Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint

Abstract

The use of animal in draft, particularly cattle, is likely as old as their domestication. However, due to high friction between sledges and sleighs and the ground or high work input implied by roller bearings, Neo-lithic and Copper Age animal traction was likely rather slow. Here, the revolute joint, an innovation of the late fourth and the early third millennia BCE, brought about wheelsets and wheels for carts and wagons along with other applications such as pivoted doors, the potter's wheel, and levers. As first automotoric machines in human history, wheelset and wheeled vehicles increased the work speed of draught cattle significantly and helped to shift prehistoric economies from being labour-limited to land-limited. Moreover, they enabled the use of horses as draught animals for Bronze Age chariots and Roman travel carts, resulting in an increase in travel speed. In terms of acceleration, these innovations were as significant as the acceleration period we currently encounter that started with industrialization. Resumen El uso de animales en el campo del cultivo, especialmente del gana-do, es probablemente tan antiguo como su domesticación. Sin embargo, debido a la elevada fricción de los trineos o incluso el gran esfuerzo que suponían los rodamientos contra el suelo, la tracción animal en el Neo-lítico y la Edad de Cobre era probablemente bastante lenta. Es debido a esto que la innovadora pieza de ingeniera de finales del cuarto y princi-pios del tercer milenio a.C. de la unta, trajo consigo numerosos juegos de ruedas tanto para carros y carretas, además de otras aplicaciones como puertas pivotantes, torno de alfarero y las palancas. Como prime-ras máquinas automotrices de la historia de la humanidad, los vehículos aumentaron considerablemente la velocidad de trabajo del ga nado de tiro y contribuyeron a descentrar las economías prehistóricas limitadas a mano de obra con terrenos reducidos. En consecuencia, el uso de caba-llos como animal de tiro para carros se popularizó en la Edad de Bronce, reduciendo así los tiempo de trayecto. Estas innovaciones provocaron un periodo de aceleración, el cual se asemeja al proceso iniciado en la revolución Industrial, que continua desarrollándose exponencialmente hasta la actualidad. Résumé L'utilisation de la traction animale, en particulier les bovins, est probable-ment aussi ancienne que leur domestication. Cependant, en raison du frotte-ment élevé entre les traîneaux et le sol ou de la charge de travail importante impliquée par les roulements à rouleaux, la traction animale du Néolithique et de l'Âge du Cuivre était probablement plutôt lente. Ici, l'articulation tournante, une innovation de la fin du quatrième et du début du troisième millénaire avant notre ère, a donné naissance aux essieux et aux roues des charrettes et des chariots, ainsi qu'à d'autres applications telles que les portes pivotantes, le tour du potier et les leviers. En tant que premières machines automotrices de l'histoire de l'humanité, les véhi cules à ensembles de roues ou à roues ont considérablement augmenté la vitesse de travail des animaux de trait et ont contribué à faire passer les économies préhistoriques d'une situation où la main-d'oeuvre était limitée à une situation où la terre était limitée. En outre, ils ont déclenché l'utilisation de chevaux comme animaux de trait pour les chars de l'Âge du Bronze et les voitures de voyage romaines, ce qui constitue une étape dans la réduction du temps de voyage dans la préhistoire. Ces innovations ont probablement été aussi importantes que la période d'accélération que nous connaissons actuellement et qui a débuté avec l'industrialisation.

Full text

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute jointEva Rosenstock
Historical Perspectives | 45
Eva Rosenstock
Speeding up.
Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint
Eva Rosenstock
Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and
the revolute joint Historical Perspectives
Published in: Staatliche Schlösser und Gärten Hessen, Claus Kropp, Lena Zoll (Eds.), Draft Animals in
the Past, Present and Future (Heidelberg, Propylaeum 2022) 45-62. DOI: https://doi.org/10.11588/
propylaeum.1120.c15597

