, it is 

 now clear that already by the beginning of the sixth century 

 a dark-coloured animal, probably either dull black or dark- 

 brown with a white blaze on the face, — features which we have 

 seen to characterise the large cross-bred horses of Asia, North 

 Africa, and Spain — was already the typical war-horse of Europe; 

 and it is not improbable that the Thuringian, Burgundian, and 

 Frisian horses, so highly praised as war-horses by Vegetius, may 

 well have been of a similar dark colour, especially in view of 

 the fact that from before the Christian era the fine cross-bred 

 horses of Northern Spain were iron-grey, a colour which easily 

 passes into black. The Roman contorniates (Fig. 92) of the 



^ Procopius, de hello Gothico, i. 18 : ^rvxf Se 'iTnnp TrjviKavTa oxovfji.ei'os, 

 TToX^fiuv T€ Mai' e/xTTei'py /cat Siaauaaadai rbv itn^aTTjv iTncyrafxivii), 6s dy] 6\ov 

 /j.€v TO adJ/jLa (paib^ ■^v, rb /J.hu-rroi' 5e dirav iK K€(pa\i]s dxpi- es pivas XevKOs fxaXuTTa ' 

 TOVTOv'KKXrjues cpaXibv, jSdp^apoi. 8i ^d\au KaXovau 



2 Procopius, de hello Persico, ii. 20: 71'oi'S 5^ rriv Hepcruv ^(podou 'lovffTiviavbs 

 /3acrtXei)s, BeXiffapLov atidis iir' aiiroiis ^7re/x\j/ev. 6 Se 'iinrois toIs drj/xocrloii 6xoi^/J.evos, 

 oi)s 5t) ^€p45ovs Ka\e7i' vevofj-iKaaLv, are ov arpdrev/xa ^uv aiiTi^ ^X^"} ^dxei TroXXy is 

 ^ixppaTriaiav d<piK€TO. 



