Gaulish horses - coat colours?

[Andreas Johansson]

I find myself about to paint some Gaulish horsemen, and found myself wondering what coat colours might be suitable for their steeds?

I have two older lots of Gaulish cavalrymen, one on mostly bay horses, the other on duns. I have no recollection how I decided on either, but the former are painted as auxiliaries for a Roman army, and the latter for a Carthaginian one, so the idea wasn't necessarily that the horses were as Gaulish as their riders.

Is anything actually known?

(Why am I painting Gauls? Shouldn't I be finishing one of the existing projects instead? Ah-ha! Gotcha! One of the existing projects is Carthaginians, which justifies painting damn near anything from west of the Aegean.)

[Erpingham]

This study found bay, chestnut and black solid colours in Iron Age Celtic horses from Switzerland.  Very small sample, so not safe to exclude other colours but does include in those.

[Andreas Johansson]

Thanks, excellent.

(Isn't it slightly weird, though, to say that no mutations in dilution loci were found? Dun being the wild type, isn't it the solid coloured horses who are mutants?)

But a mix of chestnuts, bays and blacks sounds like a good idea so far. No markings make for quick painting

[Swampster]

There is a suggestion that at least some are from a ritual context and so may have been chosen for being solid coloured.
Chestnuts in particular commonly have white markings - blaze, socks etc.
I think at least some white markings really help with the look of the painted figures and are quick to do.

IIRC, white markings seem to be less common in Chinese art, so I don't tend to put them on those figures. On the plus side, there are distinctive colours which can be used instead.

FWIW, Phil Barker's AMPW (2nd ed? - pre-Duncan anyway) and AEIR have suggestions for horse colouring in various areas which seems to come from written sources.

P.

[Martin Smith]

>
Chestnuts in particular commonly have white markings - blaze, socks etc.
I think at least some white markings really help with the look of the painted figures and are quick to do.
>

Totally agree. A few white stars/flashes on the faces and some socks makes all the difference...a chestnut without at least some white socks just isn't anywhere near as attractive on the table.

[Andreas Johansson]

FWIW, Phil Barker's AMPW (2nd ed? - pre-Duncan anyway) and AEIR have suggestions for horse colouring in various areas which seems to come from written sources.

The 1982 Duncan edition does the same - we learn inter alia that the Persians liked chestnuts and blacks - but nothing is said about Celtic horse colours specifically. AEIR isn't helpful either.

Adding a few white markings doesn't take much time, no, but still some.

I'm trying to recall where I read that Ancient British horses would be dun - maybe it had something to say on Continental Celtic horses' too? (AEIR offers that Cu Chulainn had a grey and a black horse for his team, but that's the wrong island hundreds of years later.)

[Erpingham]

I'm not sure that the genetics of that Swiss study would pick up white feet or blazes, so I wouldn't rule them out.  They didn't pick up the markers for certain coat changes, like spotted or part-colours like piebald or skewbald, though.

[Erpingham]

OK, a quick trip to the book "stack" has retrieved Phil Barker's AMPW from 1971 (I've had this for over 50 years).  He doesn't say much on Gallic horses, except on p.53 under Cavalry Horses of Other Nations he states

"Gauls considered that greys attracted more than their fair share of missiles"

This is presumably from a literary source but Phil rarely gave sources.  Anybody know where it came from?

[Andreas Johansson]

No idea what Phil's source may have been, but the below article suggests that lighter-coloured horses may have been disfavored in medieval times because they were easier targets for longbows. I confess myself a little skeptical.

https://www.nature.com/articles/srep38548?WT.feed_name=subjects_biological-sciences

I thought that the absence of spotting genes meant no markings, but on some further googling apparently only some white markings are caused by spotting genes. So the study is probably silent on the presence of other white markings.

(Hey, it wouldn't be genetics if it wasn't horribly complicated!)

[Erpingham]

lighter-coloured horses may have been disfavored in medieval times because they were easier targets for longbows.

Hmmm.. Plenty of grey horses in medieval records. As does art. The Middle Ages had more terms for grey horses than we do, which would also be odd if knights avoided them because they were arrow magnets.

Add : Here is a list of horses at one of Edward III's studs at Stratfield Mortimer, Berkshire, in 1349 (prime longbow period)

"1 bay with white spots and two rear white feet, 1 bay, 1 white-grey with one left rear foot, 1 black which blends into grey, 3 greys, 1 brown bay with two rear white feet, 2 blacks with stars in front, 3 sorrels with white spots, 1 black with two white front feet, 1 grey with white spots, 1 brown bay, and 1 bay-grey"

Grey aversion does not seem to be in evidence here. 

Further add : Another discussion of medieval horse colours, this time belonging to Henry V

https://medievalwarhorse.exeter.ac.uk/2022/12/20/a-good-horse-has-no-colour-or-does-it/

About half the horses owned by Henry V were greys, the most popular single colour being lyard, a silver-grey. Grey horses were popular gifts.  Unless Henry intended recipients to be easier targets for enemy archers, it suggests prestige rather than avoidance.

What I haven't found is continental European detailed studies on horse colours, though I've seen references to suggest that such studies could be compiled.  Maybe these would produce a different result.  Or maybe the authors were just repeating a Victorian myth.

[Duncan Head]

OK, a quick trip to the book "stack" has retrieved Phil Barker's AMPW from 1971 (I've had this for over 50 years).  He doesn't say much on Gallic horses, except on p.53 under Cavalry Horses of Other Nations he states

"Gauls considered that greys attracted more than their fair share of missiles"

This is presumably from a literary source but Phil rarely gave sources.  Anybody know where it came from?

I have looked for this reference in the past without being able to find its source. I have a vague memory the idea may be mentioned in Alfred Duggan's Winter Quarters, which of course features Gaulish horsemen, but even assuming Duggan had the same source as Phil, that is little help.

[Erpingham]

I have a vague memory the idea may be mentioned in Alfred Duggan's Winter Quarters, which of course features Gaulish horsemen,

"...as a warhorse, he had one fault : in colour he was a light grey, and it is well-known that grey horses attract more than their share of arrows" Winter Quarters Chapter II (p.40 in my 1974 paperback).  Originally published in 1958. Note the similar phrasing to the Phil Barker quote.

[Duncan Head]

Hah! Well found, Anthony.

[Cantabrigian]

Some amazing sleuth-work in this thread!

[Keraunos]

But we are left in suspense.  Is Alfred Duggan the source and it is a modern myth, or did he base his fiction on anything?