Ill] AND HISTORIC TIMES 335 



superior quality. Thus when treating of the Frisians 1 , he says 

 nothing about horses, but when he proceeds to the great nation 

 of the Chauci 2 , the next neighbours of the Frisians, he mentions 

 that they used horses in warfare, though his words clearly 

 indicate that they had no organised cavalry like the Tencteri. 

 The Langobardi (Lombards), though characterised as vigorous 

 warriors, able to maintain their independence in the midst of 

 powerful neighbours, are enumerated amongst a number of 

 North German tribes "none of whom have any noteworthy 

 feature 3 ," and several of which, such as the Anglii and Varini, 

 did not possess horses even in the 6th century A.D. Again, 

 though Tacitus 4 , like Pliny 5 , knows of the Vandals, he makes 

 no mention of cavalry or horses in connection with that nation. 

 It is therefore clear that the Angles did not bring the large 

 black German horse with them into Britain, when they colonised 

 that island, and it is very improbable that the Northmen brought 

 them to Normandy, for their famous chieftain Hrolf the Ganger 

 is proved by his surname to have habitually travelled and fought 

 on foot, a practice which can only be ascribed to the want of 

 horses, or to the circumstance that any horses which the North- 

 men then possessed were only the old North European animals, 

 not suited to carry men of large stature in war. The good 

 horses of the Burgundians, the Thuringians, and the Frisians 

 must have been either obtained from Gaul, or have been 

 developed out of good horses derived from Gaul, between 

 100 A.D. and the time of Vegetius. If then the Lombards 

 and Vandals brought large black horses into Italy, Spain, 

 and Africa, they must have acquired these animals from the 

 Thuringians, Burgundians or Frisians after the time of 

 Vegetius. But, as we have good evidence that the Gaulish 

 horses were the result of crossing the old European horse 

 with North African blood derived through Spain and Italy, 

 it is clear that Sanson's E. c. germanicus and E. c. frisius are 

 in no sense separate species or varieties, but merely breeds 

 obtained by crossing the European and African horses, by arti- 

 ficial selection, and by the conditions of climate and pasture. 



1 Germ. 34. 2 Ibid. 35. 3 Ibid. 40. 4 Ibid. 2. 



5 H.N. iv. 14. 28. 



