Leopard Spotted Horses

Leopard Spotted Horses appear in Paleolithic cave paintings. These paintings depict white, spotted horses and experts cannot agree if they depict real or imagined animals. The difference is of importance as it would reveal tendencies to either realism or creativity in early human art.[1][2] Studies of DNA in horse fossils of similar date to the paintings show the presence of the Leopard complex gene, which could result in the coat patterns shown in the caves.[3][4]

History

Cave paintings

Pech Merle cave horses with leopard spotting

Ancient cave paintings began emerging roughly 35,000 years ago and are found often in remote locations around the world. According to various carbon dating tests, roughly 25,000 years ago, a cave painting depicting spotted horses was painted in Pech Merle cave in France. European cave paintings often depict rhinoceros, wild cattle and other types of game, but the spotted horses depicted seem to indicate that the species existed 20,000 years prior to their domestication, some 5,000 years ago.[5]

The Leopard Complex

The coat patterns in horses are genetically-related and are called a leopard complex. The genes in leopard complex are also linked to abnormalities in the eyes and vision. These patterns are most closely identified with the Appaloosa horse breed, though its presence in breeds from Asia to western Europe has indicated that it is due to a very ancient mutation.

Evidence

Until now, scientists only had DNA evidence of monochrome horses - mainly bay and black - living in Europe in that period, and had therefore assumed that the spots had a shamanistic or spiritual significance – or were simply the artistic license of an imaginative caveman. With past research of ancient DNA only turning up evidence of brown and black horses as seen painted in the Lascaux Cave and Chauvet Cave, scientists wondered if the spotted horses seen in other caves such as Pech Merle, with it paintings of white horses with black spots, were real or fantasy,.[6] New DNA evidence gathered and analyzed by an international team of researchers has found that spotted horses did indeed exist in Europe in what is known as the Upper Paleolithic period, 50,000 to 10,000 years ago.[7]

Discoveries

The Dappled Horses of Pech Merle

The approximately 25,000-year-old paintings "The Dappled Horses of Pech Merle" depict spotted horses on the walls of a cave in France remarkably similar to a pattern known as "leopard" in modern horses such as Appaloosas. Horses were popular among Stone Age artists, found in most cave paintings that have recognizable animals in them, commonly in a caricature form that slightly exaggerates the most typical "horsey" features, such as their manes of hair.

Until now, ancient DNA analyses suggested horses during the Stone Age were only black or bay colored with no evidence for white-spotted patterns. This hinted that cave paintings of leopard-patterned horses were fantasy, not accurate portrayals. Some have proposed that drawings of imaginary animals might have had some kind of symbolic or even religious value.

Research now suggests those paintings might actually have been based on the real-life appearance of the animals.

Scientists investigated the differences in genes for coat color of 31 ancient horse fossils from Siberia, Eastern and Western Europe and the Iberian Peninsula. The researchers found that a genetic mutation associated with the presence of white leopard-like spotting patterns on modern horses was present in six of the European horse fossils. Additionally, seven of the fossils had the genetic variation for black coat color, whereas 18 had bay coats.

All horse color phenotypes that seem to be distinguishable in cave paintings have now been found to exist in prehistoric horse populations, suggesting that cave paintings of this species represent remarkably realistic depictions of the animals shown. This finding lends support to hypotheses arguing that cave paintings might have contained less of a symbolic or transcendental connotation than often assumed.[3] Still, although these horses might not have been imaginary but cannot be excluded that the paintings had not have any religious value.[7]

Future research

Leopard-spotted patterns in modern horses are sometimes linked with congenital problems such as stationary night blindness, perhaps explaining why any wild horses with them eventually died out long ago. As to why so many other horse fossils were found with them in the first place, perhaps this patterning provided camouflage in the snowy environments of the Stone Age, was attractive to mates or just stuck around due to random chance.

It is difficult to judge how common the spotted horses were, based on the handful of samples tested, but there may be evidence that they were "not rare." This is also a new insight, since many researchers had considered a spotted coat unlikely for Paleolithic horses. The ability to genotype Stone Age animals is a relatively new tool for archeologists, and it is possible to gain more knowledge about the appearance of these animals.[7]

See also

References

  1. ↑ http://www.history.com/news/2011/11/08/cave-painters-didnt-dream-up-spotted-horses-study-shows/
  2. ↑ "Spotted Horses in Cave Art Weren't Just a Figment, DNA Shows". The New York Times. 8 November 2011.
  3. 1 2 http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2011/11/02/1108982108.full.pdf+html
  4. ↑ "Ancient DNA provides new insights into cave paintings of horses".
  5. ↑ http://bikyamasr.com/47944/new-studies-indicate-spotted-horses-have-existed-for-35000-years/
  6. ↑ "New Study Confirms Early Cave Painters were Realists". Caving News.
  7. 1 2 3 "Pech Merle horses really were spotted, scientists say". DW.COM.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Leopard spotting (Horse).
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 3/26/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.