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint Eva Rosenstock
46 | DRAFT ANIMALS in the Past, Present and Future
Abstract
The use of animal in draft, particularly cattle, is likely as old as
their domestication. However, due to high friction between sledges and
sleighs and the ground or high work input implied by roller bearings, Neo-
lithic and Copper Age animal traction was likely rather slow. Here, the
revolute joint, an innovation of the late fourth and the early third millennia
BCE, brought about wheelsets and wheels for carts and wagons along
with other applications such as pivoted doors, the potter’s wheel, and
levers. As first automotoric machines in human history, wheelset and
wheeled vehicles increased the work speed of draught cattle significant-
ly and helped to shift prehistoric economies from being labour-limited
to land-limited. Moreover, they enabled the use of horses as draught
animals for Bronze Age chariots and Roman travel carts, resulting in
an increase in travel speed. In terms of acceleration, these innovations
were as significant as the acceleration period we currently encounter
that started with industrialization.
Resumen
El uso de animales en el campo del cultivo, especialmente del gana-
do, es probablemente tan antiguo como su domesticación. Sin embargo,
debido a la elevada fricción de los trineos o incluso el gran esfuerzo que
suponían los rodamientos contra el suelo, la tracción animal en el Neo-
lítico y la Edad de Cobre era probablemente bastante lenta. Es debido a
esto que la innovadora pieza de ingeniera de finales del cuarto y princi-
pios del tercer milenio a.C. de la unta, trajo consigo numerosos juegos
de ruedas tanto para carros y carretas, además de otras aplicaciones
como puertas pivotantes, torno de alfarero y las palancas. Como prime-
ras máquinas automotrices de la historia de la humanidad, los vehículos
aumentaron considerablemente la velocidad de trabajo del ga nado de
tiro y contribuyeron a descentrar las economías prehistóricas limitadas a
mano de obra con terrenos reducidos. En consecuencia, el uso de caba-
llos como animal de tiro para carros se popularizó en la Edad de Bronce,
reduciendo así los tiempo de trayecto. Estas innovaciones provocaron
un periodo de aceleración, el cual se asemeja al proceso iniciado en la
revolución Industrial, que continua desarrollándose exponencialmente
hasta la actualidad.
Résumé
L'utilisation de la traction animale, en particulier les bovins, est probable-
ment aussi ancienne que leur domestication. Cependant, en raison du frotte-
ment élevé entre les traîneaux et le sol ou de la charge de travail importante
impliquée par les roulements à rouleaux, la traction animale du Néolithique et
de l'Âge du Cuivre était probablement plutôt lente. Ici, l'articulation tournante,
une innovation de la fin du quatrième et du début du troisième millénaire avant
notre ère, a donné naissance aux essieux et aux roues des charrettes et des
chariots, ainsi qu'à d'autres applications telles que les portes pivotantes, le
tour du potier et les leviers. En tant que premières machines automotrices de
l'histoire de l'humanité, les véhi cules à ensembles de roues ou à roues ont
considérablement augmenté la vitesse de travail des animaux de trait et ont
contribué à faire passer les économies préhistoriques d'une situation où la
main-d'œuvre était limitée à une situation où la terre était limitée. En outre, ils
ont déclenché l'utilisation de chevaux comme animaux de trait pour les chars
de l'Âge du Bronze et les voitures de voyage romaines, ce qui constitue une
étape dans la réduction du temps de voyage dans la préhistoire. Ces innova-
tions ont probablement été aussi importantes que la période d'accélération
que nous connaissons actuellement et qui a débuté avec l'industrialisation.
Kurzfassung
Die Nutzung der Zugkraft von Tieren, insbesondere von Rindern, ist
wahrscheinlich so alt wie ihre Domestikation. Aufgrund der hohen Rei-
bung zwischen Schlitten und Boden oder des hohen Arbeitsaufwands,
den Rollenlager mit sich bringen, ging die Zugtiernutzung im Neolithikum
und in der Kupferzeit jedoch bestenfalls eher langsam vonstatten. Das
Rotationsgelenk, eine Erfindung des späten vierten und frühen dritten
Jahrtausends v. u. Z., führte zu Radsätzen und Rädern für Karren und
Wagen sowie zu anderen Anwendungen wie Schwenktüren, der Töp-
ferscheibe und Hebeln. Als erste automotorische Maschinen in der Ge-
schichte der Menschheit steigerten Gefährte mit Radsätzen oder Rädern
die Arbeitsgeschwindigkeit von Zugtieren erheblich und trugen dazu bei,
dass die prähistorische Wirtschaft nicht mehr durch die verfügbare Ar-
beitskraft, sondern v.a. durch die verfügbaren Landflächen begrenzt war.
Darüber hinaus lösten Radsatz und Rad die Verwendung von Pferden
als Zugtiere für bronzezeitliche Streitwagen und römische Reisewagen
als weiteren Beschleunigungssprung in der Vorgeschichte aus. Was die
Beschleunigung anbetrifft, waren diese Innovationen wahrscheinlich
ebenso bedeutsam wie jene, die seit der Industrialisierung die Beschleu-
nigungsphase auslösten, die wir bis heute erleben.

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute jointEva Rosenstock
Historical Perspectives | 47
Animal traction
in prehistoric archaeology
Animal traction as a secondary product
Andrew Sherratt in 1981 put forward the idea that in the
Neolithic and Chalcolithic, animals were only exploited
for their primary products – products obtained by slaugh-
tering an animal, such as meat, leather, and bone. Sec-
ondary products, i.e. products that can be “harvested”
from living animals, such as milk, maybe blood, and wool
as well as workforce, in contrast, were only exploited
from the turn from the fourth to the third millennium BCE
onwards, which marks – in broad terms - the turn to the
Bronze Age. Further research into this topic over the last
decades, however, has considerably reshaped this idea1.
Rather than a “Secondary Products Revolution”, the time
around 3000 BCE is now perceived as a phase of rapid
intensification of much older incipient secondary product
use2.
While wool production requires a particular genetic
mutation in sheep that is currently assumed to have in-
deed happened in later prehistory
3
, increasing evidence
points to a Neolithic onset of animal milk and traction
use. According to osteological hints, milking might be
as early as the domestication of sheep, goat and cattle,
and biochemical evidence demonstrates that milk was
regularly processed in ceramic vessels from the sev-
enth millennium BCE onwards
4
. Moreover, there is now
increasing material evidence also for the Neolithic use
of animal traction. From the late fourth millennium BCE
onwards, however, evidence for animal traction use not
only gets much more frequent, but also includes new
species such as donkeys and horses. Admittedly, part
of this increase in finds is a function of changed cultural
practices and, hence, preservation conditions; but since
this is true mainly for Europe, the situation in South-west
Asia suggests that also animal traction witnessed an in-
tensification from the fourth millennium BCE onwards.
Archaeological sources for animal traction
Except for northern latitudes where acidic soils pre-
vent their preservation, animal bones are among the
most frequent finds in most archaeological sites. Among
the animal species traditionally used in traction, the dog
is the oldest domesticate, as wolf husbandry started
among later Palaeolithic hunters and gatherers from ca.
30000 BCE onwards
5
. Cattle were domesticated together
with sheep and goat from ca. 9000 BCE onwards when
farming developed in the early Neolithic after the end
of the last ice age. Donkey and horses, however, were
domesticated several thousand years later around 3000
BCE at the transition from the Neolithic or Chalcolithic
to the Bronze Age
6
. Camels followed around 1000 BCE
7
,
and for the onset of reindeer domestication a wide date
range between ca. 1500 BCE and 800 AD is debated
8
.
1 Sherratt 1981.
2 Greenfield 2010.
3 Benecke et al. 2017.
4 Evershed et al. 2008; Hendy et al. 2018.
5 Bergström et al. 2020.
6 Librado et al. 2021.
7 Orlando 2016.
8 Pelletier et al. 2020.
However, as the presence of species potentially suited
for traction work does not mean they were actually used
in traction, zooarchaeologists look for signs of wear and
tear on the bones: cattle traction use has been demon-
strated to result in broadened surfaces in the distal pha-
langeal joints judging from a sample of slaughtered mod-
ern traction animals from rural Romania
9
and is a trait that
can be distinguished also in archaeological material. In
horses, in addition, bridling can lead to bit wear visible
on the teeth in archaeological material10.
Wood, bone and leather as the traditional materials
for the manufacture of traction gear hardly survive in the
archaeological record, so actual finds are limited to per-
mafrost, arid or waterlogged conditions that are found
in regions that have been settled later in the course of
prehistory due to their adverse climatic conditions. The
same is true for wooden road tracks built in marshy land.
With the onset of the metal ages, highly strained con-
struction parts such as bridles and wagon hubs have
been increasingly replaced by metal, which can then
be found in the archaeological record. However, the as-
sumed high degree of metal recycling limits such finds
mainly to grave goods in rich burials that may not always
reflect standard work equipment but rather elitist items.
Moreover, sledges and wagons as well as ards can leave
traces in soft ground. However, such traces quickly erode
unless they are buried under soil soon after, limiting their
preservation to time periods when burial mounds were
common.
Prequel: Mesolithic and Neolithic
Wooden runners found in Vis I in modern Russia dat-
ed to the seventh or sixth millennium BCE
11
suggested
that Mesolithic hunter-gatherers used skis and sledges
(Figure 1). While we cannot yet say for sure if humans or
dogs pulled such vehicles
12
, it is likely that contemporary
Neolithic communities further south knew about sledg-
es and travois-like devices, too, although interpretation
of a wooden fragment from the Cardial site of La Draga
(Banyoles, Espagne) in the 6th millennium BCE is ques-
tionable
13
. Hauling sledges is not only possible on snow
cover or frozen ground, but also on dry soil if the load is
not too heavy. Additionally, grass cover can lower friction
considerably
14
, similar to how threshing sledges tradition-
ally used in arid regions like South-west Asia glide over
cereal and pulse straw No actual prehistoric threshing
sledge has survived, but at e. g. sixth millennium BCE
Çatalhöyük West, squarish flint blades bearing a gloss
characteristic for cutting plant material have been found
15
.
Their resemblance to known insets into later prehistoric
threshing sledges is so striking that a Neolithic use of
threshing sledges should at the moment not be entirely
excluded
16
. First ard marks and actual ard finds, in con-
trast, are only attested from ca. 3000 BCE onwards and –
together with archaeobotanical evidence17 – suggest that
9 D e Cupere et al. 2000
10 Greenfield et al. 2018.
11 Burov 1981.
12 Sinding et al. 2020.
13 Guilaine 2003, 147.
14 Atkinson 1956, 109.
15 Rosenstock et al. 2019a, 178.
16 Ostaptchouk 2016, 101, 119p; Kamjan et al. 2022.
17 Bogaard 2004, id. 2005.

