Preferences in Horse Color Change Over Time

Here's a great article on how cultural preferences through time have affected the prevalence of horse color. Germany’s Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research studied DNA horses through the ages. During the Bronze Age and Iron Ages (2700 BC to 400 AD) the number of horse colors detected increased from 6 to 9 with spotted and dilute horses being common. During the Middle Ages, solid color horses, especially chestnuts, were preferred, possible due to Biblical references to the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse. 

Scientists admit their samples may have been biased since horses analyzed were associated with the noble class. As reader, I noted that the sample size was very small around 107 horses. Plus artwork from the early and late middle ages show notable examples of spotted horses. Examples: spotted horse shown on needlework from from Baldishol Church in Norway circa early 1200s or the 16th century Hunts of Maximillian tapestries. I wonder how carefully the genetic researchers checked with historians and art historians on this topic.

For those Icelandic horse aficionados out there, finds indicate that the prevalence of spotted horses in Iceland today indicate that horses marked in this way were introduced after 11th century AD, this contradicting that horses were not imported into Iceland after the initial settlement.
“Strikingly, the Icelandic horses from the Viking Age show clear differences from their modern counterparts. 'The samples we analysed originated from graves around Iceland that date back to as early as the middle of the 9th century, shortly after Iceland was settled. These horses already carried the allele for Silver dapple (two of 19 individuals), a common trait in contemporary Icelandic horses, but they did not carry any alleles associated with spotted phenotypes, although such individuals are frequent in modern Icelandic horses. Therefore, we assume that spotted phenotypes were introduced after the 10th/11th century AD, which contradicts the popular claim that the import of horses to Iceland was prohibited for almost 1000 years.”

https://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2016/12/09/horses-dreamcoat-colourful-history-unveiled/#ixzz4UYevTYks