حصان نسا

(تم التحويل من Nisean horse)
كان الحصان النيسائي سلالةً قديمةً تحظى بتقديرٍ كبير، وموطنها الأصلي سهل نيساء في غرب إيران بالقرب من جبال زاغروس. ورغم الشهرة الواسعة التي تمتعت بها هذه السلالة الأسطورية في العالم القديم، إلا أنها باتت اليوم على وشك الانقراض.

الحصان النيسي، أو الحصان النيسياني، هو سلالة خيول منقرضة كانت موطنها الأصلي السهول القريبة من مدينة همدان الحديثة في إيران.

وُصف بأنه "الحصان الخارق في العصور القديمة"، وكان أكثر السلالات تقديراً في تاريخ فارس القديمة بسبب جماله وحجمه الكبير وسرعته.

المصادر

تُعرف الخيول النيسية بشكل أساسي من المصادر النصية والأيقونية[1]. وقد ذُكرت هذه السلالة في نصوص تصل إلى الصين[2].

كانت أول إشارة مكتوبة إلى الحصان النيسي حوالي عام 430 قبل الميلاد، في كتاب "التواريخ" لهيرودوت:

"أمام الملك سار أولاً ألف فارس، رجال مختارون من الأمة الفارسية، ثم ألف حامل رمح، وهم أيضاً قوات مختارة، ورؤوس رماحهم موجهة نحو الأرض - ثم عشرة من الخيول المقدسة المسماة النيسية، جميعها مسرجة بأناقة. (تُسمى هذه الخيول نيسية، لأنها تأتي من السهل النسائي، وهو سهل شاسع مستوٍ في ميديا، ينتج خيولاً ذات حجم غير عادي.)"[3]

وقد ذُكر الحصان النيسي لأول مرة بتفصيل كبير من قبل أ. ت. أولمستيد، في كتابه "تاريخ الإمبراطورية الفارسية"[4].

الأصل

The Nisaean plain, surrounding Ecbatana (modern Hamadan)

أنتجت السهول الميدية أفضل الخيول في الإمبراطورية الأخمينية، وتم اختيار خيول الإسطبل الملكي منها. أنتجت السهول الميدية في نوش إي جان بالقرب من همدان بقايا خيول ذات أحجام متنوعة "من المهور أو الخيول المصغرة التي يبلغ ارتفاعها 1.05-1.10 متر إلى خيول يزيد ارتفاعها عن 1.50 متر عند الكتفين، مع أغلبية يبلغ ارتفاعها 1.35-1.37 متر، وتنوع من الأنواع الخفيفة إلى الثقيلة"[5]. كانت الخيول النيسية الأكثر تقديراً بينها، واشتهرت بجمالها وحجمها الكبير وسرعتها[5]. نما البرسيم، وهو علف مثالي للخيول، بكثرة في هذه السهول[6][7].

جاءت الخيول النيسية من السهول النيسية (نيشايا، نيسايا، نيسا)، التي تقع في موقع هارون آباد (شهاب آباد، إسلام آباد الغربية الحديثة في محافظة كرمانشاه)، على الطريق بين حلوان وهمدان في ميديا[8][5]. تقع بلدة نيسايا عند سفح المنطقة الجنوبية من جبال زاغروس، إيران[9].

كان في السهول النيسية حوالي 160,000 حصان في العصر الأخميني، لكن العدد انخفض إلى 60,000 في عهد الإسكندر[5].

خلال عهد داريوس، تم تربية الخيول النيسية من المرتفعات الأرمنية إلى سغديانا[10]. كان الحصان النيسي مطلوباً جداً لدرجة أن الإغريق (بشكل رئيسي الإسبرطيون) استوردوا الخيول النيسية وربوها مع سلالاتهم الأصلية، كما استوردت أو أسرت أو سرقت العديد من القبائل البدوية (مثل السكوثيون) في الإمبراطورية الفارسية وحولها الخيول النيسية[citation needed].

الوصف

Shapur I's victory relief at Naqsh-e Rostam is believed to depict a Nisean horse.[11]

The Nisean horses were highly regarded for their bravery, tenacity,[12] speed,[5][13] large size,[5][14] stamina,[14] and beauty.[5] Elwyn Hartley Edwards in The New Encyclopedia of the Horse described the breed as the "superhorse of antiquity".[15]

According to Strabo, "Their shape is peculiar, as is that of the Parthian horses, compared with those of Greece and others in our country".[5]

The Nisean horse was said[ممن؟] to have come in several colors, including common colors such as dark bay, chestnut and seal brown, but also rarer colors such as black, roan, palomino, and various spotted patterns. The ancient Nisean horse was said to have had "not the slender Arabian head of the Luristan Culture but a more robust one that was characteristic of the great warhorse". This suggests the Nisean may have been a descendant of the "forest horse" prototype.[citation needed] The Nisean, according to one source,[من؟] was "tall and swift, and color adorned his sides. The Chinese called the breed the tian ma – heavenly horse or Soulon-vegetarian dragon. Some were spotted, like a leopard or, as golden as a newly minted coin. Others were red and blue roan with darker color.[citation needed]

