CHAPTER - 2

IN THE BEGINNING

The museums of the world are full of bits. From simple bronze-age single-jointed snaffles, turned green with age and frequently found displayed alongside accoutrements of early Chinese and Mongol warriors, to Henry the VII’s sixteenth-century curb bit with high port, players, balls, and rollers—a bit so elaborate it’s more a piece of artwork than a riding tool. No matter the style—what’s clear is that the ability to control a horse from his back has been an important part of humankind’s development for a very long time.

THE DOMESTICATION OF THE HORSE

The first bits are said to have appeared in early pre-Roman times, circa 3500 BC, although archaeologists believe riding began as early as 4000 BC or even earlier, predating the development of the wheel. Before 4000 BC, horses appeared in cave paintings, but were probably hunted for meat rather than used for transportation and labor.

According to equine archaeological specialist David W. Anthony and his colleagues, the earliest major horse-related archaeological find appears at Dereivka, in what is now the Ukraine in the area south of Kiev. The people here practiced agriculture, and the number of horse bones in the refuse and burial pits is about twice what is found in other similar finds. A second area of horse domestication is located in two sites of the Botai, located in what is today northern Kazakhstan, dated about 3500 to 3000 BC. Eneolithic Botai culture thrived between 3100 and 3700, and archaeologists found evidence of mare’s milk in bowls as well as other signs of domestication in the pit house communities they found there. It’s likely that horses had been hunted as prey prior to this time, but with the discovery of some skeletal remains with clear tooth wear, archaeologists posited that the Botai had graduated from eating horses to using them for agricultural pursuits—or at least some of them, anyway.

The Botai site showed researchers how bit wear—even from “natural” bits, such as rope—can affect the teeth. There is no direct evidence of bits, since metal bits had not yet been invented and any rawhide or other soft material rotted into oblivion. But the Botai people moved heavy items, such as boulders, long distances. That suggests that they probably used horses (kept in corrals adjacent to their homes) as pack animals. A study conducted in 1992 by Anthony and Dorcas Brown on the Botai horses studied wear patterns on teeth of early Botai skeletal remains. They examined thirty-six sets of premolars from horse remains of different ages. The wear patterns suggest the use of a bit, although the true changes in horses’ teeth patterns and evidence of bridling came much later.

Some scientists theorize that horses became domesticated in much the same way dogs did—in a symbiotic relationship wherein both parties realized the benefits of having the other around. While there’s little clear evidence of this, it would be difficult to domesticate the horse without some cooperation on his part. It might have been that farmers tracked harem bands that followed regular paths and were able to find ways to corral them. It may be that older, slower, or infirm horses were the first domesticates. We can postulate that those horses that were easy to handle were bred, and bred again, leaving those who were not to forage on the steppes and be hunted for meat. During this same period, man was abandoning his hunter-gatherer lifestyle for a more staid, agricultural existence. As he planted and grew crops, horses became more and more necessary as pack animals and as traction to move items around the farm, although the cart had not yet been invented. The diminishing game herds close to their settlements forced these evolving bronze-age hunters to travel for their meat. Hence the riding horse and the bit were born.

However it happened, man and horse alike found value in their mutually beneficial relationship and the world changed significantly.

THE FIRST BITS

Much of what we know about the bridling and bitting of horses in ancient times comes from the art and artifacts that have been dug up. For the most part, skin-based saddlery disintegrates, so there’s little left of ancient harness work, but archaeologists have found depictions of horses and other equids partaking in various activities such as plowing, pulling chariots, and being ridden. Horses didn’t appear in the Middle East until around 2200 BC, although people in this region had already been using asses for draft work. Through close examination of the archaeological record we are able to, more or less, recreate the horse’s early uses and training. For example, horses are depicted in the Standard of Ur, an ancient box from Sumeria (modern-day Iraq) that dates from around 2600 BC. The box is covered in an elaborate mosaic depicting war and peace. Here, horselike animals pull wagons and chariots, clearly wearing a round-ringed bit device—possibly even a ring through their noses.

Our understanding of ancient horsemanship comes primarily from the depiction of horses in art and archeological finds. The Standard of Ur is from Sumeria (modern day Iraq), dating from 2600 BC. It depicts horses and their harnesses as used in warfare.

Of course, the very first bits were made before the development of metals, using materials that were close at hand, such as hemp rope, bone, horn, or hard wood. Antlers with holes drilled through them for rope appear to be the first real bit, although we can’t be sure.

