198 THE HORSES OF PREHISTORIC [CH. 



derived. A recent writer has endeavoured to show that the asses 

 on an Assyrian monument (p. 49) closely resemble Prejvalsky's 

 horse. But, as I have already pointed out that the Asiatic 

 horse is probably derived from Prejvalsky's horse, or rather 

 from a common stock, we need not assume that the Assyrian 

 steeds were actually the latter variety, but simply its derivative, 

 now best exemplified in the Mongolian pony. In the time of 

 Herodotus 1 the satrapy of Assyria was the most important 

 province of the Persian empire, and bred horses in considerable 

 numbers. The satrap of Assyria (exclusive of war-horses) him- 

 self owned eight hundred stallions and sixteen thousand mares, 

 twenty mares being thus allotted to each horse. As the state- 

 ments of Herodotus already cited show that the Nisaean horses 

 were the best in Asia, the horses of Assyria were evidently not 

 considered first-rate, and we may therefore infer that they were 

 of the Mongolian stock, not so much improved by crossing or 

 selection as the Nisaean steeds of Media and Armenia. As the 

 Assyrian horses of the fifth century B.C. were probably descended 

 from the animals pourtrayed on the Assyrian monuments of the 

 eighth and ninth centuries B.C., the evidence touching their 

 quality which we infer from Herodotus harmonises well with 

 the Mongolian-like appearance of the horses on the bas-reliefs. 

 According to the best authorities 2 on the history of Baby- 

 lonia, the horse does not appear to have been known in that 

 region much before 1500 B.C. As I have already shown that the 

 Upper Asiatic horse forms to this day the substratum of all 

 the various breeds of that region, we are justified in holding 

 that the first horses known in the Euphrates Valley had come 

 down from Upper Asia. Of course it may be at once suggested 

 that the Nisaean horses of the Persians and their progenitors 

 used by Mede and Assyrian were derived from Arabia, like the 

 best horses in Turkey, Persia, and India at the present day. But 

 to this view there is at least one fatal objection. Herodotus 3 , 

 when enumerating the nations which supplied horsemen and 

 chariots to the host of Xerxes, does not include the Arabs 

 among them, but expressly states that they only supplied a 



1 i. 192. 2 Hilprecht, Explorations in Bible Lands, p. 527. 



? vn. 86. 



