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Travelers Rest

by Dr. George H. Conn (Western Horseman Jul ’51)

Niwka

Travelers Rest farm was established in 1792 near Nashville, Tennessee. It was established by John Overton, who came to that community about 1789 and who was a law partner of Andrew Jackson and served on the supreme court of Tennessee after that state was admitted to the Union. The original Travelers Rest farm remained in the family of John Overton and his descendants until 1938, and during this time it became famous for the high quality of its Thoroughbred, Morgan, trotting and saddle horses.

Due to the fact that the original Travelers Rest farm was located but a short distance from Nashville, which has grown to be a city of more than 250,000 people, it became necessary in 1938 to abandon the original Travelers Rest which was then moved to Franklin, Tennessee.

The late Travelers Rest farm was owned and maintained by Gen. J. M. Dickinson, who added Arabian horses to his breeding operations in 1930. When it became necessary to abandon the original Travelers Rest, Dickinson disposed of his other horses and kept only the Arabs for future breeding and maintenance of the Travelers Rest Stud on Del Rio Pike, near Franklin, Tennessee.

Horse lovers of all kinds will be very vitally interested in the following quotation of John Trotwood Moore which is printed on the inside front cover of the Travelers Rest Arabian horse catalogs. The quotation which was first used in advertising the famous American Saddle stallion, McDonald Chief, of the old Travelers Rest, is as follows:

“Out from the past, the dim, bloody, shifting past, came this noble animal, the horse, side by side with man, fighting with him the battles of progress, bearing with him the burdens of the centuries. Down the long, hard road, through flint or mire, through swamp or sand, wherever there has been a footprint, there also will be seen a hoofprint. They have been one and inseparable, the aim and the object, the means and the end. And if the time shall ever come, as some boastingly declare, when the one shall breed away from the other, the puny relic of a once perfect manhood will not live long enough to trace the record of it on the tablet of time.”

Nasr

The author of this article had the privilege of meeting Gen. Dickinson and discussing with him briefly some phases of Arabian horse breeding, and my impression is that Gen. Dickinson had the most sound and practical ideas about the commercial production of Arabian horses of any breeder in the United States up to this time. Dickinson’s ideas in general were that you should breed good Arabian horses and sell them honestly and fairly to the most satisfactory buyers you could find. In other words, he followed very closely the policy of many of the earlier breeders of Arabian horses throughout the world. That the reader may fully understand Gen. Dickinson’s policies, we quote from the 1941 revised edition of a catalog of Travelers Rest, as follows:

“We have acquired and bred Arabian horses of the purest blood and most satisfactory individual excellence. Some of these horses have met and defeated many of the best known Arabians in the United States, including imported horses with championship records, in shows and in other competitive events that have been widely advertised in this country and abroad, open to all purebred Arabian horses, and in which horses have competed from all sections of the United States and even from overseas. Various Travelers Rest Arabian horses have made creditable showings against horses of other breeds in the latters’ specialties, and have won honors abroad.

“Of course we wish to sell the produce of our stud, for we are breeding Arabs for the market rather than for the purpose of making a collection. However, there are certain things we are unwilling to do in order to sell more horses. For one thing, we refuse to poison anyone’s mind against other breeds. We will tell you what the Arab has done and what we believe the Arab can do; but it is not our affair to persuade you that some other horse is undesirable.

“We consider it a bad policy to endeavor to sell a horse to a man who does not want it, or whose requirements it cannot fill. Only a bad product requires bad sales methods. We consider the Arab colt to be a good product that will sell itself to the customer who recognizes quality when he sees it.

“Then we are unwilling to argue that our horses are better than all other Arabs. Such claims are made for various studs. Obviously, they cannot be true of all.

“Arab horses from Travelers Rest have been successful in various kinds of competition at home and abroad. They seem to be giving satisfaction in 40 of our states and territories, and a dozen foreign countries. A substantial proportion of our sales is made to customers who have bought from us in the past, and to their friends and acquaintances.

“We believe success depends upon pleasing every customer as much as possible, and we bend every reasonable effort to sell the product of our stud where most apt to give satisfaction. We believe we now have and are breeding better Arabs than in the past, and offer our produce at prices commensurate with costs and maintenance. It is our earnest hope that every Travelers Rest Arabian horse will prove to be satisfactory and worth more than is paid for it.”

Gulastra

In discussing the breeding of Arabian horses with Gen. Dickinson in 1945, he told the author that it was the policy of Travelers Rest to price all Arabian colts of a sex at a standard price. At that time my recollection is that all horse colts were priced at $400 at weaning time, and an additional $50 was added to the price every six months until sold. Fillies were priced at $600 at weaning time and $50 was added to the price every six months until sold. Gen. Dickinson made it quite plain in discussing these prices that he did not at any time make an attempt to get a higher price than quoted for these colts even though some may have shown greater quality than others. At this time he was ambitious to have 50 broodmares producing purebred Arabian colts in his stud.

Travelers Rest Arabian stud was maintained at Franklin, Tenn, until 1946, at which time it was moved to Santa Barbara, Calif., where it was maintained for two years. Much of the breeding stock of this famous stud was returned to Tennessee in 1948, and in 1949 this stud was dispersed, going to a purchaser in Cuba.

