I have a question about the medieval era with an understanding that the answer is probably "it depends". But I feel like in all the fiction, whenever characters need to go somewhere they just, like, have a horse--regardless of their class or profession. And I wonder how realistic that is. If a typical medieval Englishman needed to get to London, say, for whatever reason, would they just have ready access to a horse? And if they did would it be a horse they owned outright, or more of a lending situation. I feel like horses must have been kind of expensive but maybe I'm biased because nowadays the only people I know who have horses are rich.
Unless the person is of the very lowest class, i.e. a serf or totally landless peasant, then yes, they probably would have some kind of access to a horse. As you note, we associate owning a horse with being rich, but in the premodern world, they were obviously far more important than they are now and most people would have either owned a horse or been able to hire one if they needed to go on a journey. There are different types of medieval horse, such as the destrier or charger (the very expensive warhorse that was only owned by upper-class knights and nobles), the palfrey (general riding horse, middle-upper class) and the rouncey (general riding horse, middle-lower classes). You also had packhorses, workhorses, mules, etc. If you were traveling any distance, you would be able to hire horses; otherwise, if you were a member of a lord or knight's retinue, it was his job to provide you with one. It's kind of like owning a car today -- i.e. people of all economic classes have cars of different types and values, but they do usually have one, because it's just a general necessity for getting around.
As such, you would NOT use your destrier for everyday riding, as they were trained specifically for war. For general farmwork, you would use oxen, rather than horses, but you would have several different types of animals. A knight would own multiple horses for different purposes and be a very skilled rider. The word chivalry comes from chevalier, which is the old French word for mounted soldier/knight, so horsemanship was the core of their identity. And of course, the availability of other modes of transport would depend on which century we're talking about, where and how far they want to go, their economic class, why they're traveling, etc etc. But for said medieval Englishman going to London, unless he's a serf, then yes, he will probably have a horse of some kind.
