Native American Horses

Native American on Horseback

Native American on Horseback

The Native Americans were not known to ride horses until the Spanish settlers arrived and taught them how to tame horses and use them for transportation. The Spanish brought the horse back into the United states during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and before this the horse was thought to have existed here during prehistoric times, and they also became extinct with the prehistoric dinosaurs.

Native American horses became very popular for transportation when they did come back due to the Spanish settlers. The first tribes that used Native American horses were the tribes that spread through what is now New Mexico into Texas and quickly became very popular among the Native indigenous people. Before long Native American horses spread throughout many of the Plains Indian tribes in the Midwest and south. The use of the horse made the lives of the Native Americans much easier and their daily tasks of hunting the buffalo and other wildlife became a much simpler task so they could provide for their tribes.

Once the horse was brought back into the area they began to breed and thrive once again throughout the lands and many more would soon arrive as European settlers began to arrive on the Native American lands. There are not many wild horses left since many nowadays are raised on farms and quite domesticated in comparison to the wild horses of the past. Native American horses were essential to the Indian tribes and they began to rely heavily on them for their travels during times of war and moving their tribal lands, as well as for hunting as previously stated.

Indian Chiefs on Horseback

Native chiefs Little Plume, Buckskin Charlie, Geronimo, Quanah Parker, Hollow Horn Bear and American Horse appear from left to right.

The Native American horses also greatly helped the Native Americans travel in order to trade many of their crafts and obtain many other goods to help their tribes and their families. The impact of the hors on native life was enormous and many Indian names also began to incorporate the word horse into them, one of the most famous being Crazy Horse. The horse was the second animal to be domesticated by the Native people; the first was the dog, which was used by the Native Americans in help with hunting.



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