The original Arabs purchased for Travelers Rest were secured from Maynesboro stud of Wm. R. Brown. Mr. Dickinson purchased almost the complete importation that Mr. Brown made from the desert, including Nasr, the white Arabian stallion, and the famous Hamida mares together with Aziza. Other breeding stock added to Travelers Rest in the early years consisted of Bazleyd, the national champion Arabian stallion known as the “peerless show horse,” and Gulastra and Kolastra, his son, all of which were bred by Wm. R. Brown’s Maynesboro stud. In addition to the above stallions, Mr. Dickenson secured two very famous grey Arabian mares, Guemura and Gulnare, both bred at Col. Spencer Borden’s Interlachen farm and which were purchased from Mr. Borden by Wm. R. Brown, who in turn sold them to Dickinson. One of the most widely known stallions owned in the early years by Travelers Rest was Antez, which became a very famous running Arabian and which was exported to Poland when he was 15 years old, where he raced very successfully for five years, being returned to the United States just before World War II.

In 1937 Gen. Dickinson made an importation of Arabian horses from Poland and Egypt. This importation consisted of seven grey mares from Poland and a gray mare, Maamouna, which was secured from the Royal Agricultural Society of Cairo, Egypt. Among this importation from Poland the following mares have been very successful in the stud: Przepiorka, Lassa, Liliana and Nora.

Travelers Rest imported in early 1939 a grey stallion, Czubuthan, No. 1499, from Poland. Czubuthan’s first foal arrived on april 3, 1940, and he went on to become the sire of the largest number of purebred Arabian horses from 1940 to 1948, and he was also tied with Raffles for the sire of the third largest number of Arabian foals registered in the Arabian stud book. (1)
          

Lassa

Several other well-known horses found their way to the Travelers Rest Arabian stud farm from time to time. Among the better known Arabs used in this breeding stud we refer to such Arabs as the bay mare Aire, bred in Argentina, and Kasztelanka, the bay mare bred in Poland and imported by Henry B. Babson, as well as the mare Kostrzewa, also bred in Poland and imported by Babson. The well known grey mare Roda, now owned by Margaret Shuey, of North Carolina, and imported by Wm. R. Brown, was also in the stud at one time, as was the mare Rose of France, which was bred at Crabbet Stud, in England, and imported by Roger A. Selby. Zarife, the famous Egyptian stallion which was imported by Wm. R. Brown, found his way to the Travelers Rest Stud and from there he was purchased by Van Vleet’s Lazy V V Ranch where he died in late 1950.

In the 19 years of their breeding operations, Travelers Rest produced many well known horses. It is apparent that they made no special effort to accumulate unusual honors for their horses, but were willing at all times to let them earn what honors they could in a general way in competition wherever and however they found it. Among some of the better known horses produced at this breeding establishment we refer to Bataan, who was used at the old Kellogg ranch while known as the Pomona Quartermaster Depot; Chepe-Noyon, a well known breeding stallion; Genghis Khan, a well known jumping horse; Jedran, a gaited Arabian horse winning in American Saddle horse classes; Nafud, another prize winner in Saddlebred competition, as well as many others which were successful in various show classifications.

Travelers Rest made consistent, steady growth for many years, and shortly before it was transferred to Santa Barbara, Calif., it was probably the second largest Arabian breeding farm in the United States, being exceeded only by the Kellogg Ranch, which was then under the direction of the Pomona Quartermaster Depot. At the height of their breeding operations, Travelers Rest produced in the neighborhood of 30 purebred foals a year. While the writer does not have the exact figures, it is his judgment that this stud at one time contained nearly 80 head of purebred registered Arabian horses.

From the 1947 catalog of Travelers Rest horses we find that during the lifetime of this famous stud, up to the close of 1946, they had bred and sold 274 purebred Arabian horses. These horses were sold to 40 or more of the states in the United States of America and were also sold and exported to 13 foreign countries. At least 37 of these Arabian horses and colts were exported to these 13 foreign countries, principally to South American countries. We find that seven head were exported to Mexico, nine head to the Republic of Columbia, six to Hawaii, three to Cuba, three to England, and two to Guatemala, and one each to seven other foreign countries. It must seem to the reader from the information given here that Travelers Rest Arabian Stud was, for the nearly 20 years that it was in existence, a very important factor in the development and popularizing of the Arabian breed in America. We take pleasure in quoting a short statement from this last catalog of 1947 which is entitled, “To the Arabian Horse.” We do not know by whom the quotation was originally made, but it is very typical and interesting. The quotation is:

“From his veins came the blood of the Thoroughbred, from his style the beauty of the saddler, his endurance gave bottom to the trotter. Big little fellow with the heart of a lion, second to some of his children but third to none, may he live on through the ages as the symbol of all that we love in the horse.”

From: CHAPTER X The Court of Ri’ad — Journey to Hofhoof

Voices of the Past:

Arabia in The 19th Century — Excerpted from:

THE BOOK OF THE HORSE Edited by Samuel Sidney, London 1875 Buying Arabian Horses from the KHAMSAT Volume 10 Number 1 March 1993

 

“All the horses offered to us for sale by the Bedouins were stallions. I do not at this moment remember having seen a gelding in their possession; and although they frequently rode mares into our camp, they never offered any to us.

