Editing Domestication of the horse (section)

===Geographic expansion===
The appearance of horse remains in human settlements in regions where they had not previously been present is another indicator of domestication. Although images of horses appear as early as the [[Upper Paleolithic]] period in places such as the caves of [[Lascaux]], France, suggesting that wild horses lived in regions outside of the Eurasian steppes<!--i.e. what today is the Ukraine and Eastern Europe--> before domestication and may have even been hunted by early humans, concentration of remains suggests animals being deliberately captured and contained, an indicator of domestication, at least for food, if not necessarily use as a working animal.

Around 3500–3000 BCE, horse bones began to appear more frequently in archaeological sites beyond their center of distribution in the Eurasian steppes and were seen in central [[Europe]], the middle and lower [[Danube]] valley, and the North [[Caucasus]] and [[South Caucasus|Transcaucasia]]. Evidence of horses in these areas had been rare before, and as numbers increased, larger animals also began to appear in horse remains. This expansion in range was contemporary with the Botai culture, where there are indications that horses were corralled and ridden. This does not necessarily mean that horses were first domesticated in the steppes, but the horse-hunters of the steppes certainly pursued wild horses more than in any other region.<ref name="Bökönyi1978" /><ref name="Benecke1994" /><ref name="Bökönyi1991" />

European wild horses were hunted for up to 10% of the animal bones in a handful of [[Mesolithic]] and [[Neolithic]] settlements scattered across [[Spain]], [[France]], and the marshlands of northern [[Germany]], but in many other parts of Europe, including [[Greece]], the [[Balkans]], the [[British Isles]], and much of central Europe, horse bones do not occur or occur very rarely in Mesolithic, Neolithic or Chalcolithic sites. In contrast, wild horse bones regularly exceeded 40% of the identified animal bones in Mesolithic and Neolithic camps in the Eurasian steppes, west of the Ural Mountains.<ref name="Benecke1994" /><ref name="Benecke1997">{{cite journal | last = Benecke | first = Norbert | year = 1997 | title = Archaeozoological studies on the transition from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic in the North Pontic region |url=http://sciencepress.mnhn.fr/sites/default/files/articles/pdf/az1998n25-26a73.pdf| journal = Anthropozoologica | volume = 25–26 | pages = 631–641 }}</ref><ref name="Uerpmann1990">{{cite journal | last = Uerpmann | first = Hans-Peter | year = 1990 | title = Die Domestikation des Pferdes im Chalcolithikum West– und Mitteleuropas | journal = Madrider Mitteilungen | volume = 31 | pages = 109–153 }}</ref>

