The Pandyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c17.19

c17.19

The waste of the country's wealth on horses that Marco Polo speaks of was due not so much to the generous terms of the contract under which horses were imported as to the unfavourable climate of South India in which these horses could not thrive and the ignorance of Indian horse-keepers. Wassaf remarks: 'It is a strange thing that when those horses arrive there, instead of giving them raw barley they give them roasted barley and grain dressed with butter, and boiled cow's milk to drink. . . . They bind them for forty days in a stable with ropes and pegs in order that they may get fat; and afterwards, without taking measures for training, and without stirrups and other appurtenances of riding, the Indian soldiers ride upon them like demons. . . . In a short time, the most strong, swift, fresh and active horses become weak, slow, useless, and stupid. In short, they all become wretched and good for nothing. . . . There is, therefore, a constant necessity of getting new horses annually.' Marco Polo confirms Wassaf and says, 'There is no possibility of breeding horses in this country, as hath often proved by trial' and the 'people do not know in the least how to treat a horse.' But he also adds this: 'The horse-merchants not only never bring any farriers with them, but also prevent any farrier from going thither, lest that should in any degree baulk the sale of horses, which brings them in every year such vast gains'.