From: Marc Verhaegen
Message: 122
Date: 1999-10-29
... If you are managing herds of horses or cattle, however, being mounted on horseback is almost obligatory. I cannot imagine how you would handle a free-ranging bull otherwise. A shepherd's job and a cowboy's job are quite different....The Divine Twins, in their Indic incarnation, were the horse-gods: the Asvins. In Greece, they are a little different. In one version, Castor is killed while he and his brother are engaged in rustling cattle. Rustling cattle? Yeah. Thinking of ancient Greece and the ancient steppe in terms of the mythic American Old West is useful. I have grave doubts that no one has ever noticed this before. But it's a subject that's ever-interesting, and probably merits a modern workup. I'm not qualified to do this. One book that seems to have not been written is an archaeological/ethnological study of equines, bovines, caprines and ovines in ancient European times, a genetic history of the domestic horse and domestic cattle, combined with a rancher's insight into how one handles the animals, and how one selectively breeds such animals.