Continues..........Page 2

Although a cliché of the sporting pages of the tabloids and broadsheets today, the phrase ‘Sport of Kings’ to identify racing horses on the flat, has been used over the ages for all forms of horse racing. In 1735, an English country gentleman, William Somerville wrote in The Chase:

‘My hoarse-sounding horn,
Invites thee to the chase, the sport of kings,
Image of war, without its guilt’.

Probably all of us at one time or another have referred to someone as being ‘on his high horse’, when he is behaving in a superior or arrogant way. This reference has been around since at least the early 1700s, and derives from the era when people of rank were mounted on horses of exceptional height in order to draw attention to their status and to allow them to be better viewed by the rank and file. However, the cliché now is a derisory term meaning someone has given himself airs and graces above his station.

There can be few in today’s competitive society who have not had occasion to feel as though they have been ‘ridden roughshod over’, i.e. given no care or consideration. This expression is based on the fact that a ‘roughshod’ horse was left with the heads of the nails standing proud of the shoes so as to give him grip and reduce the risk of slipping. Removable studs have replaced this practise, but somehow ‘ridden studded over’ lacks lyricism, which may account for the original term retaining its place in our language.

A person who seemed to be on one side of an issue and then changed to the other without warning is often said to ‘change horses mid-stream’. The importance of horses in people’s every day lives lead them to apply maxims alluded to them – their companions in work, play and survival.

‘Hold Your Horses’ – a popular way of saying ‘keep calm’, ‘stay steady’ – comes directly from dealing with nervous or excitable horses, and in the USA had become extended to people by the 1840s.

‘Kick up your heels’ – high-spiritedness – comes from the bucking of joyful horses. Yet conversely, in the 16^th century it actually meant ‘to die’. When we break rules or challenge standards we are said to be ‘kicking over the traces’ – a direct reference to a recalcitrant carriage horse resenting its restrictive harness.

To act impulsively or ‘on the spur of the moment’ is taken from the fact that the spur prompts the horse into rapid response! Writing in January 1806, Archibald Duncan regarded the funeral of Admiral Nelson as ‘… the contrivance of Mr Wyatt, on the spur of the moment’.

‘Prick up one’s ears’ – just as horses do when interested – means to take notice. A character from Shakespeare’s The Tempest, says:

‘Then I beat my tabor;
At which, like unback’d colts, they prick’d their ears,
Advanced their eyelids, lifted their noses,
As they smelt music.’

‘Put your shoulder to the wheel’ now means to apply yourself energetically to a chore, but refers to the regular requirement to help push the cart out of the mire when the going was too deep and difficult for the horses alone. A person who fails to prioritise well is often said to be ‘putting the cart before the horse’ – a futile exercise leading to much time and effort wasted.

Perhaps a less popular saying is ‘stalking horse’ which is used to express a manoeuvre to outwit an opponent. This originated with the hunter who, nearing his quarry, would dismount and use his horse as a shield to approach closer to the game – most probably a deer. Shakespeare shows how by his time the ancient phrase had already widened its meaning, for in As You Like It the Duke observes: “He uses his folly like a stalking-horse and under the presentation of that he shoots his wit”.

‘Strike while the iron is hot’, meaning to take advantage quickly of an opportunity, refers to the skill of the farrier. The iron was the horse shoe, the striker the farrier himself. While the steel is still hot from the fire, the shoe can be shaped to perfectly fit the horse’s hoof, to let it cool is to lose the moment. Geoffrey Chaucer, who was King Richard II’s Clerk of Works as well as the author of the Canterbury Tales, first recorded the maxim in 1386.

‘Take the bit between his teeth’, which horses do to avoid the control of the reins – and we’ve probably all experienced this on a disobedient or frightened horse! In human terms it has been used since the 16^th century to mean someone proceeding stubbornly on a set course. Perhaps a natural follow-on is the proverb ‘you can take a horse to water but you can’t make him drink’ meaning you cannot persuade a stubborn person to change his views, and was first recorded in 1546 by the English dramatist John Heywood: ‘A man may well bring a horse to the water, But he can not make hym drynke without he will’. We have all offered water to our horses when we have felt they must surely need it, only to find it disdainfully rejected, but how many who use the proverb realise its roots in an equine truth?

In addition, high wispy clouds are called ‘mares tails’; washing is put on a clothes-horse; we ‘bridle’ when something offends us; a complaining wife is a nag; we eat horseradish sauce, ‘devils on horseback’ and ‘angels on horseback’; fix horseshoes over doorways for good luck; our children ride rocking horses at home, hobby horses at the fair, and play with horse chestnuts even if they do call them conkers. We use equine images for corporate insignia (a certain bank’s black horse) and county emblems (Kent’s rearing horse, a Saxon motif). Some perceive that the Four Apocalyptic Horsemen each mounted on a red, black, pale or white horse, will herald the end of the world.

If this is so, equus will exercise a privilege he has earned through his selfless service to man over millennia – the emissary of the last word!

© Cheryl R Lutring 2004

We are extremely grateful to Valerie Rumsey for providing us with the amusing sketches to accompany this article

© Sue Wingate - The Joy of Horses 2004