Spanish ancestry in domestic North American horses

The horse has been central to many indigenous cultures throughout the American Southwest and the Great Plains area. However, when and where these important animal companions first integrated into such societies has long remained a mystery.

Many Western scientists believe that domesticated horses were introduced to the region by Europeans after the Spanish colonization of Mexico, and were found widely throughout the American West in the late 17th century. Much of these opinions are based on the records of 18th and 19th century European colonizers, often riddled with inaccuracies and strong anti-indigenous bias.

Scientists have conducted a comprehensive interdisciplinary analysis of the historic archeological remains of horses from the American Great Plains and Northern Rocky Mountains.

Unlike many previous studies, the analysis takes advantage of the archaeological remains of the earliest historical horse specimens rather than relying on the records of European colonizers.

The team includes, among others, William Taylor of the University of Colorado at Boulder. United States, as well as researchers from the Lakota, Comanche, and Pawnee nations, as well as other indigenous scholars from across North America.

By integrating osteological, genomic, isotopic, radiocarbon, and paleopathological evidence, Taylor and colleagues have found that early North American domestic horses show strong genetic affinity to Spanish horse populations, indicating a Spanish origin.

Horses in North America. (Photo: NPS)

Furthermore, the researchers say their findings suggest that these horses had spread throughout the region much earlier than previously believed: the animals had already spread north from Spanish settlements in the American Southwest and integrated deeply into the indigenous cultures of the Rocky Mountains and the Great Plains no later than the first half of the 17th century, if anything long before the arrival of other Europeans in the region in the 18th century.

The findings will have profound repercussions for what has been believed about social dynamics on the Great Plains during the early days of European colonization, a period of dramatic social change for indigenous peoples.

The study is titled “Early dispersal of domestic horses into the Great Plains and northern Rockies”. And it has been published in the academic journal Science. (Source: AAAS)