(MAMELUK’S CHARGER 19th century engraving by J. Greenway)

 

            …”The huffiness exhibited by Bedouins in their horse-dealing transactions, in a great measure the outburst of an insolent, overbearing nature, is seldom able to stand its ground permanently against the greater strength of their passion for money. Of a hundred bedouins that ride off in a fury as resolved never to set eyes on you again, ninety-nine will come back again. Perhaps the hundredth will not. A Bedouin brought a horse of extraordinary size for an Arab into the camp. I did not much admire the animal, but a sum equal to LB100 was offered for him. the owner, a breechless savage, in a sort of dirty night-shirt, rode away in wrath, and we never saw him again.

            “The sum total of horses bought by us in the desert was one hundred. Of these seventy-two were Anazeh, from the Qulad Ali and the Rowallas; the remainder from the tribes of Serhan and Beni Sakhr, and from men of doubtful tribe. The following statements refer to the Anazeh alone. The highest price paid was LB71, 17s. This was given for each of two horses bought by private hand, of which one was the finest that I saw in the desert. Putting these aside, the highest price was a little more than LB50, and the average price about LB34. The average height was 14 hands 1-1/2 inches, and the commonest age four and five years; but this would be an over-estimate both of the height and age of the mass of Anazeh horses offered for sale, as we selected the biggest and the oldest. Many of the horses brought were two and three years old, and might have been brought at much lower prices. Of the different breeds, the Kahailan seemed to be the most numerous, the Soklawye the most esteemed.

            “The Anazeh inflict a temporary disfigurement upon their young horses by cropping the hair of the tail quite short, after the cadgerly fashion creeping in amongst English hunters, but leave the tails of the full-grown animals to attain their natural length. They denied being in the habit of making, as they are commonly believed to do, fire-marks on their horses for purposes of distinction; and denied also all knowledge of grounds for a report which I have seen brought forward very lately, viz., that English horses had been used to improve the breed. The foals, the said, though dropped most frequently in spring, were yet produced all the year round, in consequence of which the age of their horses dated from the actual day of birth, and not from any particular season of the year.

            “With the exception of one Anazeh vicious at his pickets, I remember no instance of an Arab horse showing vice towards mankind.

            “We had an Italian horse-dealer with us, a great black-bearded man, one Angelo Peterlini. He was a good and useful man in his way; well acquainted with the dodges and mysteries of Bedouin horse-dealing; cunning in guessing the price that an Arab would take for his horse, and careful to offer him only the half, that he might work up the other half in process of bargaining; sharp-sighted in detecting the two or three “unlucky” hairs which in the Bedouin estimation might lower the value of a horse, and as pernicious in making them tell upon the price as if he believed in them; in fact, altogether well acquainted with the Bedouins, and monstrously polite to them before their faces, but with, at heart, a horror of them unspeakable (by anybody of less gifts of eloquence than himself), and with the intensest aversion to anything of the nature of what he called a ‘baruffa’ with them. Dogs, thieves, hogs, canaille, people of the devil — I wish I could convey the magnificent and sonorous emphasis with which he rolled out these and other epithets upon them behind their backs, or the ingenuity with which he framed speeches setting forth their precise relationship with the fiend, and the exact nature of a most curious connection with the hogs which he attributed to them.

            “I must add a postscript. Do not let any man, because I have rated the average price of an Anazeh horse at LB34, suppose that LB34 is to buy him a striking specimen of the race; or, because I have described the Anazeh horses as fine, imagine that the very fine ones are anything but the exception to the rule. With the Arab horse, as with everything else in the world, the average is grievously removed from the ideal, and all that you want above it you must pay for. Finally, let any one who may be tempted to seek for an Arab horse in his native deserts remember that though we, buying horses by the hundred, could attract numbers of sellers to our camp, it does not follow that he, in search of a solitary animal, could do anything of the kind, or, indeed, that he could draw together a sufficient number to offer him a reasonable choice; and above all, if he wish to avoid tribulation, let him receive as great truths all Angelo Peterlini’s remarks upon the Bedouins, and shape his course so as — if he will take any advice — to keep perfectly clear of them.”

            Having given an extract which conveys so unfavourable an idea of the moral qualities of the Bedouin, of whom we have been accustomed to read such picturesque and romantic accounts, it is right to add that the British cavalry officer’s admiration for the Anazeh as a horseman is unbounded; and I give his description here, although the subject does not properly come within the contents of this chapter.

            “His horsemanship, when he chooses to display it, is very striking and curious. He puts his horse to the gallop; leaning very much forward, and clinging with his naked legs and heels round the flanks, he comes past you at speed; his brown shanks bare up to the thigh, his stick brandished in his hand, and his ragged robes flying behind; then, checking the pace, he turns right and left at a canter, pulls up, increases or diminishes his speed, and, with his bitless halter, exhibits, if not the power of flinging his horse dead upon his haunches, possessed by the Turks and other bit-using Orientals, at all events, much more control over the animal than an English dragoon attains to with his heavy bit. On theses occasions, it appears to me that the halter served to check, and the stick to guide; but I have seen the same feats performed when the horseman was carrying the lance, and, consequently, was without his stick. Our purchases in the desert amounted to one hundred horses; amongst all I saw tried, I never saw one attempt to pull, or show the least want of docility.”

