570 PROFESSOR J. C. EWART 



still too small to carry men. As to the small fleet horses of the Northern Britons, 

 Ridgeway says we may not unreasonably infer that they were ponies of the Celtic type, 

 probably more or less mixed with the large-headed Equus caballus of Europe and Asia. 



The horses on the Continent had been so increased in size and otherwise altered 

 (mainly by the importation of improved breeds from the south of Europe) before the 

 middle of the second century, that small 12-hands ponies were probably no longer 

 easily obtainable along the routes traversed by the Roman legions and their auxiliaries. 

 It may hence, I think, be assumed that the three small Newstead skulls belong to 

 British ponies. Whether these ponies accompanied the Romans across the border, 

 or were captured from one of the northern tribes, it is of course impossible to say. 



It will be remembered that in one of the pits a pair of wheels was found. In these 

 wheels the rim, instead of being made up of several felloes, consisted of a single piece 

 of wood bent, as was the case with the wheel found in 1905 at Barhill as well as with 

 that found in 1882 at La Tene in Switzerland. These wheels, according to those 

 best able to judge, must be regarded as British until they are proved to be Roman. 

 It is hence possible that the horses to which the small Newstead skulls belonged were 

 captured along with a British war-chariot. 



It was mentioned that two of the small skulls were practically identical, except in 

 size, with the Arab-like skulls from Newstead.* This implies that they belonged to the 

 same variety as the horses found in Switzerland on sites occupied during the La Tene 

 period, i.e. during the later Iron Age. According to Dr Marek, the Hel veto-Gallic 

 horses of the La Tene period were 13^ to 14 hands at the withers — this seems to me a 

 very high estimate — and in their fundamental characters agreed with Arabs. 



It has been mentioned above that one of the small Newstead skulls seemed to belong 

 to a pony having a trace of Forest blood. Ridgeway, it will be remembered, thought 

 that some of the horses of the ancient Britons were probably mixed with the large- 

 headed Equus caballus of Europe and Asia, i.e. with a horse of the Prejvalsky or 

 Steppe type. I have failed to find any evidence of the existence in Britain, during 

 the Roman period, of long-headed native horses with the face bent on the cranium. 

 In Norway until quite recently the horses — with a few possible exceptions — seem either 

 to have been Celtic ponies pure and simple, or a blend of the Celtic and Forest varieties. 



Even now the fjord horse of Norway is largely Celtic, and, unless crossed with the 

 heavy Gudbrandsdal race — a breed of Danish extraction, — there is no evidence of 

 Steppe blood. Further, when we turn to Iceland, horses of the Steppe type are as a 

 rule conspicuous by their absence. 1 recently inspected three hundred Iceland ponies ; 

 of these, under 10 per cent, had a trace of Steppe blood, and over 90 per cent, were 

 either nearly pure Celtic or Forest horses or were crosses of these varieties. If, as 

 seems highly probable, a certain number of Irish " Roman-nosed" horses — i.e. horses of 



* One of several skulls from Walthamslow, Essex —probably of Neolithic age — in the British Museum, closely 

 agrees in its measurements with the 495 mm. Newstead Celtic skull, while a second Walthamstow skull agrees with 

 the small Newstead skull which seems to have belonged to a Celtic pony with a strain of Forest blood. Even in 

 Neolithic times intercrossing seems to have been practised, or at least possible. 



