Wild Horses and Their Relatives in the Middle Ages

In the medieval times, wild horses appear as assets - potentially useful animals to be tamed, – as beasts hunted for consumption or pure fun, as pests and, sometimes, as sources of danger. Wild Horses and Their Relatives in the Middle Ages offers a comprehensive and interdisciplinary exploration of the presence, perception, and treatment of wild and feral horses across medieval Europe and adjacent regions. Drawing on archaeological evidence, genetic studies, medieval legal codes, hippiatric treatises, chronicles, and visual culture, the book interrogates the ambiguous status of wild horses in the historical record and challenges modern assumptions about equine domestication.Anastasija Ropa traces the biological and legal distinctions between wild and domestic horses, and examines how medieval authors and artists depicted equine life. From breeding advice in hippiatric treatises to frescoes showing horse hunts, these sources reveal how horses were embedded in medieval economies, landscapes, and imaginations—not only as laborers and companions but also as symbols of status, wilderness, and power.