Shire

The Shire takes its name from the English shires, the counties where it plowed, hauled and went to war. It is thought to descend from the medieval Great Horse, the animal bred to carry a knight and up to 400 pounds of armor and still move well.

Flemish stallions went into the native English stock in the 1200s and Dutch Friesians in the 1500s, and Lincolnshire ended up with a very large black horse known as the Lincolnshire Black, or Heavy Black. Those horses hauled long distances over bad country roads and worse city cobbles, and the type spread across England through the 1700s.

The modern Shire was put together around 1790 using Robert Bakewell's breeding methods, the same ones behind the Leicester Longwool sheep and the English Longhorn. A breed society formed in 1878, and the name Shire was settled in 1884.

The first one reached the US in 1853, though serious importing waited until the late 1800s. The American Shire Horse Association was founded in 1885 and has run its registry ever since.

They are enormous, gentle, exceptionally calm, and have real endurance, with heavy feather on the legs. Jousting and medieval tournament work has given them a new audience.