****************

            “Most horsemen will admit that this is an extraordinary performance, and that none will allow it more readily than those who are acquainted with the Arab horse as he appears in our hands in India, where-so far as I may trust my own experience-he is hot, and inclined to pull. Why should he display this failing with us, and not with his original masters? My own impression is that the secret lies in the different temper of the English and the Bedouin horseman. The Bedouin (and every other race of Orientals that I am acquainted with seems to possess somewhat of the same quality) exhibits a patience towards his horse as remarkable as the impatience and roughness of the Englishman. I am not inclined to put it to his credit in a moral point of view; I do not believe that it results from affection for the animal, or from self-restraint; he is simply without the feeling of irritability which prompts the English horseman to acts of brutality. In his mental organization some screw is tight which in the English mind is loose; he is sane on a point where the Englishman is slightly cracked; and he rides on serene and contented where the latter would go into a paroxysm of swearing and spurring. I have seen an Arab stallion broken loose at a moment when our camp was thronged with horses brought for sale, turn the whole concern topsy-turvy, and reduce it to one tumult of pawing and snorting and belligerent screeching; and I never yet saw the captor, when he finally got hold of the halter, show the least trace of anger, or do otherwise than lead the animal back to his pickets with perfect calmness. Contrast this with the ‘job’ in the mouth, and the kick in the ribs, and the curse that the English groom would bestow under similar circumstances; and you have, in a great measure, the secret of the good temper of the Arab horse in Arab hands.”

[ED NOTE: It is interesting to note in this excerpt the lack of trust and also contempt for the Bedouin on the part of these particular European horse purchasers. This, however, was not the case for Wilfrid and Lady Anne Blunt, Homer Davenport and his party, and Carl Raswan among others. Each of these people by establishing respect and trust with the Bedouin resulted in a number of important foundation horses we are now the beneficiaries of in Al Khamsa.]

The Arab: the Horse of the Future (Part III)

This entry is part 2 of 3 in the series The Arab: the Horse of the Future

Articles of History:

FROM THE PAST: Excerpted from

THE ARAB THE HORSE OF THE FUTURE

by Hon. Sir James Penn Boucaut The Khamsat Vol 10 Num 4 Nov 93

Edward III. was a great warrior.

Captain Thomas Brown, 1830, says in his book that the Turkomans trace all their best horses to Arabian sires. They believe that the race degenerates unless ‘refreshed,’ and they are therefore most anxious to obtain fine Arabian horses. They live upon plunder, and march from 70 to 105 miles a day for twelve to fifteen days together without a halt. They have been known to go 900 miles in eleven successive days. Yet a sprinter would run away from them for a sprint — but for a sprint only. Where would be the sprinter at the end of the fifteen days of 100 miles a day?

The use of the Arab by the Turkoman is further alluded to by Mr. Henry Norman, M.P., in his book on ‘All the Russias,’ fifty years after Captain Brown wrote. He says that the Cossacks on the Armenian frontier are supplied with rifles by the Government; their wiry little horses are their own. Russia has imposed peace on the Turkoman, so, in spite of Imperial commissions and the importation of Arab stallions, the fleet and tireless Turkoman horse, with his flashing eye and scarlet nostril, is extinct for ever. Alas that it should be so! All honour to Mr. Wilfrid Blunt for his keeping the pure breed alive!

Captain Brown says that the horses of Turkey are principally descended from those of Arabia, Persia, and Barbary, have great fire and spirit, are extremely active, and he cites Mr. Evelyn as describing one sent to England as a perfect beauty, spirited, proud, nimble, turning with swiftness, in a small compass, and then quotes great authority as saying that nothing can surpass the Arab’s gentleness, and that his obedience to his master and groom are very great.

Captain Brown also says that in the Mysore country the Princes and people of rank have a superior breed sprung from Arabian blood, and that the Mahratta country has also long been celebrated for its horses, which have much of the Arabian blood in them.

He refers to the East India Company as keeping very fine stallions, generally of the English blood. He says that the produce of these are good parade horses, with more show than the Arabians, but they were unable to stand the same fatigue, nor had they the same mettle. This is corroborated by the Australasian, March 2, 1904, fifty-four years afterwards, which states that at the great Durbar at Delhi there was a ten days’ polo meeting, that the English ponies first gave in, the Australian lasted a day or two longer, but the only ones who stayed throughout the match were the Arabs! Yet they have neither staying power, courage, nor docility! O tempora, O mores.!

And Captain Brown sums up by saying that of late too little attention has been paid to the introduction of foreign Arab or Eastern stallions, asks where can we find such horses at the present day, either as racers or stallions, as Eclipse, Childers, King Herod, Matchem, and others; and attributes the present failure to the departure of our present racers from the foreign blood — in other words, that since racing men have abandoned the use of the Arab their horse is failing.            

Sir Samuel Baker, in his ‘Tributaries of the Nile‘ writes;

‘Never was there a more perfect picture of a wild Arab horseman than Jali on his mare. Hardly was he in the saddle than away flew the mare, whilst her rider, in delight, threw himself almost under her belly while at full speed, picking up stones from the ground. Never were there more complete centaurs than these Hamran Arabs: horse and man appeared to be one animal, of the most elastic nature, that could twist and turn with the suppleness of a snake.’

Further, in speaking of a particular horse Aggahr, in hunting a lion, who flew along as easily as a cat, he says that Aggahr’s gallop was perfection, and his long easy stride as easy to himself as to his rider; there was no necessity to guide him, he followed an animal like a greyhound, and sailed between the stems of the trees, carefully avoiding the trunks, so as to give room for the rider.