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint Eva Rosenstock
48 | DRAFT ANIMALS in the Past, Present and Future
Figure 1 – 7th or sixth millennium BCE sledge runners or skis from Mesolithic Vis

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute jointEva Rosenstock
Historical Perspectives | 49
Neolithic agriculture was hoe-based. However, this can
only hold true if the absence of evidence for the ard is not
only caused by preservation biases. Especially in the Eu-
ropean Neolithic, when primeval forests had to be cleared
to obtain agricultural land and timber-framed architecture,
cattle draught force might have been welcome also for
logging, a practice known today, too18.
While all this merely hints at the possibility of early
draught cattle, bones with broadened distal phalan-
geal joint surfaces observed at Early Neolithic sites in
South-eastern Europe (Figure 2) confirm that cattle were
at least occasionally used in draft tasks already in the
Neolithic
19
. Such “ad hoc draft use” still – like milking – re-
quires some training and hence a certain degree of famil-
iarity between animals and humans. This demonstrates
that people and their herds lived close together despite
the lack of evidence for penning or even stabling of cattle
close to the settlements in the Neolithic20.
Figure 2 – Broadened proximal articular surfaces of Bos taurus
anterior second phalange from Foeni-Salaş (A) pointing to traction use
in comparison to a specimen with the usual dimensions from Blagotin
(B), both ca. 6000 BCE
Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age
ca. 4000 – 2000 BCE
Ards and sledges
First evidence for ards is only known from around
3000 BCE onwards. Unlike later ploughs, ards do not turn
the soil and do not distribute it on the field, but merely
create furrows. Hence, fields of the Copper and Bronze
Ages were ploughed in a criss-cross fashion. The soil un-
18 Modern-day logging with draught cattle, URL: https://youtu.be/
jDrAkIMF20I [23-06-22].
19 Gaastra et al. 2018.
20 Knipper 2011.
der the mound of Jordehøj in Denmark dating from 3500
to 3300 BC has preserved one of the earliest examples
of ard marks. Judging from rock carvings at Bagnolo and
Borno 1 in Val Camonica/Italy probably also dating to
the 2nd half of the 4th millennium BCE, ards were pulled
by cattle teams of two
21
. The first preserved actual ards
(Figure 3) such as the one from Walle near Aurich in Lower
Saxony, Germany, however, date to the early 2
nd
millen-
nium BCE
22
and are as simple wooden constructions as
those observed in recent traditional contexts.
Cylinder seals of the late Uruk period (ca. 3500-3100
BCE) of Mesopotamia, such as from Arslantepe (near
Malatya, Turkey), show sledges with one seated person
and another one standing on the sledge or next to it and
controlling the single draught animal using a spike and a
rein (Figure 4). The details of the harnessing are somewhat
unclear, but the high friction of a sledge renders draw-
bars that enable the animal to brake the vehicle down-
hill unnecessary at least in flat terrain, so the connection
between the animal’s horn and the sledge shown likely
represents some sort of traces. Remains of a sledge or
wagon from the Early Dynastic period (ca. 2750-2350
BCE) and the skeletons of two bovids have been recov-
ered from tomb RT 800 of the royal cemetery at Ur (Iraq)23.
Details of the construction, including the attachment of
the draught pole, however, remain unknown. Biblical
passages such as 2 Kings 13:7, "For there was no more
left of the people of Jehoahaz than fifty horsemen, ten
chariots and ten thousand footmen. For the king of Syria
had slain them, and made them as the dust of the thresh-
ing", could explain such sledges as symbolic attributes
of high-ranking individuals derived from the threshing
sledge. Threshing sledges are archaeologically attested
by so-called Canaanite blades interpreted as lithic insets
from the fourth millennium BCE onwards24 and are tradi-
tional devices in arid regions like Southwest Asia.
21 Anati 1975; Arcà 2003.
22 Geyh/Rasmussen 1998.
23 Littauer/Crouwel 1979; Piggott 1983.
24 Anderson et al. 2004.
Figure 4 – Late Chalcolithic steatite plaque showing a cattle-drawn
sledge
Figure 3 – One of the first preserved ards from Walle – initially dated
to the 3rd, now redated to the early 2nd millennium BCE

