Natural Hiftory of the Ancients. 105 



for our prefent horfes ; and Wilfon flates 1 that 

 horfe-fhoes found on the field of Bannockburn 

 and at Nifbetmuir are remarkable for their very 

 diminutive fize. As for horfe-moeing, the art was 

 known in the time of Caefar both to Britons and 

 Saxons, although it is generally aflerted to have 

 been introduced into England by William the 

 Norman. The Greeks were accuftomed to nail a 

 rim of iron on a horfe's hoof, as may be gathered 

 from a Greek coin, now in the Britim Mufeum, 

 found at Tarentum, and fuppofed to date from 

 B.C. 200. The later Roman horfe-fhoe, made of 

 gold, which horfes wore and kicked off in triumphs, 

 proceffions and the like, were probably not nailed 

 on the foot. 



Faffing from the animal's derivation to that of 

 its name, as being a common domeftic animal of 

 the Indo-European races, it is not furprifing to 

 find the word "horfe" fubftantially one and the 

 fame in all the Aryan dialects. Thus it is ajva in 

 Sanfcrit, MTTTOC in Greek, and (connected by the 

 dialectical IAOCOC) equus in Latin; "hors" (the 

 Anglo-Saxon name), or "ors," by a ufual 

 metathefis became "ros" or "rofs" in German. 

 The horfe was not ufed by the Jews until the 

 times of David and Solomon, in confequence of 

 the hilly nature of their country, and becaufe of 

 the direct prohibition (Deut. xvii. 16). It came 

 to Paleftine from Egypt, where it had been pro- 

 bably introduced by the Hykfos. Thus it is not 

 found reprefented on the monuments before the 



1 Wilfon, "Annals," p. 437. 



