Raiders, Rulers, and Traders: The Horse and the Rise of Empires by David Chaffetz

Just following along on my history kick. (This one, like the Venice book, recommended by this Contraptions newsletter.) I didn’t know very much about horses before I read this book, but I learned a lot about them from reading this book. Nor did I know that people were using horse-drawn chariots before they rode horses, because horses weren’t strong enough to carry adult humans until people started breeding them for that purpose.

The core premise of the book, in a sense, is that horses have been so common throughout history, that people (and historians) have sort of collectively overlooked their importance and impact. (Like someone writing about how important cars are today, I suppose.) This book aims to amend that lack.

The most intriguing thing to me about this book was the way it illuminates the ways in which the geography of the central Asian steppe and its abundance of food for horses led to the roving cultures and lifestyles that built into things like the Mongols and the Huns. That it was the hunger for horses from more sedentary countries that led to this centralization of steppe power and the cycle of violence it created. The history of China in this book felt like a constant cycle between China’s hunger for horses and steppe tribes hunger for their treasures.

Anyway, there’s so much great detail here. As the author got into the 20th century and the importance of horses began to wane, I could feel his interest waning too. (Or maybe the 20th century is just too complex to try to cram into a couple chapters.) But all in all, a solid book of history. I learned a lot of things that didn’t know and built up quite a bit on things I only vaguely knew. I’d recommend this one.