Shire horse
Also shires horse.
[See quot. 1888; cf. shire n.]
A horse of a heavy powerful breed, used for draught, chiefly bred in the midland counties of England. Also known as the Old English Black Horse.
| 1875 S. Sidney Bk. Horse xii. 268 The Shire Horse. 1877 Field 14 Apr. 447/3 The Shires or Old English Cart Horse. Ibid., Influential breeders of the Shires horse should combine together and [etc.]. [1888 Sir W. Gilbey Great Horse (1899) 52 Arthur Young, in the latter part of the last century,..mentions only two varieties of Cart Horse as deserving attention, namely, the Large Black Old English Horse, ‘the produce principally of the Shire counties in the heart of England and the Sorrel-coloured Suffolk Punch’.] 1891 Spectator 7 Mar. 340/1 The show of ‘Shire horses’, as the old breed of the English cart-horse is now generally called. |
| attrib. 1877 Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc. 532 Those confined to the ‘Shire’ horse classes. 1887 Leamington Spa Courier 30 Apr. 1/6, 8 grand Shire Horse Colts and Fillies. |