History Main / SapientSteed

* ''Fanfic/VowOfNudity'': Kay'la's horse, Lug nut is a fey spirit shapeshifted into a kelpie appearance, meaning it can understand Common and generally shows more sapience than a regular horse.

** ''[[http://www.mythfolklore.net/andrewlang/211.htm The Magician's Horse]]'' (Lithuania)

** ''[http://www.mythfolklore.net/andrewlang/211.htm The Magician's Horse]]'' (Lithuania)

* In the Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index tale type ATU 314, "Goldener" or "The Youth Transformed to a Horse", the protagonist (a boy or a youth) is hired by an employer of mysterious origin. One day, while he is away, the hero opens a door and finds a talking horse that warns him that his employer wants to devour him. The boy and the horse escape to another kingdom, and the horse advises him to become a gardener in the king's court, and eventually helps the hero marry a princess. In some variants, the horse is actually the princess's brother, cursed into equine form.
** As an alternate form of tale type ATU 314, which exists in Iran, Middle East and North Africa, the protagonist is hounded by his stepmother, who tries to kill him. Whenever he comes back from school, his pet horse (or foal, or colt, or a mare) cries for the boy's fate and warns him against his stepmother's treachery.

* ''A Spell for Chameleon'' and ''The Source of Magic'', the first two novels in Creator/PiersAnthony's ''Literature/{{Xanth}}'' series. Bink rides Cherie Centaur, who is intelligent and can speak (like all centaurs). Unlike most versions of centaurs, those living in Xanth generally have no qualms about serving as steeds for their two-legged companions and can usually be expected to give rides to bipeds in any story featuring them (pretty much all of them). Mari Imbri likewise suffers herself to be ridden as does NIMBY...
** Also, in the Incarnations of Immortality series, Death's Pale Horse "Mortis", who can also transform into a pale car (whose license plate is MORTIS), is sapient. He tells the current incarnation, Zane, that a previous master of his used the switch-bladed scythe as a blowgun once.
* Creator/MercedesLackey's ''Literature/HeraldsOfValdemar'' series:
** The Companions are Standard Issue. Those Heralds recruited late in life have occasionally expressed their annoyance, especially as said steeds are [[BondCreatures mentally bonded to their riders]]. They usually get over it pretty quickly; the advantages outweigh the drawbacks, and if you don't think so, you're not the sort to be [[OnlyTheChosenMayRide Chosen]] anyway. Strictly speaking, Companions aren't horses, and tend to get quite insulted when somebody refers to them as such. They're high-level Guardian Spirits who have taken on a four-legged form as a matter of convenience.
** In the same series, the [[MagicalNativeAmerican Hawkbrothers]] are allies of ''[[IntellectualAnimal dyheli]]'', which they ride instead of horses. Sapient deer with PsychicPowers make better mounts in the Hawkbrothers' native forests, and allow themselves to be ridden as one of the assets they bring to their partnership with the humans.
* Creator/MercedesLackey's urban fantasies feature Elven Steeds, who can also turn into cars. Or motorcycles, or whatever they feel like, really. They don't talk but are quite intelligent nonetheless. There are a few occasions where it's hinted that they can communicate, mostly by flashing their headlights, but can't actually talk. In ''Born to Run'' one of the Elven Steeds communicates telepathically with its rider to plan how to distract one of the villains.

[[quoteright:350:[[ComicBook/LuckyLuke https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/4038cc49c7ab541495e1f74830d2fbaa.jpg]]]][[caption-width-right:350:I can only beat him by sacrificing my knight. He finds it offensive.]]

* Comet the Super-Horse from the 60's ''ComicBook/{{Supergirl}}'' comics was an extremely intelligent flying white horse who had several powers like super-strength and telepathy which he used to help his owner Kara out.

* In ''Podcast/TheThrillingAdventureHour'' podcast, the SpaceWestern segment "Sparks Nevada: Marshal on Mars" features a horse named Mercury who gains the ability to talk and turns out to be surprisingly cognitive for a horse.
* Marc's horse in ''Podcast/ThePenumbraPodcast'' appears to be this, as it can seemingly understand everything says.

* Hermes the motorcycle from ''LightNovel/KinosJourney''.
* The Arbalest's AI from ''LightNovel/FullMetalPanic'' is milestones more advanced than the others because he's capable of learning. Sousuke is thoroughly frustrated with him because, unlike his previous mounts who merely helped operating the mecha, Al does talk back to him if he knows he's right. Once during ''The Second Raid'', '''the mecha chewed out his pilot''', saying that he's not going to operate for him properly until he treats him as a partner.

* ComicBook/LuckyLuke's horse, Jolly Jumper, which is also really smart (sometimes he plays chess, and once he was fishing ''without Luke's help'').

* In the ''Podcast/TheThrillingAdventureHour'' podcast, the SpaceWestern segment "Sparks Nevada: Marshal on Mars" features a horse named Mercury who gains the ability to talk and turns out to be surprisingly cognitive for a horse.

* In the Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index tale type ATU 530, "The Princess on The Glass Mountain" (which includes ''Literature/ThePrincessOnTheGlassHill'' and Russian tale ''Sivko-Burko''), the hero tames three wild horses of magical origin. In some variants, the horses speak: they recognize the hero as their master and give some him some hairs of their manes, so they can be summoned.

* ''Film/ChittyChittyBangBang'': the titular car is at least semisentient, rather impatient[[note]]At one point when it felt that the knob labeled PULL wasn't being pulled fast enough, it changed the label text to PULL IDIOT.[[/note]], quite brave[[note]]Near the end, it actually [[RammingAlwaysWorks rammed]] the BigBad's getaway car because he had [[BerserkButton kidnapped]] [[PapaWolf the children]][[/note]], and deeply loyal to its owners. Also, the driver swears that while he was restoring it, he would often find that it had been advancing its own repairs and even modifying itself while he slept.

* ''WesternAnimation/PrincessGwenevereAndTheJewelRiders'' has Sunstar and Moondance, as well as Grimm the Dragon.