Horse bones were rare or absent in [[Neolithic]] and [[Chalcolithic]] kitchen garbage in western [[Turkey]], [[Mesopotamia]], most of [[Iran]], South and Central [[Asia]], and much of Europe.<ref name="Benecke1994">{{cite book |title=Archäozoologische Studien zur Entwicklung der Haustierhaltung in Mitteleuropa und Südskandinavien von Anfängen bis zum ausgehenden Mittelalter |last=Benecke |first=Norbert |year=1994 |publisher=Akademie Verlag |location=Berlin |isbn=978-3-05-002415-8 |series=Schriften zur Ur– und Frühgeschichte |volume=46 }}</ref><ref name="Bökönyi1991">{{cite book |title=Equids in the Ancient World |series=Beihefte zum Tübinger Atlas des Vorderen Orients: Reihe A (Naturwissenschaften) |volume=19 |last=Bökönyi |first=Sándor |editor=Meadow, Richard H. |editor2=Uerpmann, Hans-Peter |year=1991 |publisher=Ludwig Reichert Verlag |location=Wiesbaden |pages=123–131 |chapter=Late Chalcolithic horses in Anatolia }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last = Meadow | first = Richard H. |author2=Patel, Ajita | year = 1997 | title = A comment on 'Horse Remains from Surkotada' by Sándor Bökönyi | journal = South Asian Studies | volume = 13 | pages = 308–315| doi=10.1080/02666030.1997.9628545}}</ref> While horse bones have been identified in Neolithic sites in central Turkey, all [[equid]]s together totaled less than 3% of the animal bones. Within this three percent, horses were less than 10%, with 90% or more of the equids represented by [[onager]]s (''Equus hemionus'') or another ass-like equid that later became extinct, the hydruntine or European wild ass (''[[Equus hydruntinus]]'').<ref name="Russell2005">{{cite book |title=Inhabiting Çatalhöyük: Reports From the 1995–1999 Seasons |volume=4 |last=Russell |first=Nerissa |author2=Martin, Louise |editor=Hodder, Ian |year=2005 |publisher=McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research |location=Cambridge |pages=33–98 |chapter=Çatalhöyük Mammal Remains }}</ref> Onagers were the most common native wild equids of the Near East. They were hunted in [[Syria]], [[Anatolia]], [[Mesopotamia]], [[Iran]], and Central Asia; and domesticated asses (''[[Equus asinus]]'') were imported into Mesopotamia, probably from [[Egypt]], but wild horses apparently did not live there.<!--where? Egypt or Mesopotamia?--><ref name="Oates2003">{{cite book |title=Prehistoric Steppe Adaptation and the Horse |last=Oates |first=Joan |editor=Levine, Marsha |editor2=Renfrew, Colin |editor3=Boyle, Katie |year=2003 |publisher=McDonald Institute |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-1-902937-09-0 |pages=115–125 |chapter=A note on the early evidence for horse and the riding of equids in Western Asia }}</ref>

====Other evidence of geographic expansion====
[[File:Ashurbanipal inspects booty and prisoners from Babylon, 645-640 BCE.jpg|thumb|225px|Relief depicting [[Assyria]]n king [[Ashurbanipal]] in a chariot, inspecting booty and prisoners from [[Babylon]]]]
In [[Northern Caucasus]], the [[Maikop culture]] settlements and burials of c. 3300 BC contain both horse bones and images of horses. A frieze of nineteen horses painted in black and red colours is found in one of the Maikop graves. The widespread appearance of horse bones and images in Maikop sites suggest to some observers that horseback riding began in the Maikop period.<ref name="Anthony2007"/>{{rp|291}}

Later, images of horses, identified by their short ears, flowing manes, and tails that bushed out at the dock, began to appear in artistic media in Mesopotamia during the [[Akkadian Empire|Akkadian]] period, 2300–2100 BCE. The word for "horse", literally translated as ''ass of the mountains,'' first appeared in [[Sumer]]ian documents during the [[Third dynasty of Ur]], about 2100–2000 BCE.<ref name="Oates2003" /><ref name="Drews2004">{{cite book |title=Early Riders: The beginnings of mounted warfare in Asia and Europe |last=Drews |first=Robert |author-link=Robert Drews |year=2004 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |isbn=978-0-415-32624-7 }}</ref> The kings of the Third Dynasty of Ur apparently fed horses to lions for royal entertainment, perhaps indicating that horses were still regarded as more exotic than useful, but King [[Shulgi]], about 2050 BCE, compared himself to "a horse of the highway that swishes its tail", and one image from his reign showed a man apparently riding a horse at full gallop.<ref name="Owen1991">{{cite journal | last = Owen | first = David I. | year = 1991 | title = The first equestrian: an Ur III glyptic scene | journal = Acta Sumerologica | volume = 13 | pages = 259–273}}</ref> Horses were imported into Mesopotamia and the lowland Near East in larger numbers after 2000 BCE in connection with the beginning of [[Chariot tactics|chariot warfare]], replacing the long-established [[Kunga (equid)|kunga]] (a hybrid between the now-extinct [[Syrian wild ass]] and a [[domestic donkey]]) as the main equid for warfare.

