BritLibAddMS35166ApocalypseUnkFolio3SealBlackHorse

A palfrey is a type of horse that was highly valued as a riding horse in the Middle Ages. It was a lighter-weight horse, usually a smooth gaited one that could amble, suitable for riding over long distances. Palfreys were not a specific breed as

horse breed A horse breed is a selectively bred population of domesticated horses, often with pedigrees recorded in a breed registry. However, the term is sometimes used in a broader sense to define landrace animals of a common phenotype located within a lim ...

s are understood today.

Etymology

The word "palfrey" is

cognate In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymology, etymological ancestor in a proto-language, common parent language. Because language c ...

with the German word for a horse (of any type), ''Pferd''. Both descend from Latin, ''paraveredus'', meaning a post horse or courier horse, itself deriving from Gaulish ''vorēdos''. The German term for a palfrey, meanwhile, is ''Zelter'', which literally means '' ambler'' and is cognate with the Icelandic, '' tölt''.

Breeding

A palfrey usually was the most expensive and highly bred type of riding horse during the Middle Ages, sometimes equalling the knight's destrier in price. Consequently, it was popular with nobles, ladies, and highly ranked knights for riding,

hunting Hunting is the human activity, human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, or killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to harvest food (i.e. meat) and useful animal products (fur/hide (skin), hide, ...

, and ceremonial use.

Oakeshott, Ewart Ronald Ewart Oakeshott (25 May 1916 – 30 September 2002) was a British illustrator, collector, and amateur historian who wrote prodigiously on medieval arms and armour. He was a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, a Founder Member of the Ar ...

. ''A Knight and his Horse'', Rev. 2nd Ed. USA:Dufour Editions, 1998. Knights would ride palfreys to battle so that their heavier warhorses wouldn't be fatigued during combat.

Gait

The significant characteristic of the palfrey was that, rather than trotting, it usually possessed a smooth,

ambling An ambling gait or amble is any of several four-beat intermediate horse gaits, all of which are faster than a walk but usually slower than a canter and always slower than a gallop. Horses that amble are sometimes referred to as "gaited", particu ...

gait.Bennett, Deb. ''Conquerors: The Roots of New World Horsemanship.'' Amigo Publications Inc; 1st edition 1998. {{ISBN, 0-9658533-0-6 The amble was the name given to a group of smooth, four-beat gaits faster than a walk, but slower than a canter or gallop. The trot is a two-beat gait, about 8 mph, suitable for covering a lot of ground relatively quickly. However, the horse also has a bit of a spring in its motion as it switches diagonal pairs of legs with each beat, and thus can be rough for a rider, and the trot also jostles about packs or weaponry to a considerable degree. The amble is about as fast as the trot, not tiring for a horse that performs it naturally, and much smoother for the rider. Thus, because much ground transportation in the Middle Ages was on horseback, with long distances to be covered, a smooth-gaited horse was much desired. An amble is achieved by the horse when it moves with a four-step rhythm, either derived from the two-beat lateral gait known as the

pace Pace or paces may refer to: Business *Pace (transit), a bus operator in the suburbs of Chicago, US * Pace Airlines, an American charter airline *Pace Foods, a maker of a popular brand of salsa sold in North America, owned by Campbell Soup Compan ...

or from the diagonal trot, with the two beats broken up so there are four. There are several variations, but most either have a lateral sequence of footfalls (left hind, left front, right hind, right front), or a diagonal sequence (left hind, right front, right hind, left front). In either case, only one foot is all the way off the ground at a time. Such a gait can be maintained for long distances, and sometimes at considerable speed. Modern genetic studies have verified that ambling ability is linked to a specific genetic mechanism. Edward the Confessor Ee

Ambling horses are now uncommon in Europe. They were effectively replaced by trotting horses for several reasons: The first was that as roads improved, travel by

carriage A carriage is a private four-wheeled vehicle for people and is most commonly horse-drawn. Second-hand private carriages were common public transport, the equivalent of modern cars used as taxis. Carriage suspensions are by leather strapping an ...

became more common, and trotting horse breeds were generally larger and stronger, more suited to the job at hand. Another reason was the rise of the Thoroughbred and other breeds developed for

horse racing Horse racing is an equestrian performance sport, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its basic p ...

and for light

cavalry Historically, cavalry (from the French word ''cavalerie'', itself derived from "cheval" meaning "horse") are soldiers or warriors who fight mounted on horseback. Cavalry were the most mobile of the combat arms, operating as light cavalry ...

, both of which required horses able to gallop for substantial periods of time. Breeds swift at the gallop also tend to trot rather than pace or amble. In the Americas, ambling horses continued to be bred, both in the southern United States and in Latin America. The smooth ambling gaits today have many names, including the single-foot, the stepping pace, the tolt, the rack, the paso corto, and the fox trot (see ''

''). There are still many ambling breeds, particularly in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

where today they are referred to as gaited horses. Some of these breeds include the Missouri Fox Trotter, Tennessee Walking Horse, Icelandic horse and a sub-group within the

American Saddlebred The American Saddlebred is a horse breed from the United States. This breed is referred to as the "Horse America Made". Descended from riding-type horses bred at the time of the American Revolution, the American Saddlebred includes the Nar ...

. The Paso Fino and the Peruvian Paso, breeds developed in Latin America, perform two or three different ambling gaits of varying speed, and are probably the closest modern descendants of the medieval palfrey.

References

Types of horse Medieval society

Etymology

Breeding

Gait

See also

References