For the truck manufacturer see Tarpan (car)

For the plane see PZL M-4 Tarpan

Tarpan
1841 drawing 1841 drawing
Conservation status
Extinct (1879)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Mammalia Order: Perissodactyla Family: Equidae Genus: Equus Subgenus: Equus Species: E. ferus Subspecies: E. f. ferus
Trinomial name
Equus ferus ferus Boddaert, 1785

The Tarpan, Equus ferus ferus, was the Eurasian wild horse. The last specimen of this species died in captivity in Ukraine in 1918 or 1919.

Polish farmers often crossed the tarpan with their domestic horses. The result was a small horse breed, the Konik. Such animals, as the Konik, and also the Sorraia Horse preserved in Portugal, are now being used to breed back the Tarpan, and to fill in the niche that was left vacant by their extinction in the wild. The Hucul pony living in the Carpathian mountains is arguably the most direct descendant of the Tarpan.

The name Tarpan is from a Turkic language (Kyrgyz or Kazakh) name for the horse,^[1].

Taxonomic history

The Tarpan was first described by Johann Friedrich Gmelin in 1774; he had seen the animals in 1769 in the region of Bobrovsk, near Voronezh. In 1784 Pieter Boddaert named the species Equus ferus, referring to Gmelin's description. Unaware of Boddaert's name, Otto Antonius published the name Equus gmelini in 1912, again referring to Gmelin's description. Since Antonius' name refers to the same description as Boddaert's it is a junior objective synonym.

It is now thought that the domesticated horse, named Equus caballus by Linnaeus in 1758, is descended from the Tarpan; indeed, many taxonomists consider them to belong to the same species. By a strict application of the rules of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, the Tarpan ought to be named E. caballus, or if considered a subspecies, E. caballus ferus. However, biologists have generally ignored the letter of the rule and used E. ferus for the Tarpan to avoid confusion with its domesticated cousins.

In 2003, the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature "conserved the usage of 17 specific names based on wild species, which are pre-dated by or contemporary with those based on domestic forms", confirming E. ferus for the Tarpan. Taxonomists who consider the domestic horse a subspecies of the wild Tarpan should use Equus ferus caballus; the name Equus caballus remains available for the domestic horse where it is considered to be a separate species. ^[2]

"Bred back" horses

There have been attempts to recreate the Tarpan by breeding individuals who closely resemble the phenotype of the original animal. Two examples are the Konik horses of the Netherlands and the Heck horse of Germany. While genetically not the same animal as the original Tarpan, their outward appearance and manner is similar.

References

• Equid Specialist Group 1996. Equus ferus. In: IUCN 2004. 2004 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. www.iucnredlist.org. Downloaded on 24 December 2005.

See also

• Przewalski's Horse
• Domestication of the horse
• List of extinct animals of Europe
• Žemaitukas

External links

• The Spanish Tarpan http://www.sorraia.org/
• The Spanish Tarpan in North America http://www.spanish-mustang.org/
• American "tarpan"
• North American Tarpan Association
• Resurrecting a "prehistoric" horse This article describes how Tarpan-style horses are now bred on the Genesis Equines ranch in central Oregon, USA.
• The Extinction Website - Tarpan - Equus ferus ferus
• IUCN Red List of Threatened Species: Equus ferus