‘And once a Hamran,’ so Sir Samuel relates, ‘who was hunted by a rhinoceros who unexpectedly charged, clasped his horse round the neck, and, ducking his head, blindly trusting to Providence and his good horse, over big rocks, fallen trees, thick thorns, and grass 10 feet high, with the infuriated animal in full chase only a few feet behind him, the horse doubling like a hare.’

that is nearly as bold and as manly and as dangerous a sport as to run 800 yards on a smooth level sward for a ladies’ purse, with silks and satins fluttering along the lawn!

Sir Samuel also describes a lion-hunt, where his horse Tetel stared fixedly at the lion and snorted; but Sir Samuel patted and coaxed him, when within about 6 yards from the lion, the horse facing the lion with astounding courage, both keeping their eyes fixed on each other, the one beaming with rage, the other with cool determination. Sir Samuel then dropped the reins on his horse’s neck — a signal which Tetel perfectly understood — and he stood as firm as a rock, for he knew his rider was about to fire. Tetel never flinched, Sir Samuel fired, and the lion dropped dead. But what is that compared to the noble achievement of a jockey in winning a town plate?

Yet one more incident from Sir Samuel’s book: ‘Roder Sheriff, on a bay mare, facing an old bull elephant waiting a good chance to charge, slowly and coolly advanced till within about 8 yards of the elephant’s head, who never moved; the mare snorted, gazing intently at the elephant, watching for his attack. Sir Samuel for an instant saw the white of the elephant’s eye, and called out, “Look out, Roder — he’s coming.!” as, with a shrill scream, the elephant dashed upon the mare and her rider like an avalanche.’ Roder sheriff had never won a Derby, so, of course, you suppose the benighted man was killed! Not so, however. In Sir Samuel’s words, ‘Round went the mare as on a pivot, and away over rocks and stones, flying like a gazelle.‘ For a moment Sir Samuel thought that all must be lost; but he describes how Roder watched the elephant over his shoulder, and lured him on till the horsemen behind came up and hamstrung him. Yet of such mares we are gravely told that they have neither speed, stamina, nor docility!              
Caulincourt, Duke of Vicenza, when ambassador to Russia in 1807, saw a review of the Horse Guards raised by Paul I., the finest corps of horse in Russia, and reported that their Arabian horses ‘were of immense value.’

In the ‘Souvenirs of Military Life in Algeria,’ by the Comte De Castellane, he says of a hawking-party that ‘the Arab horsemen were mounted on the fleet mares held in unbounded estimation.’ Of one mare he says: ‘Her action was so light that she might, according to the Arab phrase, have galloped on a women’s bosom.’ Of course, a jockey or a racing trainer would sneer at this, naturally: he is so wise in horses — ‘one of the knowing ones.’ Yet I think that the opinion of a French officer, often dependent on his horse for his life, engaged in war, with as brave warriors as there are in the world facing him, might be fairly considered to be rather more valuable than that of men engaged only in sprinting races, as to which horse is the better for the ordinary purposes of humanity.

Mr. George Flemming, in ‘Travels in Mantchu Tartary,’ says that the Russian courier used to ride one pony 500 miles to Pekin in twelve days, rest a day, and return in fifteen, on the most unfavourable sort of forage. He relates that their own rides had been long and without intermission, and their ponies looked none the worse, though they were eight or ten hours in the saddle daily, doing forty or forty-five miles a day, and travelling nigh 700 miles of rough country, nothing less than that average on miserable fare — bran and chopped straw.

Whether Tartar or Turkoman or Mantchu, all those ponies have been indebted to the Arab cross.

Mr. John Hill, in the Live Stock Journal Almanack, 1903, writes that he was much impressed by the foals and young stock of, amongst others, the Arab Mootrub, and, again, that it is surer by far to breed up from the beautiful little Exmoor mare with th eMootrub cross on top. Further, that two very beautiful younsters were shown from Exmoor dams and an Arab sire. He speaks of a beautiful little pony as a typical Arab in miniature, a clear proof of the Eastern ancestry of the Welsh mountain pony. In ‘The Breeders’ Directory’ and in the advertisements of the same book are several announcements as to Arab sires.

Mr. Winwood Reade says that Cyrene, in Northern Africa, was ‘famous for its Barbs, which won more than one prize in the chariot-races of the Grecian games. ‘ Further on he says that the Berbers of the Carthaginian army were a splendid Cossack cavalry.

I give in Appendix II. the testimony of several large horse-breeders in the interior of Australia to the excellence, docility, and endurance of Arab stock got by pure stallions.

Sir Edward Creasy, in his ‘History of the Ottoman Turks,’ relates that when Mahomet II, heard in 1451 of the death of his father, Amurath II, ‘he instantly sprang on an Arab horse and galloped off towards the shore of the Hellespont.’ and he says that the Sultan Amerath, when making in 1638 a triumphal entry into Constantinople,’ rode a Nogai charger, and was followed by seven led Arab horses with jewelled caparisons.’ Nogai is between the Caspian and the Black Sea, in the country of the Kirghiz, whose horses were partly Arab.

The first of these extracts from Sir Edward shows the reliance placed by the successsful Sultan on the Arab horse at a great crisis, for often, if not mostly, many of the candidates were massacred straight away by some rival claimant. The second extract proves the admiration shown for him, and the honour always done him by a great conquering race, who conquered by the endurance, the speed, and the docility of their horses.