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint Eva Rosenstock
50 | DRAFT ANIMALS in the Past, Present and Future
Wheeled vehicles
One of the oldest examples among the variety of evi-
dence for early vehicles25 are the wheel and the axle from
Stare Gmajne in Slovenia (Figure 5)
14
C-dated to 3350-
3100 BCE
26
. The squarish axle hole of the tripartite disc
wheel shows that the wheel was firmly attached to the
rotating axle forming a wheelset
27
– a common trait in
prehistoric vehicles around the Alps. Rock depictions
from Val de Fontanalbe near Mont Bego, France, suggest
that carts in this period and region were basically travois-
like triangular devices with axles and wheels attached. A
25 Burmeister 2017.
26 Velušček et al. 2009.
27 Bulliet 2016:80.
fragmentary object carved from a tree crotch found in
Reute (Baden-Württemberg, Germany) and dendro-dat-
ed between 3709 und 3707 BCE28 could be the front end
of such a travois or triangular cart, whereas a complete
specimen found at Chalain 19 in the French Jura (Fig-
ure 6) dated to 3015-2976 BCE bears use-wear traces at
the ends of the two poles that suggest it was a travois
29
.
Engravings from the megalithic tomb at Züschen (Hesse,
Germany), in contrast, show two-wheeled vehicles with
separate draught poles and cart bodies30.
Pictographs dated from ca. 3500-3350 BCE from
Uruk (Iraq) show two round impressions under sledge
symbols. If not counting marks
31
, they could be inter-
preted as the earliest evidence for wheeled vehicles in
Southwest Asia. Here, as well as in the Northern Pontic
and in Northern Europe, wagons prevailed. With their four
wheels turning independently on fixed axles by means of
wheel hubs (Figure 7 ), they form a contrast to the wheel-
set carts of the alpine region. Early pictorial evidence
from Europe, such as wagon-shaped ceramic cups of
the Baden culture (ca. 3500-2800 BCE) or depictions on
a Funnel Beaker culture vessel from Bronocice (second
half of the fourth millennium BCE) complements actual
wheels with hubs and axles with rounded ends includ-
ing corresponding wear marks found in e.g. Gnarren-
burg, mid-third millennium BCE, or the Meershusen bog,
around 3000 BCE
32
. In the graves of the Yamnaya culture
of the Northern Pontic steppes
33
, there are also always
four disc-wheels with hubs. But as with two-wheeled
carts, cattle draught was paired, as copper figurines (Fig-
ure 8) and paired cattle burials from related cultures such
as Funnel Beaker, Baden (e.g. from Alsónémedi) and
Globular Amphora illustrate.
The spatial patterning of two- and four-wheeled ve-
hicles can be explained as adaptations to hilly and flat
terrain, respectively
34
. In the absence of separate brake
mechanisms, the cattle team has to brake the vehicle
downhill by means of the draught pole, which is much
easier in a short and rigid cart construction. The differ-
ent wheel principles are, in turn, likely connected to the
number of axles. Wheels that rotate independently of
each other enable easier cornering, as the outer wheel
with the longer travel can turn faster than the inner wheel.
This is true for single-axle carts, but it is more relevant
for two-axle wagons. Their mass causes greater load on
the individual wheel, and their wide axles cause greater
difference in the travel of the wheels in the curve35.
Cattle harness
The yoke found with the Chalain travois was only a
roughly worked roundish piece of wood, so it is difficult
to decide whether it was a horn or withers yoke36, but at
least one of the Val de Fontanalbe and all later depic-
tions suggests the horn yoke as the regular yoke type in
prehistory. In travoises as well as carts, a considerable
28 Mainberger 1997.
29 Pétrequin et al. 2002.
30 Kappel 1981; Hansen et al. 2021.
31 Burmeister 2004a.
32 Milisauskas/Kruk 1991; Burmeister 2017; Maran 2017.
33 Reinhold et al. 2017.
34 Sherratt 1986.
35 Bulliet 2016; Masson/Rosenstock 2011.
36 Pétrequin et al. 2002.
Figure 5 – Wheelset from Stare Gmajne, Slowenia, late fourth millen-
nium BCE
Figure 6 – Travois and yoke found at Chalain, France

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute jointEva Rosenstock
Historical Perspectives | 51
Figure 8 – Copper model of a cattle team from Bytyń, Poznań/Poland – probably late fourth millennium Funnel Beaker culture
Figure 7 – Yamnaya burial including a wagon with four wheels from Sharakhalsun 6 Kurgan 2, Russia

