The carved stones feature interlaced animal figures, deer, riders and their steeds, and a Christian flag.

The rider stone was uncovered during farmwork in 1874 and used to pave a cowshed until it was purchased, along with two other fragments, by the Halle State Museum of Prehistory in 1912.

Later excavations where the rider stone was found revealed more fragments and a large early medieval graveyard.

It is an early medieval settlement located within historical Thuringia (a region of a different extent than its modern namesake state).

In 1912, Stones 1, 2 and 3 were obtained from residents of Hornhausen and placed in the collection of the Halle State Museum of Prehistory.

[1]: 96–98  Three further stones, which archaeologist Kurt Böhner [de] was not able to trace by the time of his 1977 article, were apparently uncovered but later lost.

[1]: 100 In 1934, three fragments of carved sandstone were found in Sankt-Petrus-Kirche [de] at nearby Morsleben (a village about 20 km from Hornhausen).

Given the width of the framing, Böhner has inferred that there were originally ten feet, and therefore the upper register showed five figures turned to the right.

The upper image is an interlace design: a fluid loop crosses itself two times and symmetrically intertwines with two diamonds.

Both animal heads are carved in sharp relief; the eyes (circles with dot pupils) and mouths (straight lines) are rendered much more primitively than those in Stone 3.

Both the X and cross are decorated with periodic triangles jutting out, which Böhner reads as suggestive of the branches of the tree of life.

"[5]: 27  However, Romina Schiavone has studied the motifs and style and found them to be more broadly "Frankish-Mediterranean", with no elements which do not find their parallel in contemporaneous Christian art.

[1]: 89–91  Hahne disregarded the cross on Stone 4 as a mere geometric figure, which did not intend a Christian interpretation.

[1]: 119 Given their originally large dimensions, Böhner felt that the interpretation of the stones as grave monuments was unsustainable.

The only medieval function that fit carved, relief panels of this dimension were chancel screens in a church setting.

For example, in the 7th-century Basilica of Saint-Pierre-aux-Nonnains in Metz, where the stone chancel screen exhibits similar zig-zag borders and braided decorative elements.

[1]: 108  He postulated that the Hornhausen stones were originally part of the chancel screen of the abandoned St Mary chapel, but were later removed to the graveyard.

[1]: 121–126 According Böhner's reconstruction, the chancel formed from the Hornhausen stones had four stele with riders on them and two with stags and does, arranged symmetrically.

[3]: 71–72  Høilund Nielsen also revises Böhner's conclusions: on the grounds of her interpretation of the carvings within Scandinavian culture, she argues that the feet are more likely to have belonged to a group of warriors.

[5]: 26 The rider stone is an iconic German archaeological find and a universal symbol of the Early Middle Ages within Germany.

[7] The rider stone was the model for the coat of arms of Adenstedt [de], a municipal subdivision of Ilsede, adopted in 1954 on the presumption that it depicts Odin.

In 2007, a design based on the rider stone was chosen for the coat of arms of the newly created Börde district.