General Sir Thomas Edward Gordon, Military Attache at Teheran, says that the Persian horses are small, but very wiry an enduring, capable of very long journeys. On one occasion, owing to some great man having got the post-horses ahead of him, he was driven to continue the use of those he had been using for ninety-six miles right away, with only three hours’ rest at one place and one hour’s rest at another.

He was shown the Royal Stud racehorses, Arabs from Arabia, and riding horses, deer-like Arabs of the best blood.

According to Madame Waddington, wife of the French Ambassador, the Russian Emperor Alexander III, always rode his little gray Cossack horse. He rode it at his coronation, and some days afterwards at a review.

Lieutenant-Colonel Prejevalsky, a Russian, says the Mongol riders go at full speed across the desert like the wind, and their horses possess wonderful powers of endurance on very indifferent feed; they will live where other horses would perish. The great traveller, Captain Wood (J.N.), says the same.

Colonel Ramsay says that the Parsees give immense prices for high-caste Arabs, and that Sir Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy has superb English carriage horses, but they cannot stand work in the Bombay climate. That is what Mr. Carwardine, a well known Australian stock-owner, tells me of the Kimberley climate in North-Western Australia — that only Arabs can stand work there. Colonel Ramsay also describes the funeral of a grandee of Spain at Valencia, where ‘there were some splendid turn-outs — Arabs of the purest breed.’ And he speaks of his own regiment, the 14th Light Dragoons, as ‘splendidly mounted on Gulf Arabs.’

Colonel Durand describes a horse he had in India as perfectly untiring, having sinews of steel, a bold, intelligent eye, and feet of flint – he never rode his equal on a hillside — and he goes into ecstasies over his other wonderful qualities, with his ‘easy wolf’s canter, eating up mile after mile without a check, a present fit for a king.’ He says that none but the Arab could show such a combination of courage, fire, endurance, and general temper. His bold heart was the only one he trusted in implicity.

Mrs. Frances Macnab, in her ‘Travels in Morocco,’ writes that she could not say that she ever met with a horse in Morocco which had any faults or ill-temper to be compared with other horses, and they would walk all day without food. In her own horses there was not a scrap of vice in his whole nature.

Mrs. G.R.Durand, wife of the British Minister to the Shah of Persia, in her book writes that the Bakhtiari horses are often beyond price, of pure Arab race, as hardy as beautiful; quite extraordinary in the way they carry their riders over rocks and stones — they scarcely ever make a mistake, and their legs seem to be as hard as steel. A little black mare ‘carried her rider as if she had wings.’ Mrs. Durand herself had a little gray Arab, who used to come into her dining room and stroll round the table, pushing his head over their shoulders and whinnying gently for bits of bread. At a Simla dinner-party he came round the table just like a big dog.

Mr. J.H.Sanders shows that tradition had always affirmed that the Percheron, the most active and beautiful of all heavy breeds, is indebted to the Arab for his good qualities, and that recent research in France proves it. What the Darley Arabian was to the thoroughbred, that, says Mr. Sanders, was the gray Arabian Gallipoli to the Percheron. The American Percheron Stud-Book attributes the starting-point of the breeed to the overthrow of the Arabs by Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in the year 732, which left the fine Arab and Barb steeds of the defeated Arabs in the hands of the victors. It also show that the infusion of Arab blood was strengthened by the finest of Arabian stallions brought back by the Crusaders, and was kept up at irregular intervals by many Franch nobles down to 1820. the form and other distinctive marks of the Arab, says Mr. Sanders, were thus stamped upon the Percheron.

The Arab breed, he says, was also the foundation of the celebrated breed of Orloff trotters established by Count Orloff, who imported a gray stallion named Smetauxa, from Arabia, to whom a Danish mare was bred, from the progeny of which cross the breed was founded.

And the now equally celebrated breed of American Morgan trotters is also mostly indebted to the Arab blood for its excellence, through Grand Bashaw, a Barb imported into America from Tripoli. In fact, says Mr. J. H. Sanders, this Oriental blood, wherever introduced, in all nations and all climates, has been a powerful factor in effecting improvement in the equine race. Yet, says Mr. Day, for practical purposes this same noble creature is as extinct as the dodo. O tempora, O mores!

Marco Polo noticed the superb qualities of the Arab in A.D. 1260. He says that excellent horses were bred in Yemen and taken to India, and numbers of Arab chargers were despatched from Aden to India, and ‘fine horses of great price‘ were sent to India from Persia. Colonel Yule has a footnote that these latter horses were probably the same class of ‘Gulf Arabs’ that are now sent, which, as the ‘Encyclopaedia Britannica‘ says, are not equal to the pure Arabian.

Old Marco also speaks of the great excellence of the horses of Turcomania and Badakshan, remarkable for their speed, which go at a great pace even down steep descents, where other horses neither would nor could do the like, which subsist entirely on the grass, and are very docile. And he describes how the Turkomans pretend to run away in battle, turn in the saddle and shoot, the horses doubling hither and thither, just like a dog, in a way that is quite astonishing.

He also mentions several instances of the marvellous endurance of these Eastern horses. One accomplished 900 miles in eleven days, and another went from Teheran to Tabriz, returned, and went again to Tabriz, within twelve days, including two days’ rest, a total of 1.100 miles. And he tells us that the Tartars, from converse with the Assyrians, Persians, and Chaldeans, acquired their manners and adopted their religion. He should have included the Arabs, for the religion was certainly theirs; and he might also have added that the Tartars acquired many of the Arab horses. In truth, I rather think that it was the Arabs, and not the Assyrians, Persians, or Chaldeans, that Marco ought to have referred to.