When man learned to mine iron out of the earth and smelt it with tin to create bronze, another age of horseback riding began. The horse became widely used for warfare, sport (chariot racing), and agriculture. In some early finds, horses’ remains have been found buried with chariots, bridlework, and human bodies, which gives us some inkling of the importance that horses had gained since their early days as an animal hunted for meat. Art from ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Greece, as well as from China, depicts ornate bridle and harness work; already man’s understanding of horse training had evolved beyond just using an ox harness or nose ring to a more sophisticated training and steering system—a device in the mouth attached to some form of rope from which the rider or driver controls the horse’s head. In excavations of the Dereivka, archaeologists found long, slender pieces of antler that had holes in them. These were most likely the first “full cheek” cheek pieces ever invented. Shaped like a half-moon, the antler piece would have applied cheek pressure and bar and tongue pressure simultaneously.

THE WAR HORSE

What happened next? The horse’s use evolved as man changed. Greek bas reliefs circa 900 BC show evidence of horses being used to pull chariots. They did not wear a cavesson, but instead were guided by a rope in the mouth. Early Indo-Aryans, Mongols, and Chinese were the first serious inventors of bits, the designs of which remain in use today. Museum collections contain simple, single-jointed snaffles made of bronze that look like they could be found in tack stores today.

Enter the chariot: In the classic movie Ben Hur, a chariot race scene is one of the most anxiety-filled for any horse lover. The wildness of the race scene and the use of the chariot as a weapon to dislodge the competitors, although colorized by Hollywood’s fine set of paints, was nonetheless a somewhat accurate depiction of the use of horses during the Roman Empire. The horse’s use during that time was as just another piece of weaponry. The Romans employed the weight of their animals and their chariots to trample and upset enemies.

Horse and chariot warriors, however, faced some problems. The reins of the original “bits,” or steering devices, went back through the harness and allowed the drivers to exert leverage on the horse’s mouth to stop the forward motion—but that’s all. They really had no steering to speak of. Charioteers wrapped the reins around their waists and leaned their body weight to influence their galloping chariot horses while holding a whip in one hand. Archaeological records show that bits during ancient Greek chariot races had straight bars. Drivers put the strongest horse on the outside of the team so he’d be able to turn the vehicle.

Although fictional, the movie Ben Hur factually depicted the use of horse and chariot for sport in Roman times.

Experts postulate that the curb bit appeared in the fourth century BC, most likely an invention of the Celts. The leverage action of the curb provided a great deal more control for warfare—the primary use of the horse at that time—and allowed the horse-revering people a canvas on which to express their coat of arms or affiliations. The addition of the long shanks, often carved or endowed with royal crests, allowed for an incredible military advantage and may have allowed the Celts to earn their reputation as warring barbarians. They actually attempted to sack Rome but were driven back to their territory on the northern side of the Alps.

As horses from different areas interbred, their sizes and shapes changed. As they ate more and grew larger and more powerful, the need to control them became a foremost military effort. Bits turned from benign to barbaric in a matter of a few years, although they also evolved aesthetically at the same time. The ornamentation and complexity of the decoration of that time serve as models for the craftsmanship we know today in Western bits.

Examples of early bits show an innate understanding of equine nature: The cheek pieces were adorned with all manner of spikes and pegs and other devices to encourage the horse to turn away from pressure. Unfortunately, bit makers invented devices that would inflict pain when the bit came in contact with the horse’s cheeks. Nonetheless, there were a few “aha” moments in horse training: It was acknowledged that a horse who kept his head down and his poll flexed was easier to control. A more balanced seat was also coming into fashion. It was around this time that the martingale and draw reins were invented to keep the horse’s head down, allowing more control.

The greatest horsemen of the ancient world were warriors, first and foremost. It was a tough world back then—a kill-or-be-killed type of environment. Bits of the last few centuries BC reflected man’s need to be tough in battle, and the need for the warrior to be able to maneuver quickly with minimal wasted movement. Those bits can be viewed today with particular disdain from our viewpoint of “natural horsemanship.” Nonetheless, such devices paved the way for the Egyptians, Celts, and Romans to become great ancient warriors of their times.

THE AGE OF XENOPHON

Xenophon’s The Art of Horsemanship, which appeared around 350 BC, was the first writing on horsemanship that advocated gentler riding methods. As he explains in the chapter on how to make a horse more magnificent and striking, “You must refrain from pulling on the bit.” While we hear that all the time today, remember that back then riders knew no other method of controlling their horses. Xenophon goes so far as to recommend that every horseman should have two bits: one smooth with disks of good size and the “other with the disks heavy and not standing so high, but with the echini sharp so when he seizes it, he may drop it from dislike of its roughness.”

Xenophon was a Greek historian who lived from 430–354 BC. His work The Art of Horsemanship describes the proper use of bits. He believed they should be used in conjunction with a well-developed and balanced seat, not as the sole form of control. He was well ahead of his time.

In his writing, Xenophon clearly advocates what we know to be true about horse anatomy, natural behavior, and the influence of having a human on his back. “The horse’s mouth must not be checked too harshly so that he will toss his head, nor too gently for him to feel it.”

