Page:Horse shoes and horse shoeing.djvu/36

 and had attained a comparatively advanced state of civilization, in which the horse played no insignificant part, yet in the absence of this craft, even with their favourable climate and soil, the use of this animal must have been but limited, compared to what it is in our own days. It is only when we reach the period in which the ancient Greeks begin to figure in history, that doubts and inquiries arise among modern investigators with regard to a real iron or other metal shoe being employed; and for nearly two hundred years, various writers have spared neither time nor patience in attempting to arrive at some definite conclusion as to whether or not the Greeks and Romans were cognisant of this art, or at what period it first became known.

With the spread of civilization, the demands upon the services of the horse became, doubtless, very much extended; and the diversity of climate, as well as of races, would lead one to suppose that greater wear and modifications, more or less wrought in the nature and consistency of the hoof, must at an early period have rendered some kind of defence absolutely necessary; and that this again would be mentioned in the writings of men who largely devoted their attention to the welfare of this animal. Nevertheless, the antiquity of shoeing, notwithstanding the well-directed labours of many learned men, is yet a subject admitting of considerable diversity of opinion, simply because of the absence of written documents, or records of a positive character, by which this art could be traced to its origin in any particular part of the world. True, there