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Arlemidorus speaks of a shod horse, and uses the samekind of expression whilst speaking of other cattle. Winkel-man has described a cut stone in the collection of BaronStoscli, on which is represented the figure of a man holdingup one foot of a horse, whilst another, kneeling, is em-ployed in fastening a shoe/' *
Tl lat it was not usual to shoe the war horse, may be ga-thered from this, when Milhridates was besieging Cyziats,he was obliged to send his cavalry to Bithynia , because thehoofs of the horses where entirely spoiled and worn out.Diodorus Siculus informs us, in Alexander’s expedition,that he proceeded with uninterrupted marches until the feetof his horses were entirely broken and destroyed. A likeinstance occurs in Cinnamus, where the cavalry were obligedto be left behind, because they had sutiered considerablyin their hoofs, to which he adds, they w r ere often liable.Hence it may, perhaps, appear, that such horse-shoes as wenow have were unknown to the ancients ; and Chardin givesno representation of them in ancient Persian antiquities.Niebuhr, in the second volume of his Travels, expresslysays, the ancient Persians had no proper saddles or stirrups.In the grave of Childeric , a northern chieftain and Kingof France , was discovered a piece of iron, which thelearned antiquarians who saw it pronounced, from thatportion of it which the rust had left, to have been an oldhorse-shoe; they saw', or thought they saw, four distinctapertures for nails on each side; but whilst they w r ere en-deavouring to remove the corrosive excrescence of rust,to ascertain this with more certainty, it broke under theirhands . * * 7 In the same grave where this was discovered, w'asalso found a gold ring, with the royal image, and an in-scription of the name of the monarch . 8 The reason why
• Description ties Pierres gravees du Baron de Stoscli. A Florence, 176-'h 4lo.
p. 169.
7 P. J. Von Struhlenberg enumerates those things discovered in the ancientTartarian sepulchres j but among them, although he speaks of stirrups, and bits forbridles, he sa}-* nothing of horse-shoes. Vide 365, ubi supra.
8 The description of this curious discovery made as above, appears in AnastasiaChilderici, Fraueoruin Regis, sivc Thesaurus sepulchralis Tornaei Nerviorumeffossus; auctorc J. J. ChiDetio. Aniverpise, 1655. 4to. p. 224. The wholedescription is as follows: u Ferrea solea; sed ita rubigiue absumpta, ut dumveruculo clavorum foramina (qu® utrimque quaterna crant) purgare leviter ten-tarem, ferrum putre in fragmenta dissiluerit, et ex parte dumtaxut hie reprsesentaripotuerit.” Montfaucon, in Les Monumens de la Monarchic Fran^oise, Paris,1729, 4 vol. fol. i. p. 16. tab. 6, has given also an engraving of it, and saysbelow : “ Solea ferrea equi regii hie tota repr®sentatur, etsi pars ejus tautumreperta sit; sed ex ilia parte totius formaiu excipere hand difficile fuit. Modic®magnitudinis equus erat.”