Hence, what we advocate as a soft, conversational contact with the bit is indeed what Xenophon discovered in 350 BC. Xenophon is required reading for the serious horseman.

THE MEDIEVAL PERIOD TO THE MODERN ERA

Over the next centuries, horseback riding and the equipment used to control horses evolved substantially. If you look closely at bits from the medieval period, when horses were integrated into culture for work, sport, and warfare, many of the same bits that were in use back then are still in use today. In fact, in his 1940 study of ancient bits, Oxford historian John Bryan Ward Perkins called the variety “bewildering . . . it is hardly possible to do more than indicate the commoner forms and the approximate period of their use.” The main differences between the bit styles of the Middle Ages and today is ornamentation, Ward Perkins writes. The knights were fond of highly ornamental cheek pieces. Ward Perkins doesn’t identify the two kinds of bits, but it’s obvious from his descriptions that he’s talking about the curb and the snaffle. The curb bit uses indirect rein contact with the bit to control the horse. The snaffle is a direct contact bit: pull on the reins and the horse feels the pressure directly on his mouth. The monograph notes that there were five common cheek pieces and six common mouthpieces. The cheek pieces were a ring, a ring with bars coming out of the ring’s center top and bottom, a full cheek with a D-shaped ring, a full cheek with thick bars, and a type we don’t see much today—a ring with two C’s pointed backwards. This double C would serve a similar purpose as the full cheek; however, depending on the configuration, the points of the C’s (which are rounded) would cause more widely distributed pressure on the cheeks.

Mouthpieces from Ward Perkins’s collection are fairly straightforward: a straight bar, a single-jointed bit, a double-jointed bit with the center segment made of a wire loop, a single-jointed snaffle made with two hollow cones (the predecessor of today’s hollow mouth), a single-jointed ported bit, and a curb with a rather high port.

The fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were truly the eras of bit ingenuity. Most stable managers were still convinced that it was by the bit alone that a rider could get his horse to submit to his will, but they also began to understand that horses reacted differently to different bits, so they began to experiment. During this period, bit makers became true artisans who were able to combine mouthpieces with cheeks and offer riders some of the variety that we have today. Federico Grisone, for example, was a sixteenth-century Italian said to be a master of dressage education. Grisone published one of the most read Renaissance manuals of horsemanship, The Orders of Horsemanship, during that time. Although Grisone did use some of Xenophon’s theories, he believed in harsher methods to obtain submission, and the bits he invented reflect it. Horse trainers of the day still believed in force and pain, and the bit was a major weapon in their arsenal.

Sixteenth-century Italian equitation master Federico Grisone’s Ordini di Cavalcare encouraged the use of harsher bits to control horses.

Some of the ingenious creations of that time included telescoping shanks and a variety of “players” for the tongue, including balls that spun, keys that dangled, and olive-shaped mouthpieces. One bit had a ball, a solid oval with a drilled center, a center ring resembling today’s Dick Christian, and three or four keys hanging off the center. The philosophy seemed to be, “the more stuff on the mouthpiece, the better.” For the most part, the shanks were impossibly long—300 to 400 millimeters (11 to 15 inches). The length of the shanks caused the ends to splay apart, so bit makers added a bar or chain toward the bottom of the shank (called “hobbles” today) to connect them. This also helped the rider who needed to control his horse with one hand, because the strap made the shanks, and their action on the mouthpiece, work in concert. In addition to the great length of the shanks, the bits of the day were also quite heavy: many weighed as much as 800 grams, or about 30 ounces. Bits were still primarily made of bronze or iron; it wasn’t until significant metallurgical experimentation in the twentieth century that bits appeared in different materials.

An antique curb bit shows the severity of some of the ports on older bits.

The Spanish Spade and Mikmar: Note the similarities.

Besides the excessive lengths of the shanks, the difference between the curbs of the Renaissance and today is that the ports were much higher. Historians theorize that such elaborate long-shanked bits were really for show. Working horses, plow horses, and other “regular” horses were ridden and driven in snaffles, as evidenced by the number of snaffle bits found in archaeological sites. Still, there are plenty of paintings that depict the working horse with a rope halter and a curb bit. Historians chalk this up to artist interpretation rather than veracity.

The seventeenth century saw diminishment in the diversity of bits and the customized fashion in which they were made. Xenophon’s balanced seat philosophy had finally taken hold. Horsemanship evolved from using the bit for control to the use of the seat and aids. The great French equestrian, Antoine du Pluvinel, instructor to Louis the XIII, was known for his humane training methods, and as such was able to influence equestrianism in significant ways, not the least of which was to diminish the popularity of the spiked, sharp, and inhumane bits that predated him. Du Pluvinel’s legacy is clearly seen today: he advocated refining the horse’s training to the point where just the very lightest touch on a simple curb bit had an influence on the horse. He was one of the first proponents of gentle horse-training methods.

