Europeans have generally regarded horse-flesh as unfit for food; but hippophagy or horse-eating has always existed among some rude races, and has been advocated by many gastronomers in Europe. In Paris horse-flesh has long been surreptitiously dealt in as a cheap article of diet, and its sale, under strict official supervision, was authorized in 1866. The necessary use of it there during the siege of 1870-1 brought it into more general favor, which has been maintained. It is also eaten to some extent in other countries. [Century Dictionary, 1903]