SHOEING JFTER THE NORMAN CONQUEST. 391 



employment of horsemen had been amply demonstrated 

 to them at the battle of Hastings, where their victory was 

 mainly due to the well-equipped cavalry force they carried 

 from Normandy. We have seen that in France shoeing 

 was extensively practised at this time, and was, indeed, an 

 inevitable necessity, from the custom introduced of cum- 

 bering men and horses with heavy weapons, and encasing 

 them in massive armour. At Hastings, even the steeds 

 were rendered proof against the attacks of the Anglo- 

 Saxons by an impenetrable covering. Roger de Hoven- 

 den, writing of this period, says, ' Cepit Rex Anglias 100 

 milites, et septies viginti equos coopertos ferro, et servientes 

 equites, et pedites multo.'' 



So that in England the practice of shoeing horses 

 with iron shoes attached to the hoofs by nails, was, after 

 the settlement of the Normans, completely established 

 and general. The form of shoe introduced by them was, 

 perhaps, more artistic than that of the earlier periods, and 

 the same as that in use in France ; being usually furnished 

 with calkins, heavy, larger in size than those found before 

 their arrival, and having three, or more rarely four, nail- 

 holes on each side. These nail-holes were nearly square, 

 and wider at the top or ground-surface than the bottom 

 or foot-face. The heads of the nails were also square, to 

 fit the holes, and projected more or less from the surface of 

 the shoe. The points of the nails, when driven through 

 the hoof, were cut off, and only enough of the nail left to 

 double over and form a clench or clinch.^ Examples of 



' Annal. p. 444. 



" This term would appear to be neither of Greek, Latin, nor French 

 origin, but derived from the Anglo-Saxon Glh-lcnched, twisted, gradually 



