[1] The first written reference to the Nisean horse was in around 430 BCE, in Herodotus' Histories: They were highly sought after in the ancient world.
The ancient Nisean horse was said to have had "not the slender Arabian head of the Luristan Culture but a more robust one that was characteristic of the great warhorse".
[citation needed] The Nisean horse was first mentioned in great detail by A.T. Olmstead, in his History of the Persian Empire.
[citation needed] Olmstead also wrote that the Assyrians started their spring campaigns, by attacking the Medes for their horses.
In 36 BC, Mark Antony avenged Crassus's death by launching a campaign against Media Atropatene with 16 legions.
When the Parthians would not give him the battle he wanted, he ravaged Armenia, and brought back the Armenian King Artavasdes to Egypt.
According to Michael Decker in the Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity, Nisaean horses were the most famous Iranian breed.