And Laurence Oliphant says that these Turcoman and Badakshan people attained to some degree of civilization by reason of their commercial relations with the Arabs, and that his experience proved that their ponies possessed great pluck and powers of endurance.

Long before Marco Polo’s time far Easstern Asia was on the watch for Arab horses. Knei Shan (probably Khojend towards Merv) was ‘celebrated for its horses of divine race.’

China went to war with the Great Wan in 104-103, and again in 109-98 B.C., for the possession of this country and its horses, which were undoubtedly Eastern horses — most probably Persian Gulf Arabs.

In ‘The History of Russia‘ (Bohn’s Library) the success of the Tartars is attributed partly to their ‘being masters of the provinces which produced the finest horses.’

Mr. Shaw, in his ‘Visits to High Tartary,’ frequently refers to the handsome horses. He describes a sport where a dead goat is thrown on the ground, and the horsemen try to pick it up without leaving the saddle; when one succeeds he is chased by the others, doubling and turning, their hands seldom on the reins, banks and ditches jumped while they are half out of the saddle, galloping with one another, trusting entirely to their steeds when tugging with both hands at the goat. But, says he, ‘the Toorkee horses seldom make a mistake.’

The Rev. Dr. Henry Lansdell(1893) writes of his travels in Central Asia, that, fearing his horse would slip, he dismounted, but found that was for the worse, since the horse proved the surer footed, and he had to remount and trust to the animal.

Sir Henry Layard describes clouds of Bakhtizari and Arab horsemen in mimic fight, pursuing each other, bringing up their horses on their haunches at full speed, firing guns as they turned in their saddles, and performing various feats.

Sir Henry was once chased, and his horses were weary, having been nearly twenty-four hours without rest; but, says he, ‘they were sturdy beasts, and eluded their pursuers – it was wonderful!” The horses were able to bear great fatigue, and required little nourishment. Could Carbine have saved him?

He describes Mehemet Taki Khan’s magnificent and beautiful Arab mare of pure blood, and the exercises of his horses of the finest Arab breeds — galloping to and fro, wheeling in narrowing circles, while their riders, discharged their guns from behind, picked up objects at full speed, or clung at full length to one side of their horse, in order not to offer a mark to the enemy, and so on. How would these exercises suit your thoroughbreds, or your cavalry horses which ran into the streets at Winchester, and into the sea at Southampton?

Mr. Selah Merrill, of the American Exploration Society, writing of his journeys in Syria and Palestine, says that on one occasion he was ten hours and forty minutes in the saddle, and that on another occasion he was seventeen hours in the saddle one day, and fifteen hours the next; that the horses had a remarkable faculty of finding the way, and that, when riding in a difficult place, if you trusted entirely to your horse, you were almost certain to pass it in safety.

The Rev. Hugh Price Hughes, describing his journey to Jordan and the Dead Sea, writes (1901) that his chief dragoman was ‘magnificently mounted,’ as also were the four Arabs who were his escort. They put their splendid Arab horses through pretty and skilful performances.

A recent special correspondent writes in the Land of Arabia– Ararat, that the region was celebrated for its breed of horses, high-spirited, well bred, and noted for great endurance.

Disraeli writes in one of his letters:’Hunted the other day, and was the best man in the field, riding an Arabian mare.’ They rode much more cruelly in those days.

The Hon. Sir James Penn Boucaut, 1905.

The Arab: the Horse of the Future (Part II)

This entry is part 3 of 3 in the series The Arab: the Horse of the Future

Articles of History:

FROM THE PAST: Excerpted from

THE ARAB: THE HORSE OF THE FUTURE

by Hon. Sir James Penn Boucaut
The Khamsat Vol 10 Num 4 Nov 93

Circassian Warriors, 19th century engraving courtesy of Judith Forbes.

In the autobiography of General Sir Harry Smith, of Aliwal, a very great soldier of wonderful energy, reference is frequently made to his celebrated Arab horse Aliwal, which carried the veteran in all the battles of Gwalior and Sikh campaigns in 1847, accompanied him to the Cape, returned with him to England, afterwards served him faithfully in his commands at Davenport and Manchester, and was in his possession for eighteen years. It is related that on the anniversary of the Battle of Aliwal, when there was a full-dress dinner at the General’s house, someone would propose Aliwal’s health, and Sir Harry would order him to be sent for. The groom would lead him all round the dinner-table, glittering with plate, lights, uniforms, and brillent dresses, and he would be quite quiet, only giving a snort now and again, though when his health had been drunk, and the groom had led him out, you could hear him on the gravel outside prancing and capering.

Sir Harry writes:

‘I had one little Arab, not 14 hands, descended from Arabs; he never gave me a fall, and I never failed to bring the brush to his stable when I rode him; but with all the other horses I have had some awful falls, particularly after rain, when the sand is saturated with water and very heavy.’

It is further written of the General that he usually rode his little Arab Aliwal, and always when the troops were in line he would suddenly put his horse into a gallop and ride at the line, as if he were going to charge through them; that the men were, of course, well up to this trick, and stood perfectly steady, and the little Arab always suddenly halted within a foot of the line.

