The evolution, biology and domestication of horses is served up at the AMNH (with a brief insight into the history of pants…)

Just recently we camped on Assateague Island National Seashore, (a healthy drive out of NYC off the coast of Maryland) with a roving population of mean ‘n’ wild ponies (descendants of escapees stowed there by tax evaders). Their behavior was pretty interesting to watch- a strong sense of follow the leader (except when they unexpectedly met two goretex-clad bipeds, when all bets were off).

Ponies recently

Man’s relationship with Equus callabus is clearly much deeper than “My little pony”, as illustrated at the American Museum of Nature History’s (AMNH) Horses exhibition. The fossil record of equine forms are a work-horse example of evolution- diagrams of various toed forms are text book and Darwin collected fossilized Equus teeth near fossils of extinct South American mammals during the Voyage of the Beagle. But the exhibition at the AMNH focuses briefly on evolution before moving on to a section on domestication. The ‘follow the dominant guy’ trait that horses have contrasts with their considerably more ‘bitey’ and feisty cousins the zebras, something we may have (and do) make use of. We apparently can’t be absolutely sure about domestication date based on morphology- while clear morphological changes emerged with pig and dog domestication (such as snout shortening), early domesticated horse forms resemble their wild cousins bone-wise. Is this as wild horses can essentially be ‘broken’ rather than traits favorable to man being reinforced through breeding?

The AMNH exhibition also has pant facts though! While men didn’t immediately throw off their hosiery, pants (a.k.a trousers) are thought to have originated as horse-riding gear!

The exhibition runs at the AMNH, NYC until January 4th 2009.