By Frederick Henry Huth (1887). The dedication of the
book is to The Duke of Cambridge.
What does an author and collector of research do in the
1800’s when they cannot stand up a blog? Well, it seems they index their books
on a topic and write it into a book so that they know how to guide others doing
research.
Fredrick Henry Huth was such a researcher on the topic of
hippology – or rather, the study of the horse. In his own words “By far the
greater number of books collected in these pages are monographs on the Horse
but I have not thought it wise to exclude other works on Natural History
dealing with the Horse Ass or Mule in any very distinct degree.”
He was a
collector of rare books on the subject and put together an index of his own collection.
He was later guided to do so for as much of the collected works on the topic as
he could. This compiled index has the material listed by date, then later by
author and then again organized by subject matter. In the preface of this book
he cites that he only included works that were of hippography specifically and
not works that made just casual mention of horses. Again in his words “I have
endeavoured to condense this volume to the utmost limit of its utility by the
excision of all superfluous matter”.
The first- thus earliest record he cites- is a partial work
from Kimon of Athens circa 430bc. That is a record 50years prior to the famous
Xenophon in 380. There are summaries of 77 works from Kimon up to Bernardo
deVargas in 1600. There are another 500+ works of books, journal writings and
articles ranging from 1602 until 1886.
This is not a book full of beautiful pictures and artwork. This is a researchers dream to be pointed to sources many did not even know existed. This index is a free eBook online ...
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