The oldest known saddle, patched cowhide, lay in a woman's grave in Xinjiang
In a tomb in the Turpan basin of western China, archaeologists found a cushioned cowhide saddle dated to between 727 and 396 BC, the earliest yet discovered. It had clearly been ridden on and mended. Its owner, a woman, belonged to the Subeixi culture, people who traded with the Scythians and shared much of their material culture.
Early saddles were soft pads with no rigid frame. Assyrian cavalry around 700 BC rode on fringed cloths held on by a girth, breast straps and cruppers, and nomads buried at Pazyryk in Siberia around 500 to 400 BC had twin leather cushions with detachable facings of bone, horn or hardened leather. Saddles quickly became badges of rank, decorated with fine leatherwork, carved horn and gold.
The rigid frame, called the tree, changed things for the horse as much as the rider. By lifting the rider clear of the spine and spreading weight across both sides of the back, it cut the pressure on any one spot, keeping horses comfortable and working longer. Chinese felt-covered wooden frames appear with the cavalry horses of the Terracotta Army, finished by 206 BC, and the Romans used a four-horned solid saddle from the 1st century BC. Neither had stirrups.
Stirrups needed that frame, because standing in them on a treeless pad creates sore pressure points. India had a simple leather toe loop in the 2nd century BC. The first reliable image of a rider with a pair of stirrups comes from a Chinese tomb of about 302 AD, and by 477 they were common across China before spreading to Europe. Mounted warriors could now make massed charges with spears and swords, a tactic also used by the cavalry of the Mali Empire.
Later designs followed the job at hand. Medieval knights needed a high front and back to stay seated in armour. English fox hunters jumping fences in the 18th century preferred a flatter saddle with a low front and back, and Federico Caprilli angled the flaps in the early 20th century to allow the forward seat. Western saddles grew from Spanish ones, gaining a horn so cowboys could tie off a rope holding cattle.
Source: Saddle