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint Eva Rosenstock
52 | DRAFT ANIMALS in the Past, Present and Future
part of the load rests on the animals. A combination of
horn yoke and cart is not uncommon
37
, but puts extra
strain on the animals in comparison to a cart with withers
yoke or a four-wheeled wagon with horn yoke. While the
fastening of front and neck yokes may result in chafing
on the horn, the horn sheaves usually do not survive in
the archaeological record. Hence, damaged horn cores
such as in the find from Holubice (Figure 9) represent ex-
ceptional cases: either chafing was so severe that the
bone underneath the horn was also affected or – more
likely – the animal had lost the horn sheave by accident38.
But in general, this find fits into a trend of increasing os-
teological evidence for physical strain on cattle from the
late fourth millennium BCE onwards
39
. Other yoke finds,
such as from Arbon-Bleiche 3 (3384-3370 BCE), Vinelz
(28th century BCE) and Chalain 2 (27th to 26th centu-
ry BCE) have anatomically shaped recesses typical for
withers yokes. With its comparatively small width of only
ca. 1 m compared to 1.3 m to 1.7 m as in other finds, the
yoke from Arbon-Bleiche
40
is too small to leave space
for a draught pole between grown up animals, so it was
either used for smaller animals such as goats or for train-
ing young cattle without a vehicle. The first known cases
of genetic hornlessness, recognisable in cattle skulls by
a characteristic cusp in the neck, appear in the fourth
millennium BCE, too
41
. Given the spontaneous mutation
rate of the underlying genes and their associated effects
on other bodily traits such as eyelashes and genitals
42
,
their occurrence at a time when first dung finds (e.g.
37 Silvester 1980.
38 Peške 1985; Benecke 1994, 273.
39 Hüster Plogmann 2002; Johannsen 2006; Milisauskas/Kruk 1991.
40 Leuzinger 2002.
41 Benecke 1994, 273; Müller 1963.
42 Wiedemar et al. 2014.
from Thayngen-Weier or Pestenacker) demonstrate live-
stock keeping close to the dwellings or even in stables
appears
43
seems no coincidence: in crowded situations,
hornless cattle are less likely to hurt each other, but they
can – of course – not be harnessed with a horn yoke. As
suggested by Yamnaya copper finds, cattle were steered
using nose rings44.
Hollow ways and wooden tracks
Often-used tracks would cause wheels to slide in the
mud, especially in rainy weather. To prevent sliding and
consequently uneven wearing of the wheels, felloes were
frequently studded with metal nails in the third millenni-
um BCE of South-west Asia45. In Europe, wooden tracks
preserved in bogs likely served the same purpose. With
widths between ca. 2,40 m and 4 m, they were broad
enough for early wagons with their gauges between
1,2 m and 1,6 m, and the lack of curves suggests that
early wagons had indeed no steerable front axle as sug-
gested by traces of wear on preserved wagon parts
46
.
Hence, draught poles were likely rather long to give more
leverage facilitating the job of the cattle team if a wagon
must go around a curve.
Later Bronze Age ca. 2000-1000 BCE
Equid domestication
Remains of domesticated African wild ass (Equus asi-
nus) have been found in archaeological contexts in North-
east Africa from the fifth millennium BCE onwards; from
the fourth millennium BCE onwards, they also appear in
South-west Asia. Attempts at domesticating the Asiatic
wild ass or Onager (E. hemionus) led to the first hybrid
animals created by humans shortly before the domestica-
tion of the horse
47
. Several horse populations of Eurasia
also including the Przewalsky’s horse (E. przewalsky)
48
were intensively exploited from the fourth millennium BCE
onwards
49
. Here, one population from the Volga-Don re-
gion has been determined as ancestral to the modern do-
mestic horse (E. caballus) using genetic evidence. Select-
ed traits in these early domestic horses included genes
connected to greater docility and stress-resilience as
well as better performance in running and weight bear-
ing
50
. Such traits were highly desired if we look at the
Kikkuli-text, a 2nd millennium BCE training instruction for
chariot horses found in the Hittite capital in Central Ana-
tolia
51
. It hence seems plausible that the development of
a related technology for light-weight vehicles in the region
accompanied the expansion of the horse into South-west
Asia and Europe around 2000 BCE
52
. As, however, also
in South-western Asia experiments with lighter equid
draft were made since the third millennium BCE, the di-
rection of influence is still a matter of debate53.
43 Ebersbach 2002.
44 Reinhold et al. 2017.
45 Mühl 2014.
46 Burmeister 2004b, id. 2018.
47 Bennett et al. 2022; Grigson 2012; Milevski/Horwitz 2019; Mitchell
2018; Wang et al. 2020.
48 Gaunitz et al. 2018.
49 Anthony/Brown 2011; Outram et al. 2009.
50 Librado et al. 2021.
51 Raulwing 2005; Starke 1995.
52 Grigson 2012; Librado et al. 2021.
53 Burmeister/Raulwing 2012; Chechushkov/Epimakhov 2018.
Figure 9 – Worn horn core from Holubice, Bell beaker period, early
third millennium BCE

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute jointEva Rosenstock
Historical Perspectives | 53
Chariots and spoked wheels
Judging from pictorial evidence such as the so-called
Standard of Ur (Figure 10), not only cattle, but also don-
keys or onagers were harnessed in the early third millen-
nium BCE in front of heavy four-wheeled wagons with
a parapet. Moreover, models of so-called straddle-cars
and carts with a platform for standing drivers were at-
tempts at developing lighter two-wheeled vehicles pulled
by up to four equids. While wheel construction in South-
west Asia and Europe only experienced minor progress
in later prehistory, mainly by reducing material needed by
lunate openings
54
, the oldest evidence for spoked wheels,
a key trait of true light-weight vehicles, is associated with
the horse in what today is Southern Russia. Here, carts
buried at Sintashta (Figure 11) and related sites dating to
the beginning of the second millennium BCE
55
had two
wheels of approx. 1 m diameter. Judging from traces they
left in the ground, the felloes and spokes were max. 4 to
4,5 cm thick
56
, pointing to advanced woodworking tech-
54 Piggott 1983; Lindner 2021.
55 Id. 2020.
56 Piggott 1983; Burmeister 2017; Lindner 2021.
niques such as bending and the lathe. The association
of the wheels with horses is clear from the deposition
of horse skeletal remains as well as bridle cheek-pieces,
but whether the vehicle bodies were made from massive
wood or a frame with trellis or whether the body’s open-
ing was towards the rear or the front remains unknown. In
somewhat later vehicles with similar multi-spoked wheels
from late second millennium BCE Lchashen in Arme-
nia, however, a light framework with interwoven leather
straps has been preserved that opens to the front and
suggests a seated driver. Chariots with front parapets
and rear openings for standing drivers as in the older
four-wheeled wagons, but with spoked wheels, however,
do not predate depictions from the 18th/17th centuries
BCE in South-west Asia and hence suggest a merging of
pre-existing South-western Asian vehicle concepts with
the horse and new wheelwright techniques as Eurasian
innovations57.
With only four spokes per wheel and ca. 25 kg total
mass only, the developed Late Bronze chariot was ex-
tremely light and – consequently – did not require stud-
ded felloes
58
. By the second half of the second millenni-
um BCE, such chariots (Figure 12) were used for cruising
(Figure 13), hunting and warfare and formed an integral
part of South-west Asian and Mediterranean and Europe-
an elite lifestyle59; Egyptians perhaps lampooned people
as only superficially integrated into Egyptian culture by
showing their chariot as cattle-drawn
60
, and an increas-
ing symbolic charge of wheeled vehicles is visible in
specimens like the Trundholm sun chariot (Figure 14). For
a south-facing onlooker, the bright gilded side is visible
when the vehicle is moved from East to West, while the
return travel from West to East displays the dark side,
mimicking the daily cycle of the sun’s movement across
the sky and reminding us of the ancient Greek mytholog-
ical association of the sun god Helios with a chariot.
57 Piggott 1983; Lindner 2021.
58 Mühl 2014.
59 Lindner 2021; Metzner-Nebelsick 2003; Pankau/Krause 2017.
60 Masson/Rosenstock 2011; Burmeister 2013.
Figure 12 – Egyptian wooden chariot, 18th Dynasty, currently in the
Museum of Florence
Figure 11 – Remains of an early second millennium BCE burial of a
male with remains of weapons, two horses and a two-wheeled vehic-
le from Sintashta Mogila Grave 30
Figure 10 – The Standard of Ur showing equids, likely onagers or
hybrids between donkeys and onagers, pulling a four-wheeled wagon

