Exhibition Dates: February 16 through August 14, 2011

© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

Dr. John Mc Carter at the podium introduces the scientists who helped make this show possible and then invites the school children with cowboy and cowgirl hats
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photos

by Ed  Vincent

The young cowgirls get a face to face with a North American early horse.
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo


Hyracotherium  "eohippus"known as the dawn horse.
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

The hyracotherium lived during the Ypresian (early Eocene
link for more info), about 52,000,000 years ago.  It was not much bigger than todays fox.  It had four toes on the front feet and three on the back.  The kicking legs are more muscular in general and the fewer toes seems to work well with increased speads.  Modern horses have one toe, a hoof and it took some time for that to evolve.

Early cave art represented in full scale reproductions at the Field Museum.
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo



Early North American Horse evolution witnessed in fossil teeth.  The teeth on the left are smaller and less designed to work well with more grasses in both size and grinding regions.  The tooth on the right is very similar to modern day teeth for horses.  There is also a long necked early horse above.
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photos





The known migrations of horses.
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photos

Horses went extinct in North America along with the majority of mega-fauna once modern man had arrived.  It is known from fossil evidence that people killed and hunted many if not all of the animals to their demise.  Arrowheads have been removed from the bodies of hunted mammoths, arrowheads like no other others in the world--clovis arrowheads.  How much of mega-fauns extinction was caused by humans can not be known, but how much of the dodo birds extinction was the result of people or the carrier pigeon?  When humans first came upon the game in North America the animals had no idea what they might be in for, perhaps like animals today on the Galapagos islands made famous by Charles Darwin.  The animals in Africa had, and have a better sense of the dangers of people and learned to be fearful of our presence, keeping them alive with people as we both evolved over millions of years together.



Dr. Jim Phillips one of the curators of this exhibit poses in front of a modern horse.  He did not fall from a horse, but had surgery on a foot.
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo


An armored horse for decoration and combat.
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

A Clydesdale and Shetland Pony

© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

The largest tooth on a horse is called the WOLF tooth by breeders, and it is closest to the jaw hinge on the upper jaw.  This WOLF tooth is removed to make room for the bridal to fit in.

The horse is also one of small number of animals that does not have ability vomit.  It is unable to coordinated the action of moving its muscles to remove food from its stomach.  This places the horse in danger if it is unable to move to keep itself digesting.  Horses, rabbits, rats, guinea pigs and the Japanese quail are on the short list of animals that can not vomit and are called nonemetic--this also makes them very easy to poison.

A Clydesdale and a Homo Sapien show their bones...

© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

<>Ancient Art, Paintings and Posters of the glorious horse.

© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

"The Horse concludes with a spectacular life-size modern horse sculpture created by artist Deborah Butterfield, who constructed the piece out of wood and cast it in bronze."
© Suburban Journals of Chicago photo

THE EXHIBITION AT A GLANCE

Exhibition Title: The Horse

Exhibition Dates: February 16 through August 14, 2011

Overview: The Horse is a comprehensive exhibition that tells the story of the how the horse became the most important animal ever to interact with humans.   The Horse showcases cultural objects, spectacular fossils, models, dioramas and hands-on activities that highlight the unique bond between horses and humans and show how horses helped shape human civilization by changing the scale and scope of transportation, trade, warfare, and sports.

Exhibition visitors will see a full suit of armor from 15^th-century Germany and a horse-drawn fire engine from the 19^th century. They will discover exciting news about archaeological finds concerning the domestication of the horse and the role of horses in sport. The Horse offers numerous interactive stations that invite visitors to discover characteristics of many breeds of horses, and look inside a horse with a life-size, interactive video.

Location: The Field Museum, 1400 S. Lake Shore Dr, Chicago, IL 60605

Phone Numbers: 312.922.9410 general Field Museum information

Organizers: The Horse is organized by the American Museum of Natural History, in collaboration with The Field Museum, the Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage, the Canadian Museum of Civilization, Gatineau-Ottawa, and the San Diego Natural History Museum.

Major Sponsor: Harris Bank

Admission: Tickets to The Horse include Museum basic admission and are priced at $22 for adults, $18 for seniors and students with ID, and $15 for children 3-11. Discounts available for Chicago residents. Visit fieldmuseum.org or call 312.922.9410 for details. To buy

Tickets, call 866-FIELD-03 (866.343.5303), visit fieldmuseum.org or buy at The Field Museum. Special rates are available for tour operators and groups of 15 or more by calling the Museum’s Group Sales office at 888.FIELD.85 (888.343.5385).

Explore The Horse

Exhibition Walk Through

The Horse welcomes visitors with a dramatic Introduction – a high-definition projection of a horse in motion that emphasizes the beauty, grace, and strength of these magnificent creatures. Shot at 1,000 frames per second, the footage details the horse’s musculature and movement, and is set to the sounds of thundering hoof beats and the whinnying and snorting of a herd of galloping horses.

The Evolution of Horses examines the beginnings of the horse family 55 million years ago and the evolution of the horse. This section features a spectacular diorama of North America’s Great Plains 10 million years ago. Visitors come face-to-face with a variety of now-extinct horse species that lived there, including Dinohippus (a close relative of modern horses, with single-toed hooves and a diet mostly of grass) and two three-toed species, Nannippus and Hypohippus. Also featured are skulls and jawbones showing the evolution of the shape of horse teeth over time and an illustration of the migration of the horse from North America to other continents.

