A world without horses

So, as part of a fantasy/clockpunk setting I'm in the process of creating for a series of novels I hope to write, I am positing a Europe-like continent where horses don't exist. Otherwise the flora and fauna of the continent is pretty much identical to that of RL Europe.

Now, I'm wondering, how would this impact technology, culture and so forth? Specifically, I am aiming for a situation where a substitute for horses as mounts for cavalry isn't readily available. I.e., there are no equine species whatsoever. Would people somehow breed oxen or elk that could be ridden, or would cavalry and other equestrian uses for horses simply never develop? In what other ways would society evolve differently? Might a lack of horses serve as a spur (no pun intended) to an earlier development of mechanical vehicles, or would it set progress back so much that such processes would never have a chance to get started in the first place?

I was thinking at first that the situation might prove somewhat similar to that of the Americas or Australia, since in the former we killed off all the horses before learning to domesticate them, and because the latter never had any to begin with. But of course, Europe would still have a whole slew of other large domesticable animals, and if crops still spread from a Fertile Crescent-like region, there'd still be a major incentive to get a hold of plow-animals and beasts of burden.

Anyway, any ideas or insights regarding this scenario would be very warmly welcomed! Cheers!

edited 2nd Dec '11 6:26:31 AM by EtherealGears

http://etherealgears.blogspot.com/ From Lovecraft to Wodehouse via Darwin and Dalí

Just to throw in my own skewed viewpoint, what if Europe had no horses? Well, who used horses? The nobility—to get places faster, to send messages faster, to ride into battle faster or with more armor. Without that convenience (and that's all a horse gives you, convenience), the pace of life slows down. The lord has to ride in an oxcart just like a peasant, even if the cart is more opulent. News doesn't travel as fast, so people have a more relaxed perspective on current events. Wars still happen, but you don't have cavalry to make decisive charges or to make your knights look good. With all this in mind, you could make the case that a horseless Europe would democratize itself earlier and more thoroughly, since the aristocracy would not have so many advantages.

Or you could go the other way and posit that, without horsepower, the Europeans would channel their aggression into sea power. They'd put more effort into digging canals and developing navigational aids. They'd discover the New World and the Far East sooner and conquer them faster.

Under World. It rocks!

^ First off, horses in Europe weren't limited to only the nobility. Horses were work animals, as well as luxury transportation. Not everyone owned one, and few people owned more than one or two, but they weren't as rare as you're making it sound. High-bred riding-only horses were a mark of wealth, not necessarily nobility.

To the OP: Look at the pre-Columbian cultures of Mexico, Central, and South America. No horses.

...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.

The mesos also had no sheep, no goats, no cattle, no pigs, etc. Do donkeys also get banned?

If you're going to use deer-type animals as mounts, then they won't be nearly as sturdy as horses. You can just about rule out any sort of heavy cavalry. Realistically, they'd probably pick light individuals to ride them fast as messengers or scouts.

Shinigan (Naruto fanfic)

Most of horses non-riding functions in such roles can be replaced by oxen. They were often preferred over horses anyhow, especially in contexts were strength and/or stamina were issues.

It would be similar to Tokugawa era Japan, I'd wager, with wealthy people getting places via rickshaw and palanquin. Great Britain even used something along those lines during the Victorian era, called Sedan Chairs.

Poor people would just have to walk, and messages would be sent by runner.

Are you considering having any sort of riding mount available in the world at large, or are you removing all potential riding beasts? Because if horses did not exist, its likely that Camels would have taken their place, and once one group of people comes up with a riding animal, it tends to spread that knowledge rapidly through trade routes, because they are just that useful.

Yes, because selective breeding can't possibly allow the reindeer to match the average horse.[/sarcasm] The only problem with reindeer is the antlers, and even that's not much of an issue.

I suppose with selective breeding they might. Heavy cavalry mounted on any sort of deer still seems unlikely to me.

Shinigan (Naruto fanfic)

Moose were used as cavalry by Sweden at one point.

Also, I'm pretty sure that the OP didn't mean for any mounts, as he said "its like the Aztecs". Otherwise my suggestion for a mount would be Bear Cavalry.

In the 'knight on a white horse' sense yes, in the more mundane 'armoured butcher riding a reluctant herbivore' sense, it's actually probably going to work better, after all, you set the armour right and you can make the Reindeer carry its own 'lance' (ie. antlers, false ones can probably be arranged for the times when they don't have any).

Thank you all for the interesting input. I've been thinking about a few things...

I remember Jared Diamond writing that reindeer and moose, just like elephants, are problematic in that they can be tamed, but not actually domesticated. I.e., they don't breed in captivity well and thus it's tricky to engineer the stock to create more mount-worthy individuals. Furthermore, I was considering the camel angle. I don't quite want to remove camels, but could they really have served the same function as warhorses in medieval-style mounted knight combat? I know they're good for travel and transport, but I'm a bit sketchy on the martial capacities. If they're too neat a substitute for horses they may have to go as well.

I like the input regarding sea travel, and the comparison with Japan was very elucidating. I'm wondering if the latter might not be the closest parallel to model things on, with the added complexity of a much larger geographic region, and of course all the social, cultural and religious differences between a Japanese-style and a European-style culture.

http://etherealgears.blogspot.com/ From Lovecraft to Wodehouse via Darwin and Dalí

You would be surprised how much Japan resembles England historically - I think that the cultures share similarities because they are both small island nations next to larger mainland neighbors. For example, both had a medieval attempt to conquer the mainland (England's Hundred Years War, Japan's successful albeit brief first conquest of Korea under the Ashikaga Shogunate). Both also have large amounts of fish in their diet, and both armies favored the longbow over heavily-armored cavalry (the favored weapon of the samurai was the yumi: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yumi).