[[File:Shirenzigou panorama.png|thumb|Surroundings of the [[Barkol Kazakh Autonomous County|Shirenzigou]] archaeological site in Barkol County.]]
A further expansion, into the lowland [[Near East]] and northwestern [[China]], also happened around 2000 BCE. Although ''Equus'' bones of uncertain species are found in some Late Neolithic sites in China dated before 2000 BCE, ''Equus caballus'' or ''Equus ferus'' bones first appeared in multiple sites and in significant numbers in sites of the [[Qijia culture|Qijia]] and [[Siba culture|Siba]] cultures, 2000–1600 BCE, in [[Gansu]] and the northwestern provinces of China.<ref name="Linduff2003">{{cite book |title=Prehistoric Steppe Adaptation and the Horse |last=Linduff |first=Katheryn M. |editor=Levine, Marsha |editor2=Renfrew, Colin |editor3=Boyle, Katie |year=2003 |publisher=McDonald Institute |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-1-902937-09-0 |pages=139–162 |chapter=A walk on the wild side: late Shang appropriation of horses in China }}</ref> Skeletal evidence from sites in [[Shirenzigou]] and Xigou in eastern [[Xinjiang]] indicate that by the fourth century BCE both horseback riding and mounted archery were practiced along China’s northwest frontier.<ref name="Li">{{cite journal |last1=Li |first1=Yue |last2=Zhang |first2=Chengrui |last3=Taylor |first3=William Timothy Treal |last4=Chen |first4=Liang |last5=Flad |first5=Rowan K. |last6=Boivin |first6=Nicole |last7=Liu |first7=Huan |last8=You |first8=Yue |last9=Wang |first9=Jianxin |last10=Ren |first10=Meng |last11=Xi |first11=Tongyuan |last12=Han |first12=Yifu |last13=Wen |first13=Rui |last14=Ma |first14=Jian  |display-authors=5 |title=Early evidence for mounted horseback riding in northwest China |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |date=24 November 2020 |volume=117 |issue=47 |pages=29569–29576 |doi=10.1073/pnas.2004360117 |pmid=33139545 |pmc=7703595 |bibcode=2020PNAS..11729569L |language=en |issn=0027-8424|doi-access=free }}</ref>

A few horse bones, and an iron horse bit, have been found at [[Gandhara grave culture]] (c. 1200 - 800 BCE) sites, of Pakistan's, Swat Valley.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Azzaroli |first=Augusto |date=1975 |title=Two Proto-historic Horse Skeletons from Swāt, Pakistan |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/29756092 |journal=East and West |volume=25 |issue=3/4 |pages=353–357 |issn=0012-8376}}</ref> While the contemporary [[Vedas]] (c. 1500–500 BCE) make numerous references to both the use of [[History of the horse in the Indian subcontinent|horses and chariots within the Indian subcontinent]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Sparreboom |first=M. |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Chariots_in_the_Veda.html?id=6alT6zhVUlAC&redir_esc=y |title=Chariots in the Veda |date=1985 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-07590-0 |language=en}}</ref>

In 2008, archaeologists announced the discovery of rock art in [[Somalia]]'s northern [[Dhambalin]] region, which the researchers suggest is one of the earliest known depictions of a hunter on horseback. The rock art is in the Ethiopian-Arabian style, dated to 1000 to 3000 BCE.<ref name="Tdodras">{{cite journal|last=Mire|first=Sada|title=The Discovery of Dhambalin Rock Art Site, Somaliland|journal=African Archaeological Review|year=2008|volume=25|issue=3–4|pages=153–168|url=http://www.mbali.info/doc494.htm|doi=10.1007/s10437-008-9032-2|s2cid=162960112|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130627100400/http://www.mbali.info/doc494.htm|archive-date=27 June 2013}}</ref><ref name="Guafcpaonas">{{cite news|last=Alberge|first=Dalya|title=UK archaeologist finds cave paintings at 100 new African sites|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/sep/17/cave-paintings-found-in-somaliland|newspaper=The Guardian|date=17 September 2010}}</ref>