the evidence from Begash suggests that the key species within Eurasian pastoralist
economies started with and remainedsheep/goat and cattle, as early as 2500 BC.
Thus horse riding—whenever it actually began—was not essential to successful
herd management during the early to middle Bronze Age and did not have
dramatic and immediate political, social and military consequences in the
formative stages of Eurasian pastoralism.
At p. 1036 Frachetti and Benecke conclude that:
the zoological record from Begash illustrates that the increase in horses through
time correlates first with opportunistic hunting forays at the end of the Bronze
Age and then with expanding political engagements that undoubtedly reshaped
the organisation of Eurasian pastoralist communities from the first millennium
BConward.39 Drews 2004, p. 167, n. 101.
40 Kohl 2007, p. 140.
41 Anthony 2007, p. 239.
42 Anthony 2007, p. 251.
43 Anthony 2007, p. 262. Anthony and Ringe 2015 propose that a folk migration ca. 4000
BCbrought Proto-Anatolian speakers down from the steppe into Anatolia. Because the
Anatolian languages did not inherit the PIE terms for wheeled vehicles, it is necessary
somehow to separate the Anatolian languages from the “other” IE languages before
the invention of wheeled vehicles. As we have seen in Chapter 1, there is no evidence—
either linguistic or archaeological—for a migration into Anatolia from the steppe, while
there is plenty of evidence for a continuous trickle of colonists going the other way
early in the Neolithic period.
44 Drews 2004, pp. 12 and 25. See Fig. 4.6 (p. 137) in Harding 2000 for percentages of
animal bones found at central European sites.
45 Anthony 2007, p. 344. See also the map at p. 345, with arrows showing the direction
of the folk migrations. In her Kurgan theory Gimbutas had reduced the role of folk
migrations, proposing instead a subjugation or “kurganizing” of the indigenous
Europeans by conquerors on horseback from the steppe.
46 Anthony 2007, p. 341.
47 In their translations of the IliadRichmond Lattimore and Robert Fagles chose to render
the epithet hippodamosas “breaker of horses.” In 1898 Samuel Butler had rendered it
as “tamer of horses,” as had Lang, Leaf and Myers 15 years earlier. This was
etymologically justified, because “tame,” from Old English tam, derives ultimately from
Proto-Indo-European deme, which is also the source of the Greek dam-and the Latin
dom-. In modern usage, however, “taming” denotes a completed action, as does
“breaking,” whereas hippodamossuggests a continuing relationship between the master
and his horses. In the Homeric epics hippodamosdenoted a man who controlled horses
under the yoke.
48 On the origins of the myth see Hansen 2000.
49 Drews 2004, pp. 32–33 with Fig. 3.2.
50 Drews 2004, pp. 32–36, with Figs. 3.3 and 3.4.
51 Drews 2004, Figs. 3.6 and 3.7.
52 On the rarity of horses, whether wild or domesticated, in the Zagros see Potts 2014,
pp. 48–53.
53 Drews 2004, p. 40 and p. 161, n. 28.
54 Clutton-Brock and Davies 1993.
55 See Littauer and Crouwel 2001, p. 331:
It could be argued that copper/bronze bits would not have discoloured the teeth.
Since no similar stains have been found on the teeth of other animals that would52 The Kurgan theory and taming of horses