All the bits of today are only variations on former themes. From the Middle Ages to the Industrial Revolution, nothing much changed about bits—curbs and jointed snaffles ruled the day. We still have five or six mouthpieces and five or six styles of cheeks. Even hackamores, bitless bridles, and rope halters have their origins in early equestrianism. The Spanish vaqueros (cowboys) trained their horses in a jaquima (hackamore) before adding a bit—a practice brought to the Americas by the Spanish Conquistadors who also left a few horses behind. Loriners of yesterday are much the same as those of today, crafting bits based on style or perceived need. Compare photos of a seventeenth-century Spanish spade bit, for example, to a Mikmar from 2009: the mouthpiece is wide, the port is smooth, the entire apparatus lies back on the tongue. With the exception of ornamentation, the bits are nearly identical. Check out the Arms and Armor exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. There in the case with the Mongol warrior is a single-jointed snaffle bit that could be found in any tack store today.

THE ARRIVAL OF THE BIT IN NORTH AMERICA

No matter what style of riding you practice, be assured that your bit’s origins came from Europe. One clear example is the Western spade bit, with slightly shorter shanks, a very wide mouthpiece, and a large spade that curves back against the tongue. After all, there were no horses on the North American continent until the conquistadors brought them here. No matter the differences between Western and English, all our U.S. equestrianism evolved from the same basic place: the military battlefield of the Middle Ages.

While avid riders might be righteous about their particular training methods and their discipline’s “better way,” such argument is largely moot. Everything we know about horse training has come originally from the ancient battlefields of Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Horses had to learn to jump obstacles with riders aboard during battle. They moved sideways, forward, and backward, leaping up and kicking out behind. Today you can see such high-level training in the mounted police forces, during the performance of the Lipizzaner horses, and in the dressage and jumper show rings. These types of riding may look far-flung from the cow horse working on the ranch in Montana, but their origins—and their equipment—at one time were identical.

When the Spanish conquistadors came to this country through the seventeenth century, they brought with them the skills and the basic equipment of European equestrianism. They were granted large tracts of land in the region we now know as California, becoming known as the “californio” ranches. They were famous for the length of time they took to finish their highly refined reining horses. Their classical training method involved starting their horses in a hackamore or rope bitless bridle that applied pressure on the nose and the poll for control. Technically, the word “bosal” refers to the noseband of such a bridle, but it is common today to use the expression “bosal hackamore” when describing a specific type of rope bitless bridle (see chapter 10).

As the horse was trained, the vaqueros gradually added first a light snaffle with two reins, then a curb-style bit, and finally the spade bit. The spade bit required the lightest of hands and the lightest trained horse to achieve the classic forward vaquero reining horse. The vaquero used a romal rein, which was heavy enough and the bit quick enough to transmit the minutest signal. The horses of the day were lighter in build and smaller, and when tackling the chores of a working cowboy the vaquero’s horse had to be delicately trained to move away or toward a cow in an instant.

No less refined, Texas-style horsemanship evolved from the same basic riding technique, but with a faster and harder rider. He was more apt to use a grazer bit with a much lower port and turned back, solid shanks. The Texas cowboy didn’t need as much lateral flexibility, and was riding a larger, fleeter horse bred to chase cows. The grazer bit’s shanks curved back to allow the horse to graze during long days working cattle on the ranch.

The difference in control between Texas and vaquero training styles was the result of the time it took to “finish” a horse, and the practicalities of the horse’s use. For example, the finished reining horse in the vaquero tradition was controlled with subtle movements of the left hand, positioned further back than the cow horse rider’s hand. The severity of the bit also required additional equipment to keep it even, light, and soft in the hand. The reins were made of braided rawhide to keep them from swinging and causing extra motion against the bit, aided even more by the addition of chains to the end of the reins. Many of today’s romal reins have safety catches to release should the rein catch on something.

The Texas cowboy, on the other hand, was more likely to neck rein with the hand forward in front of the horn. The reins were light and split, and the bit was less adorned. The working cowboy spent hours on the range. When not in pursuit of an errant cow, the cowboy’s horse walked forward with his head and neck low, and the cowboy rode with a passive hand and a relaxed position. But when the action heated up (such as when a cow took flight or the cowboy needed to rope a steer), the rider took up more contact, raised his hand, and came forward a bit in the saddle to be able to maneuver his cows and his horse quickly.

Throughout history, the need for control of horses in warfare drove extensive innovation in bit design, producing a variety of styles over the centuries, from Ancient Greece into modern-day use. A browse through museum display cases confirms that while we certainly know a great deal more about horses and riding than we did in 3000 BC, our bit styling has not changed drastically since those early attempts at controlling horses.

History and tradition are part of equestrianism. They are among the many reasons that we love the sport and art of riding. Our bits, despite our ability to fashion new metals and better understand our horses through science and observation, remain largely unchanged.