Breast-strap harness and horse collar
Arnés de pecho y collera para caballos
- Date
- c. 300 BCE · confidence low
- Place
- China (Warring States: breast-strap harness; Han-Wei: horse collar)
- Credited to
- Chinese drivers and farmers
- Field
- Movement
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
The breast-strap harness rests the pull on the sternum rather than the throat, and the padded collar spreads it over the shoulders, multiplying the horse's usable pulling power fourfold. The Greco-Roman throat harness strangled the animal.
The date of the padded collar varies between the 1st century BCE (Han reliefs) and the 5th century CE; Needham places the breast-strap harness in the 4th century BCE.
What it led to
- The horse as a heavy draught and plough animal, replacing the slow ox
- Overland transport of much larger, faster loads
- The medieval European agricultural revolution when it arrived (9th-10th centuries)
- Efficient single-horse carriages and carts
Built on
- Chariots of Yinxu (Shang dynasty)c. 1200 BCE
- Cast-iron mouldboard ploughc. 100 BCE
- Ox yoke
- Cart with a draught pole
- Padded harness fabric
Made possible
- Animal-drawn and sail-assisted wheelbarrowc. 300 CE
- Horse-drawn plough
- One-horse carriage
- Medieval three-field rotation