Eduardo J. Torres was appointed academician of the Peruvian Academy of Veterinary Sciences, in an act that took place on October 23rd, 2018 at Lima (PerĂş). After the incorporation ceremony, the new academic presented his master lecture entitled: “Evolution and utility of horses”.

Inspector of the National Veterinary Force, Military Veterinarian and with more than 50 years dedicated to the practice of the Veterinary in very diverse fields, the newly appointed academic made a defense of the horse and its usefulness for man, raising the need to maintain this utility in an immediate future, to avoid its disappearance. He supported his dissertation in recent genetic studies related to the evolution and history of the domestication and use of such animals.

During his speech he stressed that, despite the many studies carried out, the horse continues to be an enigma to be deciphered. He showed that horse is possibly the animal that has contributed the most to the spread of cultures but, despite this close collaboration with man, “we still have a lot to know about it”.

In his opinion, “despite what the equine family has contributed to the development of humanity, today, we are forgetting about it and many equine populations are in serious danger of extinction”. For this reason, he defended: “It is necessary to develop in society the knowledge of the usefulness of horses; the need to dispose of them and the goodwill to get it”.

Among the possible lines of work, he pointed out: the increase of its use in the maintenance of ecosystems; the popularization of sports and social activities with equine participation; the regulation and empowerment of hippotherapy; its use as guide horse for people with sensory limitations and the production of antidotes that allow the control of one of the biggest causes of death in certain countries.

“Equine therapy, which is practiced since S. IV a.C.n. is today an alternative treatment to be used “in addition to” and not “instead of”, and that has proven useful for the treatment of people with physical, mental or sensory disabilities, mental health problems and / or adaptation social”, he said.

CRIOLLO HORSE

Also, throughout his presentation, he reviewed the circumstances surrounding the origin and spread of the horse in America and explained why, in his opinion, the “Criollo Horse” is, “at the same time, unique and diverse, with special mention of the Peruvian Paso Horse“.

He remembered that, for a long time, the horse that was introduced to America was Spanish, not only because the colonization of the New World was done by the Spaniards, but because the conquerors and colonizers of any nationality were looking for the Spanish horse “for being the best for those necessities”, as was recognized by the chroniclers of the time.

These horses, tamed by the natives of the country, have developed those “qualities that made them more useful, both in rusticity as in character or functionality”. Due to the structure of the terrain and its habitual use in long journeys, the resistance and the comfort of running have been sought, qualities that are achieved with such a characteristic “step” that has given name to this group of horses and to specific races: “Paso Fino”, “Peruvian Paso”, etc. “As it was already done in the Middle Ages, in Europe, with the Spanish “Jennet”, we find ourselves again with an evolution mediated by utility, which causes the appearance of “races”, he highlighted.

Torres, in his presentation, questioned the ascription of the inheritance of the “amblador” characteristic of the “paso horses” only to the intervention of the Berber horse, since the Muslim occupation was comparatively limited and, in the times of occupation by Romans and Carthaginians, already existed in the peninsula “ambladores horses”, as the Asturcones and the Celdones (now Losino), especially valued, as it was in the High Middle Ages the Jenette Spanish”

PERUVIAN “PASO” HORSE

Regarding the evolution of horses in Peru, Torres emphasized that “the first ancestors of the current “Peruvian Paso Horses” (CPP, for its abbreviation in Spanish) are the horses acquired by Pizarro and Diego de Almagro to Moyano de Benalcázar, which, through Panama, they arrived in Peru in 1532 and they were of Berber origin”.

In relation to the “Peruvian Paso Horses”, Torres highlighted the fact that Peru was “Horse Distribution Center”, with no other ways of supplying horses than those arriving through the Pacific Ocean, and that, in addition, the horse it will dedicate almost exclusively to the tasks and rural displacements, which “meant that, for centuries, it was not subject to crosses with other races and that it retained its most outstanding characteristics”, qualities that have been maintained in the current CPP.