Vintage Horse Collar

This vintage horse collar is in great shape.  We are going to do some work on cleaning it up and also adding a mirror to the center as a nice decorative piece.  

A horse collar is a part of a horse harness device used to distribute a load around a horse's neck and shoulders when pulling a wagon or plough.  The collar often supports and pads a pair of curved metal or wood pieces, called hames, to which the traces of the harness are attached.  The collar allows a horse to use its full strength when pulling, essentially allowing the horse to push forward with its hindquarters into the collar rather than to pull with its shoulders as it would be required to do if wearing a yoke or a breast collar.  The collar also an improvement on the yoke, as it reduces pressure on the windpipe.  From the time of invention of the horse collar, horses became extremely valuable for agricultural success and for pulling heavy vehicles.  When the horse was harnessed with the horse collar, the horse could apply 50% more power to a task than an ox due to its greater speed.   Horses generally also have greater endurance and can work more hours in a day.  The horse collar was important in development of Europe, as the replacement of oxen with horses for ploughing boosted the economy, reduced reliance on subsistence farming and allowed the development of early industry and education in the rise of market-based towns.  

Impact of the Horse Collar: 

The creation of the horse collar removed the previous physical restrictions the old harness had on the animal, and allowed the horse to be able to exert its full strength in plowing.  Originally, the structure of the old harness forced the horse to literally pull its workload.  The horse collar's development instead allowed the horse to push its workload, increasing the efficiency of its labor output.