HORSE SHOEING - ANCIENT HISTORY

Why do horses wear shoes and how are they fitted?

Ever since horses were first domesticated thousands of years ago, horsemen realised the importance of protecting their animals’ feet. On hard or rocky terrain, shoes protected a horse’s hooves from cracking or wearing down faster than they could grow. In soft, wet terrain – like the farmlands of northern Europe – shoes stopped their hooves from becoming porous and unstable, as well as helping the horse gain a good footing.

To prepare the foot, a farrier – an expert who shoes horses for a living – gives the horse a basic manicure by levelling off the hoof with a rasp and trimming excess growth. Next, they take a shoe made steel or aluminium and heat it in a forge until it glows red-hot. The shoe is quickly placed against the hoof to makes an impression, which the farrier uses as a guide for reshaping the malleable metal with a hammer and anvil. The shoe is cooled in water and fixed to the hoof with nails, which are angled so they exit the outer wall of the hoof and can be bent down to form clenches. Finally, the edges are smoothed down with a rasp.

In "How it Works - Book of Incredible History", Imaging Publishing, UK, 2015, excerpt p.21. Digitized, adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.