In 1965, archaeologists excavated nearly 500 funerary objects from the Tomb of Feng Sufu, an influential mandarin of the Northern Yan Dynasty, which lay at the eastern base of Jiangjunshan Hill in Xiguanyingzi Town, Beipiao County-level City, Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province. Of those objects, the most remarkable was a pair of stirrups.

It is by far the earliest double stirrups whose age can be determined, both in China and the world.

The stirrup arm was made by twisting the two ends of a triangular mulberry wooden strip upwards to form a stirrup eye, with the fork then filled with a triangular wooden wedge. The outside of the stirrup arm and the eye are covered by nailed gilt copper sheets, and the inner side of the stirrup arm is covered with a thin nailed sheet of iron painted with black lacquer.

Zhou Yali, a scholar from the city of Chaoyang, said that although the earliest prototypes of stirrups in China could be seen in pottery figurines unearthed from a tomb built in the second year of the Yongning reign of the Western Jin Dynasty in the city of Changsha, that were just single triangular stirrups that would help a rider to mount and dismount but could not be used while riding.

The earliest metal riding stirrups in China and he world were discovered in the Tomb of Murong Xianbei in West Liaoning and date from the middle of the third century to the beginning of the fifth century, nearly 1700 years ago.

Those stirrups are 300 years older than the first European stirrups, and their use spread from the area north of the Yellow River to the area south of the Yangtze River, from East Liaoning to the Korean Peninsula and the Japanese archipelago, and along the Grassland Silk Road from Central Asia, westward to Europe.

The invention of stirrups gave cavalrymen a strong point of support for their feet, which freed their hands to shoot while galloping. They could also move sharply on horseback during combat, such as slashing on both sides.

The invention of stirrups, particularly double metal stirrups, made cavalry more important in the majority of battles in the cold weapon era. The Encyclopedia Britannica states, “It is surprising that the foundation of the age of knights is due to the invention of stirrups.”

Dr. Needham, an authority on the history of science and technology from the UK, said, “There are rare inventions like the stirrups which are simple but make such a profound impact on history! As Chinese gunpowder helped destroy European feudalism in its final stage, Chinese stirrups initially helped establish European feudalism.”

It is no exaggeration to say that it was the stirrups invented by the Xianbei in ancient China and improved by Murong Xianbei in West Liaoning that pushed medieval Europe into the “Age of Knights” and triggered earth-shaking changes a thousand years ago.