Use

The Nisean horses were used to carry the royal Achaemenid chariot,[5] took part in Mithraic religious rituals, and in official ceremonies.[14]

The Nisean and Ferghana horses had symbolic sacred role for royal legitimacy. Images of Nisean horses with a horn-like growth on their foreheads appeared on royal seals and coins from the Seleucid era.[14]

Some later scholarship has connected the Nisean tradition of horn-like forehead growths with broader Eurasian descriptions of elite horses. A 2026 study by Olzhas Ospanov compared the Nisean and Ferghana "heavenly horse" traditions, arguing that both were associated with large size, speed, stamina, elite warfare, and high social rank. The study discusses Nisean horses with horn-like forehead growths in Seleucid-era royal imagery alongside Chinese textual descriptions of elite horses with a frontal protuberance. The authors suggest that these traditions may be understood within a wider Eurasian tradition of elite, sacred, and royal horses.[16]

Olmstead also wrote that the Assyrians started their spring campaigns, by attacking the Medes for their horses. The Medes were the breeders of the first Nisean horses.[17]

Describing the horses of the Parthian cavalry, Strabo notes that they were distinct from those of the Greek world, but similar to the Nisean horses of the Achaemenid kings.[13] The Romans had their first encounter with the Nisean and the Parthian cataphract at the Battle of Carrhae (53 BC) when General Crassus went up against the great Parthian General Surena. After Crassus fell to the Parthians, his head and standards were presented to Orodes II. In 36 BC, Mark Antony avenged Crassus's death by launching a campaign against Media Atropatene with 16 legions. At his disposal were 100,000 infantry and 10,000 cavalry, drawn from as far away as Gaul and Spain. Of these, 30,000 were Roman Legionnaires. When the Parthians would not give him the battle he wanted, he ravaged Armenia, and brought back the Armenian King Artavasdes to Egypt. Among the prized possessions taken were the first Nisean horses in Rome. When Antony died, these horses fell into the hands of Augustus. According to Michael Decker in the Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity, Nisaean horses were the most famous Iranian breed.[18]

A ritually buried stallion from Parthian period was discovered in Armenia, which suggests similarities to a Nisean horse.[1]

Sasanian metalwork depicting a Nisean horse.

The Nisean horses continued to be the most famous breed in the Sasanian period, which was favored most along with a small traditional breed.[5]

The Nisean horse was likely the ancestor of the Turkoman horse.[19] Modern horse breeds such as the Thoroughbred are considered to have some Nisean roots.[20] Many hippologues consider Rakhsh, the stallion of the legendary Iranian hero Rostam, to be a Nisean horse.[21]

Historical events

  • Following their assassination of Bardiya in 522 BCE, the conspirators led by Otanes and Darius the Great agreed that whoever's horse neighed at the moment of sunrise would be rewarded with the kingship of Persia. According to legend, Darius' Nisean horse neighed first.
  • In 481 BCE, Xerxes invaded Thessaly and raced his Nisean mares against the legendary Thessalian mares and beat them.
  • In 479 BCE, General Mardonius was killed beneath his gray Nisean stallion at the Battle of Plataea. The stallion was so feared for its training that the Athenians had actually devised a plan to kill the horse.
  • When Alexander the Great conquered Persia, he demanded a tribute of thousands of Nisean horses from the captured cities.
  • When the Roman writer Strabo saw the Nisean horses, he said that they were the most elegant riding horses alive.
  • Describing the parade of Antiochus IV Epiphanes in Daphne, Syria, Polybius lists Nissioi (Νισαῖοι) as one of the units there, which refers to the Nisean horses.[22]
  • The elite Sasanian cavalry unit Zhayedan are thought to have used the Nisean horses.
  • St. Isidore of Seville stated that the Roman horses of the imperial stud, founded by Justinian I in Constantinople, were the most beautiful horses in the world.
  • Emperor Wu Ti was told about the Heavenly Horses to the West and sent an army to get some for China; thirteen Heavenly Horses were taken from Ferghana along with a thousand lesser animals. When the Emperor saw the horses, he decided that the expedition was worth it.
  • The Nisean became extinct with the conquest of Constantinople in 1204.