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint Eva Rosenstock
54 | DRAFT ANIMALS in the Past, Present and Future
Figure 13 – Women driving a chariot. Reconstructed fresco from the palace at Tyrins/Greece, second millennium BCE

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute jointEva Rosenstock
Historical Perspectives | 55
Figure 14 – The so-called sun chariot from Trundholm/Denmark, ca.
1400 BCE
Yoke adaptations for equids
With their different physique, horses cannot be har-
nessed with a cattle yoke without specific adaptations.
The archaeological record in the Bronze Age Eurasian
steppes has not preserved remains of horse gear, but
petroglyphs – that are, however, admittedly difficult to
date – suggest yoke-like constructions
61
as in the ear-
ly equid draft of South-west Asia
62
. Assuming that the
blueprint for harnessing horses was the cattle horn yoke,
depictions showing yokes close to the horses’ nape of
the neck do not seem entirely improbable as early stages
of a technology transfer and have – moreover – proven
functional in experiments
63
. Models and actual yokes
such as found in Egyptian graves of the New Kingdom
(Figure 12), however, show withers yokes additionally
fastened by straps, often aided by a fork-like device to
embrace the animal’s lower neck. Suited mainly for light
draught, this type of horse harness instigated a long-last-
ing division between heavy cattle draught for freight carts
and wagons as well as the ard on the one and light horse
draught for travel and race vehicles on the other hand.
Sequel: Iron Age and later periods
From ca. 1200 BCE onwards, the Iron Age in South-
west Asia and the Eastern Mediterranean sees the trans-
formation of the ultra-light chariot into a heavier, sturdier
and more harnessed vehicle as described in Homer’s
Iliad that had, consequently also studded felloes
64
. In
Europe, spoked-wheeled wagons appear as burial gifts.
Judging from associated bridle finds, these wagons were
likely horse-drawn, and in some of them a pivoted front
axle is plausible
65
. Interpretations often revolve about the
ceremonial use of such vehicles, but the four matching
wheels from Stade (Germany) show that draught was
heavy and frequent enough to require studded felloes
66
.
In the later European Iron Age from ca. 400 BCE onwards,
two-wheeled chariots are also known as grave goods
67
.
How these Iron Age roots evolved into the known spec-
61 Chechushkov/Epimakhov 2018.
62 Littauer and Crouwel 1979.
63 Spruytte 1983.
64 Mühl 2014.
65 Koch 2006; Lindner 2021; Pare 1992; Piggott 1983, 138-194.
66 Mühl 2014.
67 Piggott 1983; Crouwel 1992; Id. 2012.
trum of Roman vehicles such as the four-wheeled raeda
and the two-wheeled cisium, however, has not yet been
the subject of targeted research
68
despite the important
role roman technology had for the development of me-
dieval animal draught technology
69
. Merowingian kings
reported to travel their realms on cattle-driven wagons
70
,
however, are apparently a case of satire
71
similar to the
Egyptian example mentioned above, as both medieval
South-western Asia and Europe saw the rise of riding –
on camels
72
or on equids – for personal transport and
warfare until the resurge of wheeled travel with carriages
from ca. 1400 CE onwards73.
Animal traction and acceleration
in prehistory
The revolute joint and the first machines
From the record outlined above, the appearance of
what is colloquially called the “wheel” was key to the
change in intensity in animal traction we observe around
ca. 3000 BCE. However, the word “wheel” does not tech-
nically correspond to a technical or kinematic concept.
Hence, the popular idea of the “invention of the wheel”
74
has prompted common misunderstandings in prehistor-
ic research, as wheel-shaped objects such as spindle
whorls and evidence for rotary motion predate wheeled
vehicles by many millennia: judging from Middle Palaeo-
lithic twisted threads
75
, mankind has known how to use
rotary motion since at least the time of the Neanderthals,
and Neolithic fibre spinning by means of a spindle
76
is
just an extension of this principle: ceramic spindle whorls
are rare, but attested since the seventh millennium BCE77.
However, despite the superficial resemblance of a spin-
dle to a wheel attached to an axle
78
, the rotary motion of a
twisting spindle is not the pivoted motion that constitutes
the kinematic pair of a wheel-and-axle. Rather, a spindle
stick and a whorl form the spindle as a typical compos-
ite tool. Spindle and thread form what Miriam Haidle has
termed a complementary toolset
79
. Here, like with bow
and arrow, it is the constant control of the skilled human
that keeps the active parts, i.e. the spindle and the thread,
moving correctly. In contrast, in the respective machines,
i.e. in the crossbow or the spinning wheel, the correct
movement of the parts is ensured by joints in which the
crossbow bolt or the spindle can move only in the de-
sired direction. In that sense, the rotary motion of a roller
bearing is only a complementary tool use, as the rollers
must be steered by humans. Wheelsets (Figure 15 left), in
contrast, do not require human interference due to piv-
oted motion in the revolute joint formed by the axle bear-
ings. The same is true of wheels rotating around the axle
(Figure 15 right), kinematically speaking levers that turn
68 Raepsaet 2009.
69 Holmes/Thomas (in this volume).
70 Masson/Rosenstock 2011; Murray 1998.
71 Kölzer 2004.
72 Bulliet 1990.
73 Id. 2016, 132.
74 Kaiser 2010.
75 Hardy et al. 2020.
76 Langgut et al. 2016.
77 Barber 1991; Çilingiroğlu 2009; Levy/Gilead 2013; Schoop 2014.
78 Klimscha 2017.
79 Haidle et al. 2015.

