Oldest DNA from domesticated American horse lends credence to shipwreck folklore | Hacker News Reader

Oldest DNA from domesticated American horse lends credence to shipwreck folklore

phys.org

109 pointspseudolus28 comments

If you looked side by side at an american mustang and a modern european warmblood or thoroughbred (after the introduction of arab and anglo-arab lines into european studbooks around the 17th century during an apparent period of fashionable anglomania in france), the missing link between them would be iberian horses like the lusitano and andalusian. It's not scientific, but mustangs are thought (colloquially) to be the descendents of escaped iberian horses both because of the plausibility of the shipwreck theory, and their general conformation. (shorter backed, roman noses, pointed ears, whereas up-hill withers are more of an artificial selective breeding trait) Another marker for iberian horses today is the common incidence of piraplasmosis, which may be interesting to see if it appears in those island horse bones, as it may indicate where the horse would have acquired it.

The andalusian and lusitano are often called baroque breeds and they have a more compact conformation and up-and-down movement that we refer to as "carriage-y" now because we think of pulling carriages, but the iberian horses were bred for their agility and bold temperament for cattle herding (bullfighting and skirmishing cavalry), so a shorter back (think turning a short wheelbase) gave them an advantage. Wild horses in the US weren't subject to the "lightening up" of the breed that introducing anglo-arabs into european studbooks did. But admittedly these are post-hoc explanations that pervade horse history.

The DNA evidence in the article confirms some ideas that I think had more rigor and reason than folklore, unless we treat historians and horsemen as folklorists.

Do you have a newsletter I can subscribe to

Unfortunately, these days if it isn't 'science', it doesn't count...

That is a great bit of knowledge you have and it opened up a whole realm of thinking regarding genetic modification that I haven't ever explored. Primarily about the longevity and complexity of a society that requires the modification compared with their ultimate success. As we see many instances of domestication in various species, but often little diversity in that domestication.

I'm interested to know what the possible genetic markers could provide regarding the history of the migrations across, say, Northern Europe of the Celts and Scots and if there are any distinct breeds that can be traced. Or tying those forward to the breeds we see of the various native tribes across America

I can recommend this documentary series: https://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/equus-story-of-the-horse-abo... it's dramatic, but fun.

(second episode here: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7xsqy0)

I have a pet theory about how greek mythology talks about wisdom originating from centaurs who lived in the forests of the "east" rhymes pretty well with mongolian horse cultures, where full time riders being percieved half-man and half-horse barbarians is a pretty plausible metaphorical description. These centaurs would have brought sophisticated techniques for domestication, and even the necessary cultural morals and ethics that were the effect of their competence - and which cultivated willingness in the animals, and the stewardship of them. The myth of greek titans raised with the wisdom of centaurs is appealing, and what we understand as hellenic western values that originate from those myths may have been the necessary conseqeuence of our species relationship to horses. The link above talks about the Mongolian connection.

This is more hypothesis generation than explanatory, but horses live shorter lives than humans, we would have left dead ones behind over the course of our migrations. Maybe it could inspire something to test for in the genetic record. The documentary gets into prehistoric ancestors of them, so there are definitely serious people working on this academically.

Interesting take. I'll check these out, thank you

Surprised that the article doesn't at least mention the fun fact that horses (and camels!) originally evolved in North America, only becoming extinct around 10,000 years ago as a result of the cooling caused by the last ice age.

Interesting! Why couldn’t they have migrated down to Mexico?

I suppose, they were hunted along the way. Humans were already there. https://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2015/03/25/horses-hunted-north-a...

Hunting to extinction and/or out-competition from humans for resources is also cited by some sources as a factor.

It's a regular coincidence in archaeology that when humans show up, other species tend to go extinct. Then there's debate whether humans caused it or not.

I understand it is a popular theory, but I just have a hard time believing that humans would be able to hunt horses to extinction in the Americas, without even a small reserve of them remaining and then repopulating. The current estimate is less than 1M people spread out across the Americas around 10k BC...I just don't see how it could happen. It seems like larger climate change may have been the reason humans start going to America, and also leading to the horses demise.

For anyone interested, the picture Figure 1 [0] - as one would except - is quite messy but yeah, Equus (most recent common ancestor) node 1 and node 2 (3.9 - 7.8 mya (~5.6 mya)) and the divergence (node 3) to caballine/non-caballine Equus @ ~4.0–4.5 mya; those bifurcations - based on the found fossils - all originated from North America (orange color).

