A Quick Look At Different Types Of Saddles - By: michael russell

Appreciating the wide variety of saddles available today is all the easier once one learns bit about this fascinating and extremely useful tool for riding a horse. Basically, the saddle is a supporting device for a horseback rider. It's fastened to the animal on its back and is kept there by what's called a girth, for starters.

Nowadays, a particularly-ubiquitous kind of saddle seen on most horses is the one intended for use in equestrian horse riding competitions. It's also called an equestrian saddle, by the way. There are other types made for other kinds of animals, including camels, which means that a saddle -- while fairly simple and construction and design -- is extremely versatile and quite common everywhere.

Most historians and scholars date the appearance of the saddle to about 800 BC. These first versions were very crude and mainly consisted of some sort of pad and a cinch to keep the pad on the back of a horse (it was called a surcingle). A special saddle tree was added to the saddle about 200 BC, while actual paired stirrups made their first appearance somewhere around 380 A. D.

Generally speaking, almost all of the various kinds of saddle available today date their genesis to the 1700s and 1800s. Today, most such riding tools have been built specifically for one sort of equestrian or horse riding discipline or another. These include the classic cowboy, or Western, saddle as well as the sleek and minimal equestrian riding tool used in Olympic or other competitions.

It's the case that, with proper care and maintenance, a good saddle can last for many years, even several decades or more. Many men and women out West have a saddle that has been handed down to them from generation to generation and so on. These saddles are classic examples of horse riding technology, and aren't all that different from the 19th century versions.

Today's modern saddle is a result of a branching-off of two different saddle types; the classic Western saddle and the equally-classic English saddle. In terms of the English version, a couple of different variants exist, including one used in equestrian dressage. One notable variant of the cowboy saddle is the famous McClellan US Army cavalry saddle, which is still popular today.

Saddles have a long history among riders of the American Southwest and West, and they're as common in a cowboy movie as John Wayne or Roy Rogers or even the Lone Ranger and his famous horse, Silver. These extremely versatile horse riding tools have been with people as long as they've ridden horses, in fact, and are also seen on the backs of many a famous Kentucky Derby or Olympic competitor as well.

About the Author

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