Horses and Hunters considers the early interactions between horses and humans between 40,000 and 10,000 years ago in Europe. Our first relationship with horses probably began with humans hunting the wild horse as prey: early hunting weapons and horse remains show that long before humans rode horses or used them as beasts of burden, they hunted the animals for food. The exhibition contains prehistoric stone tools as well as horse bones and teeth over 17,500 years old from the famous horse-kill site of La Solutré in central France, along with large-scale photographs of cave paintings depicting horses – including one from Chauvet Cave in southern France that dates back 33,000 years.

Domesticating Horses explores the archaeological site of Krasnyi Yar in northern Kazakhstan, where researchers are uncovering the remains of a 5,000-year-old village that shows early signs of horse domestication. Included are a recreation of the dig site and a video interview in which a lead archaeologist explains some of the many steps involved in the excavation. This section also briefly examines the early domestication of other animals, including dogs, pigs, and sheep.

The Nature of Horses delves into the many extraordinary qualities of horses that have made them so significant and useful to humans. Their bodies are powerful, living machines that can work all day powered only by grass. They have both the ability to comprehend subtle commands and the motivation to obey them. Creatures of instinct, horses accept the authority of herd leaders, making them receptive to taking orders from humans as well.

A skeleton mount created by the early 20^th-century anatomist Samuel Harmsted Chubb shows a dramatic display of a man trying to control a rearing horse. Chubb’s innovation of mounting skeletons in life-like, natural positions revolutionized the presentation of such mounts in museums.

A computer interactive offers a virtual peek inside a moving, life-size horse, revealing how special adaptations to the horse’s legs, digestive system, vision, and hearing gave the horse its unique qualities as a partner for humans.

How We Shaped Horses, How Horses Shaped Us examines how horses and humans have influenced each other. Throughout the ages, people have created dozens of breeds in efforts to make horses faster, stronger, bigger, or smaller. And, horses have changed human culture by influencing:

• Warfare – Men on horseback or in horse-drawn chariots were the ultimate weapon for over 3,000 years – until they were finally replaced by soldiers in tanks and airplanes using machine guns and other modern weapons. The exhibition examines the many ways people have used horses in war, including the samurai in Japan, the Spanish as they invaded South America in the 1500s, the horse-drawn chariots of ancient Greece, the Amazon warriors, and European knights of the Middle Ages. Also featured here is an ivory sculpture of a Japanese samurai on horseback, and a World War I-era gas mask designed for a horse.

• Work – Horses in the 19^th century helped push Europe and the Americas into the Industrial Age by pulling carriages, buses, and carts on streets, towing barges along canals, and herding cattle across the North American plains. Display highlights include Chubb skeleton mounts of a 2,370-pound draft horse (bred to be massive and strong) and a 170-pound Shetland pony (specially bred to work underground in coal mines in the 1800s).

• Status and Spirituality – From the North American plains to the steppes of Central Asia, horses have long served as symbols of power, nobility, and wealth. Some cultures have considered horses gods, and in many faiths they play a role in sacred ritual. The exhibition features a wooden goblet with hoof-shaped feet used by the Sakha people of Siberia, who celebrate the summer solstice with a drink of fermented mare’s milk. In addition, visitors can examine a wealthy Crow woman’s ceremonial horse gear, including the saddle, blanket, stirrups, and bridle ornaments, and a terra-cotta horse from India, where village potters create massive horse figures as an offering to the god Aiyanar.

• Trade and Transportation – The fastest means of land transportation for most of human history was by horseback. Horses made possible the conquest of the vast Mongol empire, ruled by Genghis Khan and his descendants in the 1200s and 1300s. Featured here is a Mongolian fiddle with a carved horse head on the end and two strings made of hair from a horse’s tail. Instruments such as this originated in Central Asia and quickly spread to other cultures via the Silk Road and other trade routes.

The exhibition examines how America’s legendary Pony Express, created in 1860 (and lasting only a year and a half) cut the amount of time it took to get a letter across the United States from 25 days by carriage to 10 days by horseback.

Also featured are images by pioneering British photographer Eadweard Muybridge (1830–1904), the first person to freeze the movement of a running horse into a series of still photographs. His photographs resolved once and for all a long-standing debate about whether all four hooves of a trotting horse leave the ground at the same time.

• Sports – One of the world’s fastest land animals and a magnificent athlete, the horse is prized for speed and agility. Equestrian sports examined here include Greek chariot races, the Afghan game buzkashi, thoroughbred races, polo, and hunting on horseback (an ancient sport dating back at least 2,700 years).

Today, we do not depend much on horses for warfare, travel, or work. Instead, we value them mainly for recreation and companionship. The final section, An Enduring Bond, examines how humans care for horses. With a total of 58.5 million horses in the world today, this bond should remain strong for many years to come. Some contemporary issues discussed include racehorse injuries and some strategies for preventing them, such as installing synthetic tracks, and the difficulties of protecting the small populations of wild and feral horses around the globe.

The Horse concludes with a spectacular life-size modern horse sculpture created by artist Deborah Butterfield, who constructed the piece out of wood and cast it in bronze.