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute joint Eva Rosenstock
56 | DRAFT ANIMALS in the Past, Present and Future
around a fulcrum
80
. After a long development of human
tool use from basic to modular, composite and finally
complementary use
81
, the revolute joint around 3000 BCE
constitutes the first attested moveable connection be-
tween components, and numerous applications of this
new principle appear in the two millennia on either side
of 3000 BCE82.
Figure 15 – Andrew Sherratt’s rotating axle principle (left) can be
called a wheelset, a technical term actually derived from railroad
vehicles, and is in kinematic a terms of a wheel-and-axle – rotating
wheels (right), in contrast, are wheels in both technical and kinematic
terms
One of the oldest examples is the door from Roben-
hausen (Switzerland), the first pivoted door among oth-
er later specimens from both wood and stone
83
. With a
date around 3700 BCE, the Robenhausen door supports
the idea that animal figurines from the Northern Pontic
Tripol’e culture that are somewhat unreliably dated to the
first half of the fourth millennium BCE
84
might have held
in their pierced legs revolving wheelsets predating actual
wheeled transport (Figure 16) and raises the idea that the
wheel-and-axle (or rotating axle, as Sherratt has put it)
principle might somewhat predate the lever or fixed axle
principle of wheeled vehicles
85
. Even though the two prin-
ciples seemingly appear contemporaneously in the ar-
chaeological record
86
, the kinematically entirely different
mechanisms underlying the wheel-and-axle on the one
and the lever on the other suggest that what is perceived
as “the wheel” are in fact two separate innovations. Fur-
ther applications of the wheel-and-axle are the potter’s
wheel and the lathe
87
– the latter in itself a prerequisite for
80 Reuleaux 1875.
81 Haidle et al. 2015.
82 Rosenstock 2020.
83 Altorfer 1999; Gauron/Massaud 1987; Klimscha 2017.
84 Burmeister 2004; Matuschik 2006, 281.
85 Bulliet 2016, 72. Chub, in prep.
86 Burmeister 2017; Maran 2017.
87 Cartwright 2005.
the construction of advanced vehicles , while the lever
principle is used in well sweeps
88
and balance scales
89
,
innovations that are all first attested in the third millen-
nium BCE. They all can be called the first machines in
human history.
While a somewhat unprecise use of the term “ma-
chine” can be observed in ethnographic and prehistoric
research
90
, moveable connections are the defining crite-
rion of the ISO 12100:2010 norm for the term machine as
an “assembly, fitted with or intended to be fitted with a
drive system consisting of linked parts or components, at
least one of which moves, and which are joined together
for a specific application”. This machine definition is in
line with 19th century CE approaches, such as by the
engineer Franz Reuleaux
91
who still knew about the use
of human, animal, wind and waterpower rather than only
steam, combustion and electricity. However, it is not in
line with the Machinery Directive of the European Union,
which excludes directly applied human and animal power.
But 2006/42/EU is inconsistent, as it tolerates human and
animal power for some machines such as the block-and-
tackle, and hence we can safely posit that the revolute
joint constituted the first machines in the fourth millenni-
um BCE. Likely initially merely manual machines – such
as pivoted doors and perhaps wheeled toys of the fourth
millennium BCE – soon were combined with pre-existing
Neolithic knowledge of cattle traction to become auto-
motoric.
Work speed and travel speed in early animal draft
Why carts and wagons were developed in the first place
is an interesting question that has not yet been convinc-
ingly answered and may lie anywhere between ritual and
utilitarian purposes
92
. Here, the hypothesis that Neolith-
ic economy was in broad terms labour-limited, whereas
only in later prehistory economy became land-limited
93
can be helpful to understand the – despite all symbolic
meanings of wheeled vehicles – practical initial reasons
for inventing carts and wagons and the apparent lack of
ards before the end of the Neolithic. Although according
to our definitions the ard is not an automotoric machine
like carts and wagons, but an automotoric composite
tool, its development appears connected to wheeled
transport as another means of reducing the necessary
input of manpower into production. The ard significantly
increases the area that can be cultivated in comparison
to hoe-based culture
94
and consequently the amount of
harvest to be transported. The same applies to other bulk
materials that are new in the Final Neolithic and Chalco-
lithic such as ore from extractive metallurgy
95
as well as
soil, rubble and other material for monumental mounds
96
.
Sledging and logging have high friction coefficients and,
hence, Neolithic animal traction was likely rather slow.
Roller bearings, albeit not attested in the archaeological
record
97
, can potentially reduce friction, as we demon-
88 Ro st 2 017.
89 Genz 2015.
90 Bleicher 2018; Gleser 2016; Leroi-Gourhan 1943; Id. 1945; Id. 1965.
91 Reuleaux 1875, 38.
92 Maran 2017.
93 Bogaard et al. 2019.
94 Kerig 2013a; Id. 2013b.
95 Bulliet 2016.
96 Müller 1990a; Id. 1990b; Rosenstock et al. 2019b.
97 Harris 2018.
Figure 16 – Chalcolithic animal figurines with pierced legs from sites
of the Tripol’e B2 and C1 cultures, early fourth millennium BCE