Also, Japan was surprisingly sophisticated during the Tokugawa period despite refusing to trade with most of the West (remember they still traded with the Netherlands). They didn't just go through a modernization period during the Meji Era, but they already had some of the pieces in place. For instance, perhaps some of the most sophisticated clockwork automatons ever created come from medieval Japan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karakuri_ningy%C5%8D), and after learning about hang-guns from the Portuguese, the Japanese created some of the best arquebus for that time period (and then used them to conquer Korea - they only had to stop when their few thousand samurai were physically exhausted after holding off millions of Chinese soldiers for months. The Chinese basically overwhelmed the new guns with sheer numbers - it didn't matter if you killed hundreds of thousands of them every battle, they just kept marching forward until the Japanese had to leave. It was an insane, if effective, strategy on the part of the Chinese: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_invasions_of_Korea_%281592%E2%80%931598%29).

Here's some more background on the Tokugawa and why they used palanquins. Basically, Japan has always had horses, but after the Tokugawa took over and declared themselves shogun they wanted to break their enemies ability to wage war. Horses were therefore banned from all shogun-controlled roads (basically, no one could ride horses on roads, since the shogun controlled just about all the roads). They also outlawed the wheel, so that no one could move around large amounts of goods - it was another way to prevent local uprisings from arming themselves, and it jury-rigged the system to favor the Tokugawa - because it forced all trade to go by sea, and the Tokugawa were one of three domains with permission to trade by the sea, thus making them enormous profits.

Horses were domesticated earlier, so I suspect it was never seriously tried (elephants OTOH are so long-lived and so slow-breeding that it would be difficult).

Well, the English and the Nordic tribes pretty much considered horses pack animals right up until the Norman invasion. Consider if much of your landscape is either mountainous or wooded, horses really aren't going to be that much use to you in combat.

Camels are used for war by the Persians, Arabs, other central Asians, and if I'm not mistaken, the Byzantine. Personally, I think the European elk make great mounts and work animals if properly bred..

edited 5th Dec '11 12:35:31 AM by Blurring

If a chicken crosses the road and nobody else is around to see it, does the road move beneath the chicken instead?

Ah, yes. My dear old home country of Sweden once pondered the implemention of moose cavalry. Then we hunted the poor brutes almost to the edge of extinction. Having a father who grew up around men hunting the damn beasts for a living, though, I've always had the idea that they're too sociopathic and crazy to tame (reindeer are far more easily herded, etc., which is why the Sami roll that way). But I suppose that's how all animals start before you begin breeding away their will to fight. Maybe it's worth looking into. Cheers!

http://etherealgears.blogspot.com/ From Lovecraft to Wodehouse via Darwin and Dalí

Matt had already asked this above, How about donkey ?

Did you want to remove just knight-style mounted combat ? or all riding animals ? Donkey can be put on chariot. Without heavy horse cavalry to compete, chariot will still reign on close-range shock combat.

On the subject of breeding, I read somewhere that good horses are stupid horses. Like, the only horse that would willingly charge into battle, or something similar, would be a stupid one. Wild horses are smart enough to try and throw someone who is leading them into that situation off. This is why people had to break horses, besides getting them used to the idea that they'd be chained to big heavy rolling things and having other animals sitting one their backs (an uncomfortable situation for any prey animal i should think). So people have been systematically breeding intelligence out of horses, except this makes them way more fearful. Might this, or the lack of this, have an effect on a horse-less world?

edited 5th Dec '11 7:55:18 PM by Grenedle

Breeding domesticated animals to become stupid is a prevailing theme. Except maybe for cats. Those who works with wild cattle and buffaloes know how aggressive they can be. Compare this to the domesticated breeds.

If a chicken crosses the road and nobody else is around to see it, does the road move beneath the chicken instead?

There's a big difference between "stupid" and "docile and compliant". Domesticated animals are bred for the latter, not the former.

...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.

Docile animals tend to have a shorter lifespan in the wild (both directly through their docility, and indirectly through their inexperience), so the latter effectively leads to the former, at least, where the animals aren't actually bred for their brains.

edited 5th Dec '11 8:28:47 PM by MattII

Yeah, most domesticated animals are stupid in a "problem solving" sense, but smart in a "understanding of social structures" sense.

For example, domestic dogs are capable of metacognition (thinking about thinking; for instance, a dog can watch another dog trying to solve a problem, and think about how they would solve the problem), but its doubtful that wild wolves are. However, very few domestic dogs are capable of understanding even basic problem solving skills. Example:

Dogs are a special case, they were bred as companion animals, not food animals (mostly at least), and so intelligence was valued, sometimes. Are sheep, goats, horses pigs or cattle in any way more intelligent than their wild ancestors? I doubt it, and I even doubt most dogs are as intelligent as your average wolf. Except for perhaps shepherding dogs, intelligence just wasn't a sought-after attribute

edited 5th Dec '11 8:59:46 PM by MattII

Apparently, in selecting companion dogs for blind people, they have to avoid the actual smartest dogs (probably border collies, in this case) because those dogs would realize that the owner was not the one in control and lead them all over the place wherever they happened to want. I've always found that amusing.

Also, anecdotally, there are some odd stories I've read about members of a line of cats bred for intelligence by someone with nothing better to do. One was apparently able to use a splinter of firewood as a lever to open a door that was stuck shut but not latched (in order to reach a female in heat). There's your problem-solving for you. Not like Sir Can't-Get-Out above (though that must be a special case; I can't imagine most dogs are so monumentally stupid).

Shinigan (Naruto fanfic)