A horse's splint bones are thought to be remnants of toes from prehistoric horses. The splint bones are small bones (about the size of a pencil at the top and tapering down to be much smaller) found on each side of the cannon bone.

All horses, regardless of when they were actually born, are considered to have a common birthday of January 1. This is one of the reasons most horsemen don't like their foals to be born late in the year: Even if a foal is born on December 31st he or she will have their first birthday the very next day.

Scientists believe that the first known ancestor of the horse lived about 50 million years ago. This prehistoric horse is called Eohippus and had four padded toes on the front legs and three padded toes on the back legs. Eo means "dawn" and hippus means "horse," so Eohippus is "dawn horse."

Horses have a prehensile upper lip. Prehensile means "adapted for seizing, grasping, or taking hold of something." Their upper lips are very sensitive and capable of feeling the smallest of differences in objects.

Horses cannot breathe through their mouths.

Horses don't have a gallbladder?

In the wild, foals will suckle until they are a year old, and sometimes longer?

The horse has the largest eyes of any land animal?

A horse's teeth occupy more space in its head than its brain?

Horses are not color-blind?

Horses have memories that put elephants to shame?

The height measurement of a 'hand' is 4 inches. That's because it was considered to be the width of an 'average' mans' hand across the knuckles.

Adult male horses generally have 40 teeth, but females only 36?

Barley is thought to be the first grain to be domesticated, and probably the first to be fed to horses?

There were no horses in Australia until 1788?

The sequence of the horse's footfalls at the walk was correctly described by Aristotle (384-322 b.c.) in the 4th century b.c.

The state of Wyoming has used a cowboy on a bucking bronco on its license plates since 1936?

Selective horse breeding has been practiced by the Arab tribes since at least the 7th century?

Caspian ponies probably existed in Mesopotamia in 3000 b.c.

The Clydesdales became the Anhueser-Busch symbol on April 7, 1933?

A coltpixie is believed to be a spirit horse which lures mortal horses into bogs?

In Greco-Roman myth, donkeys are a symbol of lust.

The oldest horse on record is Old Billy. Foaled in 1760, he died at age 62 in 1822. He

was a draft cross bred in Woolston, Britain.

Women rode astride until the 15th century, then followed the period of sidesaddle.

The Celts were using nailed-on horseshoes by the 5th or 6th century b.c.

An ancient practice is putting a horse's shoes on backwards - toe to heels - to mislead a pursuing enemy. It was used in the 11th century by King Alphonso in his escape from the

Moorish Kind Ali Maymon of Toledo, Spain; in 1303 by Robert the Bruce in his escape from King Edward; and in 1530 by Duke Christopher of Wuurtemburg in his escape from

Emperor Charles V. And if you believe the movies, it was a common practice in the Old West.

The word 'farrier - one who shoes horses' comes from the Latin ferririus, "iron worker"

There are over 300 different breeds of horses and ponies around the world.

Many horses live, (and work), until they are over 30 years old! The oldest recorded horse was a barge horse in England known as "old Bill". He lived till the grand old age of 62!

Most foals are born at night when the herd is least likely to be on the move.

The horse that starred as Mr. Ed in the TV series, was a registered American Saddlebred.

The smallest breeds are the Falabellas of Argentina and the newer Miniature Horse and Miniature Pony breeds now enjoying much popularity. The tallest breed is the Shire, from England.

Draught Horses are the world's strongest animals apart from elephants.

It is estimated that there are about 750 million horses in the world.