Humans have been domesticating animals for thousands of years. Domestication is the process of taking a wild species and making them live with humans. An animal is considered to be domesticated when some part of their life has been permanently changed by living with humans. Most scientists agree that the dog was the first domesticated animal and reached domestication around 17,000 years ago. The cat is considered domesticated also, however they have only been domesticated for about 3,500 years. The horse on the other hand has only been domesticated for 4,000-6,000 years. Scientists believe that while isolated examples of domestication may have occurred around the 6,000 year mark, widespread domestication did not occur until around 4,000 BC.

However, the horse of today has been much longer in the development. Horses have not always been the impressive creatures that they are today. The first recorded instance of an equine creature was Eophippus. This was a small horse that was just barely a foot tall - about 14 inches. He was a forest dwelling horse that had three toes on its hind feet and four toes on its front feet - instead of hooves. Eophippus lived around 60 million years ago! This horse is sometimes called the "Dawn Horse" since it was the beginning of the species. Fossilized remains of this horse are found in Wyoming, Utah and some places in Europe.

Moving forward in history by about 20 million years, the equine species evolved a bit to produce the equine called Mesophippus. Mesophippus looks much more horse-like than Eophippus. During this time the land was drying from swamp to forest and Mesophippus grew taller and the three toes started to form hooves at the base of the toes. Mesophippus' teeth were further evolved also and he could run much faster than Eophippus.

About 30 million years ago, the next equine species to evolve become extremely recognizable as the forerunner of today's horses. Not only did Miohippus have hooves, he had a bunch of loose hair at the end of a furred tail - the beginning of the free-flowing tails that we see today. Miohippus looks much like a mule with the slightly blocky head and muscular build.

About 20 million years ago, the world produced Merychippus. Merychippus had a mane and a basic tail. Merychippus evolved on North America and was the first Equine breed to develop specifically to live on the windswept plains. His teeth evolved to be very similar to what we see in the modern horse's mouth. He was about 35 inches tall or three feet. The same size as some ponies today. He still had some residual toes, but they no longer touched the ground and he had a true hoof.

About 12 million years ago, the next step of Equine history was born - Pliohippus. This new equine needed speed to survive and the hoof continued to form and harden. Pliohippus crossed the land bridge between Asia and North America where he flourished on both continents. He grew bigger and stronger. Prehistoric humans hunted him for his food and hide. However, he died out in North and South America. Equines would not be seen again on American soil until the Spaniards brought them to help conqueror the New World. Pliohippus had a stiff upright mane, had a longer head than modern horses and had wider set eyes. He was about the size of a donkey and was very strong.

In the next edition of the paper - learn how Pliohippus helped create the modern horse and how there are still breeds of prehistoric horses alive today!