The use of horses as mounts and for transportation was an important advance in human mobility. However, it was not clear until now when humans first used horses for riding. Now, analyzes of 4,500 to 5,000-year-old skeletons from the southeastern European steppe provide a possible answer. In five dead people belonging to the Yamnaya culture, the researchers identified anatomical changes that typically result from regular horseback riding. This proves that horses were not only kept as suppliers of milk and meat, but also served as mounts relatively shortly after their domestication around 5500 years ago.
The domestication of horses was a turning point in human cultural history. Because with these four-legged helpers, our ancestors were able to cover greater distances for the first time, transport loads effectively and develop completely new techniques in agriculture, but also in warfare. Where exactly the first horses were tamed and purposefully bred is not entirely clear. However, genetic and archaeological studies indicate that steppe dwellers in what is now Kazakhstan had tamed horses around 5,500 years ago. Wild horses were also domesticated early on in the North Caucasus, and the ancestors of today’s domestic horses developed from these horses. In the beginning, the steppe dwellers probably kept these horses primarily as suppliers of meat and milk.
When did humans start riding horses?
However, when people in the Eurasian steppe began to use them as mounts has so far been disputed due to a lack of clear evidence. Because whether a horse was ridden cannot be seen from its skeleton, and reins made of leather or other perishable materials usually do not last for long. Even among the steppe nomads of the Jamanja culture, it was previously unclear when they began not only to use their horses as draft animals, but also to ride them. This culture developed in the Pontic-Caspian steppe from the fourth millennium BC and spread from there to Mongolia and south-eastern Europe. Archaeological finds suggest that the Yamnaya accomplished this enormous expansion of more than 4500 kilometers in just two centuries around 3000 BC. “It is difficult to imagine how this expansion was possible without advanced transport methods,” explain Martin Trautmann of the University of Helsinki and his colleagues. However, it has not yet been possible to prove whether the Jamanja were mounted on horseback.
The earliest pictorial representations of people on horseback date back to around 2000 BC in Mesopotamia. They usually show riders in the chair seat typical of riding bareback and stirrups: “It’s physically demanding because you have to keep squeezing your legs together to find support on horseback and you have to keep balancing,” researchers explain. This is exactly where her study begins. They examined 156 skeletons from the period 4500 to 5000 years ago for changes typical of riders that were found in south-eastern Europe. “There is no single unique feature, but the combination of various anatomical abnormalities can provide reliable information about habitual activities,” explains Trautmann. Specifically, the researchers looked for six diagnostic criteria for horseback riding, including changes in the hip bone and femur and abnormalities in the muscle attachment points of these bones.
Clear evidence for riding in Yamnaya dead
The analyzes showed that 24 of the dead people examined met at least some of the six criteria for regular riders. Five other skeletons from people buried around 5,000 to 4,500 years ago in Yamanja burial mounds in Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary met four out of six criteria, and one of them even met all six. These people must have regularly sat on horseback during their lifetime. “These are the oldest people who have been clearly identified as horsemen,” the scientists write. In their view, this proves that the Yamnaya were already moving about on horseback at that time. “Horse riding thus appears to have evolved not long after the domestication of horses in the western steppes of Eurasia,” says co-author Volker Heyd of the University of Helsinki. It is true that these early horses were probably even less tame than their descendants and also more jumpy. This probably made them even less suitable for combat on horseback. “But horseback riding was certainly useful for patrolling vast areas and monitoring large herds of cattle,” the researchers explain.
The team also found a dead body even older than the five Yamnaya riders, who also showed some evidence of riding. “The grave in Csongrad-Kettöshalom, Hungary dates from around 4300 BC. The pose and grave goods suggest that this is a steppe immigrant,” says co-author David Anthony of Hartwick College in the US. “Surprisingly, he also showed four of the six pathologies associated with riding.” According to the researchers, this could indicate that some steppe dwellers rode horses perhaps even a thousand years earlier than the Yamnaya. “An isolated case is not conclusive evidence, but Neolithic steppe tombs from this era also sometimes had horses buried in human tombs and stone clubs were decorated with carved horse heads,” Anthony said. This at least suggests that horses already played an important role in these cultures.
Source: Martin Trautmann (University of Helsinki) et al., Science Advances, doi: 10.1126/sciadv.ade2451