References

  1. ^ أ ب Nachmias, A.; Bar-Oz, G.; Nadel, D.; Petrosyan, I.; Gasparyan, B. (27 October 2021). "A Monumental Horse Burial in the Armenian Highlands". Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia. 49 (3): 41–50. doi:10.17746/1563-0110.2021.49.3.041-050.
  2. ^ Hanson, Chris (1 January 2020). "SYNCHRONY: AN ASPECT OF THE ABILITIES OF STEPPE HORSE ARCHERS IN EURASIAN WARFARE (525 BCE – 1350 CE)". Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers.
  3. ^ Herodotus, Histories, 7.40.2-3
  4. ^ Olmstead, A. T. History of the Persian Empire. University of Chicago Press. 1948
  5. ^ أ ب ت ث ج ح خ د ذ ر Shahbazi, Alireza Shapur. "ASB i. In Pre-Islamic Iran". Encyclopaedia Iranica.
  6. ^ Aḥsan, ʻAbdushshakūr (1992). Studies in Persian Language and Literature (in الإنجليزية). Bazm-e-Iqbal. p. 44.
  7. ^ Edwards, Elwyn Hartley (1987). Horses: Their Role in the History of Man (in الإنجليزية). Willow Books. p. 65. ISBN 978-0-00-218216-4.
  8. ^ لاحظ سترابو أن كلاً من ميديا وأرمينيا كانتا مناسبتين لتربية الخيول الجيدة. ويذكر مرة أخرى (11.14.9) أن النوع النيسي كان يُربى في أرمينيا أيضاً، مضيفاً: "كان مرزبان أرمينيا يرسل سنوياً إلى ملك فارس 20,000 مهر في وقت عيد ميثراسينا (مهرجان مهرجان)".
  9. ^ "Nisaia". Archived from the original on 2013-02-11. Retrieved 2020-03-26.
  10. ^ Bläsing, Uwe; Dum-Tragut, Jasmine (15 May 2020). Cultural, Linguistic and Ethnological Interrelations In and Around Armenia (in الإنجليزية). Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 87. ISBN 978-1-5275-5136-7.
  11. ^ Amjadi, M. A.; Yeganeh, H. M.; Sadeghi, M.; Abbas Raza, S. H.; Yang, J.; Najafabadi, H. A.; Batool, U.; Shoorei, H.; Abdelnour, S. A.; Ahmed, J. Z. (2021). "Microsatellite Analysis of Genetic Diversity and Population Structure of the Iranian Kurdish Horse". Journal of Equine Veterinary Science. 98 103358. doi:10.1016/j.jevs.2020.103358. PMID 33663714.
  12. ^ Chidwick, Hannah-Marie (2024). The Body of the Combatant in the Ancient Mediterranean. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 92.
  13. ^ أ ب Markman, Sidney David (1969). The Horse in Greek Art (in الإنجليزية). Biblo & Tannen Publishers. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-8196-0247-3.
  14. ^ أ ب ت ث Olzhas, Ospanov; Alan, Vincelette (June 2026). "Galloping Across Realms: Scientific and Symbolic Interpretations of the Eurasian 'Heavenly Horse' and Other Galloping Horses in Art". Arts (in الإنجليزية). 15 (6). doi:10.3390/arts15060116. ISSN 2076-0752.
  15. ^ Edwards, Elwyn Hartley (2000). The New Encyclopedia of the Horse (in الإنجليزية). Dorling Kindersley. p. 34. ISBN 978-0-7894-7181-9.
  16. ^ Ospanov, Olzhas; Vincelette, Alan (2026-05-29). "Galloping Across Realms: Scientific and Symbolic Interpretations of the Eurasian "Heavenly Horse" and Other Galloping Horses in Art". Arts (in الإنجليزية). 15 (6): 116. doi:10.3390/arts15060116. ISSN 2076-0752.
  17. ^ Olmstead, A. T. History of the Persian Empire. University of Chicago Press. 1948[citation needed]
  18. ^ Decker, Michael (2018). "horses and donkeys". In Nicholson, Oliver (ed.). The Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-866277-8.
  19. ^ "TURKMEN CULTURAL TREASURE AND HISTORIC SYMBOL" (PDF). Aeterna. ISSN 2541-8076. Retrieved 27 June 2026.
  20. ^ Amjadi, Motahareh Ala; Yeganeh, Hassan Mehrbani; Sadeghi, Mostafa; Abbas Raza, Sayed Haidar; Yang, Jinmeng; Najafabadi, Hamed Amirpour; Batool, Uzma; Shoorei, Hamed; Abdelnour, Sameh A.; Ahmed, Jam Zaheer (March 2021). "Microsatellite Analysis of Genetic Diversity and Population Structure of the Iranian Kurdish Horse". Journal of Equine Veterinary Science. 98 103358. doi:10.1016/j.jevs.2020.103358. PMID 33663714.
  21. ^ Bläsing, Uwe; Dum-Tragut, Jasmine (15 May 2020). Cultural, Linguistic and Ethnological Interrelations In and Around Armenia (in الإنجليزية). Cambridge Scholars Publishing. ISBN 978-1-5275-5136-7.
  22. ^ The unit was either Iranian cavalrymen from Media, or cavalrymen from elsewhere who were armed in the Median manner. Wójcikowski, R. S. (10 December 2019). "A Grazing Horse and a Mare with a Foal-Achaemenid Motives in the Coinage of Antiochus III the Great?". Parseh Journal of Archaeological Studies (in الإنجليزية). 3 (9): 129–138. doi:10.30699/PJAS.3.9.129.

Further reading

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