The origin and influence of the thoroughbred horse . i,Kai \uv dyplwv Kai ;puv Kai dopKaduiv irXridos iv avrip, ktX. ] THE EXISTING EQUIDAE 53 dorus, speaks of a region south of Nabataea well wooded andwell watered, abounding with all kinds of cattle, wild asses{hemionoi), wild camels, deer, and gazelles; lions, leopards andwolves were also common. As there were thus both wild assesand wild camels in Arabia down to the Christian era, there canbe little doubt that the domestic asses and camels of the Arabtribes were derived from the wild species of that Fig. 27. The Somal
The origin and influence of the thoroughbred horse . i,Kai \uv dyplwv Kai ;puv Kai dopKaduiv irXridos iv avrip, ktX. ] THE EXISTING EQUIDAE 53 dorus, speaks of a region south of Nabataea well wooded andwell watered, abounding with all kinds of cattle, wild asses{hemionoi), wild camels, deer, and gazelles; lions, leopards andwolves were also common. As there were thus both wild assesand wild camels in Arabia down to the Christian era, there canbe little doubt that the domestic asses and camels of the Arabtribes were derived from the wild species of that Fig. 27. The Somali Wild Ass. Mr Lydekker^ has pointed out that if the chigetai and thekiang are regarded as races of one species, there would seemconsiderable reason for considering the onager and the ghor-khar as sub-species of a second; for the two latter certainlydiffer from the two former much more than do the membersof the two groups from one another. In their tendency to a 1 The wild ass of Mongolia, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1904, p. 431. 54 THE EXISTING EQUIDAE [CH. greyer colour, smaller hoofs, and possibly in a greater length ofear, the two southern forms present an approximation to thetrue wild asses of Africa, which is quite what we might expectfrom their geographical distribution. In colour, and perhapsalso in length of ear, as well as in their cry, the chigetai andthe kiang are more horse-like. (9) The African Wild Ass {E. asinus, Linn., taeniopus,Heuglin), which is held to be the source of our domestic ass,still survives in Abyssinia, Nubia, and other parts of North-eastAfrica
Size: 1612px × 1550px
Photo credit: © The Reading Room / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookpublisher, booksubjecthorses
