Summary Material remains of harness elements from different parts of the Roman Empire have contributed to a new interpretation of the harness depicted on funerary reliefs of the second‐third centuries AD from north‐western Europe and on other figured documents, such as Trajan's Column in Rome (dedicated in 113 AD). As recent experimental reconstruction has shown, the curved wooden plaques, held firmly in place by a metal bow, may have formed a precedent for the collar and hames developed during the Middle Ages into the form still in use today. The most important innovation was the introduction – no later than the second century AD – of single draught between shafts, replacing traditional paired draught with pole and yoke. There is even some evidence that other elements of modern harness, such as traces and the whippletree, hitherto considered to be medieval inventions, were also known during the period of the Roman Empire.

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Chinese worlds is not doubted, but just what was exchanged and how the transmission of ideas took place is a question very much under investigation. This paper examines peculiarities of equid harnessing and draught across this vast area as a case in point to consider such issues as diffusion and independent invention, especially in relation to the emergence of single draught vehicles.1 Rasche 1978; Yü 1967, 152-66 examining tradeespecially silkthat was conducted via intermediaries across Eurasia where India and Parthia were the most important. Clearly many types of exchange took placepeople, goods and ideasand that interaction increased over time, and was of concern to emerging empires such as the Xiongnu and Rome (Kim et al. 2017) and in Late Antiquity (Di Cosmo and Maas 2018). 2 Yü 1986, 167-9 discussing the transfer of technology, especially of iron; Di Cosmo 2002, discussing interchange with present-day Mongolian territory.