Mounting block

Some have three or more steps leading up to a platform which gave extra height and therefore easier access to the saddle and less chance of falling when dismounting.

The generally poor condition of roads up until the late 18th century in Scotland for example, meant that most passenger transport by horse was literally on horseback.

The first recorded wheeled vehicles to be used in Ayrshire were carts offered gratis to labourers working on Riccarton Bridge, Kilmarnock, in 1726.

With the invention of the automobile, the need for the public mounting block vanished and they now are used exclusively by equestrians or retained as historic features at old inns, kirks, etc.

[12][13] In the 1860s, those mounting blocks that remained in London e.g. Bayswater, were thought of as quaint and old fashioned "in the true style of olden times".

So said Tam o' Crumstane, unbousome and baggie; And mountin' the stane at Gibbie's house-end, Like a man o' great pith, wi' a grane, and a stend He flew owre his yaud, and fell i' the midden!