[next @~1mya (the lower orange (North America) caballine arm from node 3): leading to E. caballus (green: Eurasia) --> domesticated [1] horses]

Regarding the causes of the Late Quaternary extinctions [2] it is pretty hard to pinpoint a single cause e.g. climate change etc. and there are a lot of hypotheses floating around (probably the most curious/spectacular of the bunch: younger dryas impact theory).

But at some point regardless of the causes - approx. 10.000 years ago - there are no traces found of (wild) horses in the Americas, anymore; they only reemerge again with the reintroduction by the European colonists in the 15/16th century.

[0]https://elifesciences.org/articles/29944/figures#content

[1]https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/horse-dom...

[2]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8654998/#!po=32...

I had read this kind of timeline before but then more recently encountered claims that the Native Americans had horses (e.g., https://indiancountrytoday.com/news/yes-world-there-were-hor...). Is there any validity to these claims?

The overlap between the last known modern horse and the first people in America is about 2000 years. If they domesticated horses in that time, how come the horses didn't thrive along with the human population?

I think the horse population where already on the brink of vanishing due to climate change after the last ice age, and the new Americans simply ate the last of them.

I have quickly scanned the Phd thesis [0] and regarding the citied (basically the same sources as mine above) DNA analysis and fossils found (carbon dating) the uncertainties in the measurements themselves are given as evidence of "denial". Apart from presupposing a "western mindset/bias" there is no clear pointing evidence given to the contrary other than the indigenous oral/cultural history; it is after all a Phd in "Indigenous Studies". So, the biological hard evidence (phylogeny/populations) seems pretty weak.

But of course one should be open to the possibility, there are a lot of twists, turns, dead ends ... in history (we have very limited datapoints), especially farther afield.

[0]https://m.box.com/shared_item/https%3A%2F%2Fapp.box.com%2Fs%...

That's super interesting. Always thought they originated in Europe, Asia, and Africa

The tiny community museum in Shoshone, California has fossilized camel tracks taken from a nearby dry lake.

> the fun fact that horses (and camels!) originally evolved in North America, only becoming extinct around 10,000 years ago

It is important to note that those "horses" that became extinct were about the size of large house cats. We have miniature horses today, but the originals were much smaller.

Would you rather fight 100 American horses …

For context, domestication of large beasts of burden were an important factor in early technological progress. These animals were important for farming and also for commerce (eg by transporting goods and people across large land distances).

People point to this for the lower technological progress in South America vs Europe and Asia because the largest animal South American peoples had access to (up until a few centuries ago) was the llama.

Obviously there are military implications to the horse as well. Not just the Mongols either. Horses were key to Rome too.

The Spanish brought over horses obviously.

But it's really interesting to think how society in the Americas could be completely shaped and changed by something like a shipwreck bringing horses, something they didn't have until then.

The shipwreck theory isn't that horses were introduced to the Americas by a shipwreck. It's specifically the Chincoteague and Assateague ponies that are being discussed here. There's a lot of speculation as to how they ended up on the islands and one of those is that they swam to shore after the ship they were on, bound for a Spanish colony further south, was wrecked and sunk.

The saltwater cowboys and the annual pony roundup on Assateague Island (the descendants of the shipwrecked Spanish horses) are very unique pieces of coastal culture, it's an interesting case study in preservation of a "wild" population [0].

0 - https://www.chincoteague.com/pony_swim_guide.html

Is there a purpose/reason for doing this beyond tradition & public entertainment? It seems a bit cruel/stressful for feral animals to be herded, penned, and then forced to swim?

There is a purpose! Without regulation of the population, then there wouldn’t be enough resources in terms of grass on the island and so you would have part of the population starving.

The animals are individually vet checked as well as a part of the process.

Hmm... maybe they need some Guide Stones which talk about herd management.

>Without regulation of the population, then there wouldn’t be enough resources in terms of grass on the island and so you would have part of the population starving.

Exactly so. If only more of my fellow human beings took this bit of logic to heart about our own species we'd be much better off.

There are two populations of "ponies" on Assateague. A VA herd and a MD herd. The land-manager for each is different (USFWS vs NPS).

For the VA (USFWS) herd, the herd size is capped at 150 adults and the Chincoteague VFC is the herd manager/owner. The annual pony crossing is part of herd health and population management. Pregnant and newly birthed mares/foals do not make the crossing - they are corralled separately and transported via trailer. Part of the crossing effort includes health checks as well as the auction.

The MD (NPS) herd is feral with contraceptives used to manage population and avoid over-grazing. Other than contraception, the herd is managed like other wild life (ie, mostly left alone, except for exceptional circumstances). This herd is not part of the crossing.

There are several wikipedia entries for the ponies, the crossing, etc, if you're interested.

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