Speeding up. Prehistoric animal traction and the revolute jointEva Rosenstock
Historical Perspectives | 57
strated during our trials at Domäne Dahlem in Berlin in
2016
98
. However, frequent breaks between hauling in-
tervals are necessary in which a team of several peo-
ple shifts the rollers and realigns the bearings, so roller
bearings, if used at all in the Neolithic, caused an inter-
mittent and consequently equally slow workflow. With a
cart or wagon, in contrast, only one person is necessary
to control the animals. Moreover, they can seamlessly
pull for hours and for as long as the oxen can work – i.e.
about half a day99 – and, hence, helped to transform early
economies from slow and labour- to fast and land-limited.
Although soon to be complemented by the horse for fast
draught, cattle traction continued into the modern era, as
many contributions in this volume show.
Whether horses were even herded and let alone
ridden in Eurasia before they were harnessed to two-
wheeled vehicles in the early second millennium BCE re-
mains an open question, as archaeochemical evidence
for equid milk consumption and signs of bridling wear
on equid teeth detected in fourth millennium BCE sites
100
have recently been challenged
101
. Goat and sheep have
a strong herd instinct that makes them easy to shepherd,
and cattle – like donkeys - tend to face potential threats.
Horses, however, have a pronounced flight instinct that
makes it virtually impossible to herd them as a pedestri-
an, and this may have been one of the reasons behind
the desire of early Eurasian pastoralists to speed up – be
-
sides, of course, the joy the new velocity brought about.
Whether early draft horses were mainly trotters or ran in
full gallop as shown in later second millennium BCE char-
iot depictions from Egypt (Figure 17), or whether at least
some of them had genes determining pacing that are
currently first attested in the Medieval era
102
remains to
be investigated; more knowledge about early horse gait
may help to better understand the Kikkuli text
103
as well
as rhythm perception of charioteers and – from at least
the first millennium BCE onwards104 – horse riders in the
ancient world. Equids, hence, can be seen as a first at-
tempt at finding other and faster motors than cattle. How-
ever, horses increased only the travel speed of prehistoric
societies. And although this faster travel speed implies a
wide range of potential and yet underexplored effects on
realms like communication, migration, and warfare, work
speed and therefore the pace of production remained
determined by cattle until the horse collar enabled the
use of the horse also in heavy traction in the Medieval105.
Over time, not only every suitable large domesticate
including camels
106
and reindeer
107
has been harnessed
for traction. While sailing ships represent later prehistoric
instances of the use of inanimate powers such as the
wind, and water power has been known since at least the
Roman era, vehicles have been driven by animals until
the steam engine, an innovation that has been argued to
be one of the drivers of the acceleration of life observed
98 Rosenstock et al. 2019b.
99 Masson 2015.
100 Anthony/Brown 2011; Outram et al. 2009.
101 Taylor/Barrón-Ortiz 2021; Wilkin et al. 2021.
102 Wutke et al. 2016.
103 Raulwing 2005; Starke 1995.
104 Littauer/Crouwel 1979.
105 Holmes/ Thomas (in this volume).
106 Bulliet 1990.
107 Losey et al. 2021.
by a number of philosophers and historians. Both, the in-
vention of the revolute joint around ca. 3000 BCE and the
harnessing of new motors around 2000 BCE, significantly
accelerated work and travel speed of prehistoric societ-
ies. In a similar way, the industrial revolution around ca.
1800 AD and the subsequent rise of new motors such as
the steam engine, combustion and electricity accelerated
human life even further. Modern experiences of accelera-
tion have been the subject of research by e.g. Paul Virilio,
Reinhart Koselleck and Hartmut Rosa
108
, and it can be
fruitful to view prehistoric technical developments such
as animal draft also from the angle of awareness of time
in space and, hence, speed.
Acknowledgements
Building on a long-lasting cooperation with Astrid Mas-
son, the talk for the #draftanim21 conference and this
paper form part of my research on time and time aware-
ness in the ancient cultures within the framework of the
Einstein Center Chronoi, Berlin. I gratefully acknowledge
the support of the Einstein Foundation Berlin and the
center’s speakers, Eva Cancik-Kirschbaum, Christoph
Markschies and Hermann Parzinger, as well as all Chro-
noi colleagues and fellows. I thank Ursula Brosseder for
her critical and constructive comments, and my biggest
thanks go out to Claus Kropp for organising a fantastic
online conference and putting this volume together.
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List of Figures
Title (Traditional equipment for cattle draught on display in the courtyard
of the Selçuk caravanserai of Sultanhanı (Prov. Aksaray/Turkey):
a döven (threshing sledge) with stone insets in the background, and
a cart with solid wheels in the foreground (part of the drawbar
apparently damaged and sawed off) – going back to at least the
4th millennium BCE, such implements have a deep history and
significantly increased working speed in agricultural production) –
E. Rosenstock.
Figure 1 – Burov 1981, fig. 1.
Figure 2 – Gaastra et al. 2018, fig. 5.
Figure 3 – Jacob-Friesen 1963, fig. 233.
Figure 4 – Nagel 1964, fig. 2.
Figure 5 – von Nikolai 2021, fig. 13.
Figure 6 – Pétrequin et al. 2002, fig. 6.
Figure 7 – Reinhold et al. 2017, fig. 11.
Figure 8 – Bakker 2004, 284 fig. 2.
Figure 9 – Peške 1985, fig. 4.
Figure 10 – Roaf 1991, 194.
Figure 11 – Outram et al. 2011, fig. 2.
Figure 12 – Köpp-Junk 2018, fig. 8.
Figure 13 – Papadimitriou 2001, 41 fig. 35.
Figure 14 – Egg/Pare 1995, pl. V/2.
Figure 15 – Sherratt 1986, fig. 2.
Figure 16 – Bondár 2012, fig. 3
Figure 17 – Köpp-Junk 2018, fig. 9.
Author info
Eva Rosenstock
Bonn Center for ArchaeoSciences
c/o Institut für Archäologie und Kulturanthropologie
Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn · Römerstraße 164 · 53117 Bonn
E-Mail: e.rosenstock@uni-bonn.de
Digital paper: https://youtu.be/6UqcpvKozzg