description: Horses are trained and ridden for practical working purposes as in police work and controlling herd animals on a ranch. They are also used in competitive sports including, dressage, endurance riding, eventing, reining, show jumping, tent pegging, vaulting, polo, horse racing, driving, and rodeo. Some popular forms of competition are grouped together at horse shows, where horses perform in a wide variety of disciplines. Horses are used for non-competitive recreational riding such as fox hunting, trail riding or hacking. There is public access to horse trails in almost every part of the world; many parks, ranches, and public stables offer both guided and independent riding. They are also used for therapeutic purposes, in specialized paraequestrian competition and non-competitive riding to improve human health and emotional development. Horses are also driven in harness racing, at horse shows and other types of exhibition, historical reenactments. ceremonies, often pulling carriages. In some parts of the world, they are still used for practical purposes such as farming. They continue to be used in public service in parades, funerals, police, volunteer mounted patrols, and mounted search and rescue. Though there is controversy over the date horses were domesticated and first ridden. The best estimate is that horses first were ridden approximately 4,500 BC. . There is some evidence that about 6,000 years ago, near the Dneiper River and the Don River, people were using bits on horses.. However, the most unequivocal early archaeological evidence of equines put to working use was of horses being driven. Chariot burials about 2,500 BC present the most direct hard evidence of horses used as working animals. They played an important role throughout human history, in warfare and peaceful pursuits such as transportation, trade and agriculture
language: English
title: Horses and Horsemanship Through the Ages
titlecomplete: Horses and Horsemanship Through the Ages
ratings_count: 5
publisher: Random House Value Publishing