The shoe is definately not of the early Spanish colonial period - they were big and broad with typically square nail holes - if the animal was shod at all.  Your example has a fuller (the little groove around the underside) and it appears to have been made for commerically available nails.   Shoe was probably one of the blanks available late 19th and early 20th century to blacksmith / farriers by the barrel.  Its narrowness, roundness, and wear at the toe, seem to indicate a horse rather than a mule shoe and use on a front hoof.  The second image link didn't work but it appears the shoe has clips instead of calks - they were usually used to increase traction and to keep the horse from stepping on its own shoe and pulling it off in rough going or under loads.

Greg Johnson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Greg Johnson" 
> To: 
> Sent: Tuesday, November 15, 2005 4:28 PM
> Subject: Horseshoe help
>
>
>> A colleague of mine asked me to post this on HISTARCH for him. The
> following is his message.
>>
>> A horseshoe was found on a survey in northern New Mexico near El Moro
> National Monument. First, does it date to the historical period? Second,
> are there any other potentially diagnostic features? Pictures of the
> horseshoe can be viewed at http://www.sricrm.com/histarch/DSC01763.GIF and
> http://www.sricrm.com/histarch/DSC0174.GIF.
>>
>> Thank you,
>>
>> Robert Heckman
>> Statistical Research, Inc.
>> Tucson
>>
>
>
> 



S.P. Austin