The following epitaph on his horse by Sir Harry, in his own handwriting, is still preserved:

‘NEAR THIS SITE IS BURIED SIR HARRY SMITH’S CELEBRATED CHARGER OF THE PUREST BLOOD,

ALIWAL.

‘Sir Harry rode him in the Battles of Moodkee, Ferozesshahur, Aliwal, and Sobraon. He was the only horse of the General Staff that was not killed or wounded. He came from Arabia to Calcutta, thence to Lahore; he was marched nearly over India, came by ship to England. He was twenty-two years old, never sick during the eighteen years in Sir Harry’s possession. As a charger he was incomparable, gallant, and docile; as a friend he was affectionate and faithful.’

Is this all a romantic dream? Can the opinion of a racing gentleman founded upon ‘sprinting,’ or of a stable youth founded upon ‘tips,’ or of a ‘dandy’ of Piccadilly, or of the ‘best boy’ of a Melbourne barmaid, be placed against the practical experience of all these great soldiers?

In the Franco-Prussian War the Arab again proved his sureriority. The Times of February 24, 1871, gave an account of the entry of General Bourbaki’s army into Berne, and the distress of both men and horses, but it qualified this as to the Arabs by adding that

‘undoubtedly the Arabs justify the established reputation of their breed for endurance by the very tolerable condition they presented and the comparative elasticity of their paces.’

Mr. W.G.Palgrave, in his ‘Central and Eastern Arabia.’ vol. II., says of some horses then before him, that never had he seen or imagined so lovely a collection. their stature was indeed somewhat low–he did not think that any came up to 15 hands; 14 appeared to be about their average — but they were so exquisitely well shaped that want of greater size seemed hardly, if at all, a defect. He says that they appeared a little, a very little, saddlebacked — just the curve which indicates springiness without weakness; every other part, too, had a perfection and a harmony unwitnessed, at least by his eye, anywhere else — an air and step that seemed to say, ‘Look at me: am I not pretty?’ Their appearance justified all reputation, all value, all poetry.

Captain Burnaby, in his Ride to Khiva, says of horses of the Kirghiz, that no horses that he has ever seen are so hardy as these little animals. He bought one with saddle and bridle, 14 hands, for 5 Lb. Of excessive leanness, and by his description only fit for the knackers, which in England would not have been considered able to carry his boots, yet, in spite of quite 20 stone on his back, he never showed the least sign of fatigue. There is Arab blood in these horses, or they are of a kindred breed. All over the steppes Arabic words are used, showing the influence of the Arabs in the past; indeed, they overran much of this country.

In July, 1270, a French expedition (the seventh Crusade), under Louis IX. attacked Tunis. Mr. Pellissier, writing in 1844 on this Crusade, says that the Arabs attacked the French Crusaders every day, and that

‘if one pursued them they fled; but when the French returned to their quarters, tired out by a bootless chase, the Arabs turned round and assailed their pursuers with arrows and javelins. This is exactly how they treat us today.’

In the latter sentence he referred to the Arabs under Abd-el-Kader in Algiers. It was as bootless a chase for the French cavalry to try to catch the Arab horses in Algiers in 1840 as it was for the same cavalry to try to catch the Arab horses in Tunis in 1270; 600 years had not lessened the difference in merit between the two breeds: the Arab was still facile princeps.

General De Wet could furnish instances yet sixty years later of other European cavalry having bootless chases after Arab horses. In 1535 the Emperor Charles V. attacked Tunis with success, and amongst the terms of the treaty of peace which was made it was provided that the suzerainty of Sprian was to be recognised by a yearly present of twelve horses. No such term would have been made unless the horses had been known to have been of unusual excellence. You don’t take coals to Newcastle nor Arab horses to Arabia. But you send them elsewhere. Another Bey of Tunis, Ahmed Bey, in 1842, sent, amongst other things, a present of an Arabian horse to Louis Philippe, King of the French. So that we have three Kings of France in three far-apart periods receiving presents of Arab horses from the Bey of Tunis, and there are scores of other instances where an Arab horse has been deemed worthy of being a present to be received by one Sovereign from another. Was I not justified in saying that it was childish of my unknown friend, above referred to, to say that there is neither speed, stamina, nor docility, in the Arab horse?

Napoleon Bonaparte, in his ‘Observations on Egypt.’ states that although discipline made 1.000 of the French cavalry superior to 1.500 Mamelukes, yet man for man the Mamelukes were the better — ‘two of them were able to make head against three Frenchmen,’ because they were better armed and better mounted; and Sir Edward Creasy says that Napoleon is the best writer on the subject of Egypt that a general or statesman can consult.

The Mamelukes were probably Arabs, but were certainly mounted on Arab horses, and Cook’s ‘Guide to Egypt‘ cites Warburton as stating that the Mamelukes were the most superb cavalry in the world. Major Upton says in effect the same with reqard to the present age:

‘The real armour of the Bedaween horsemen, offensive and defensive, is the speed of his mare.’

Polybius wrote that it was the superiority of Hannibal’s cavalry which gained him all his victories. That cavalry was Numidian — that is, Arab.

‘Thormanby,’ in a book on The Horse and his Rider, whom I should by no means take to be an Arab enthusiast, affirms that the Arab is in many respects entitled to take the lead among all breeds of horses; that his pace is rapid and graceful; that his is hardy, and can continue traveling at the rate of from fifty to sixty miles a day; that it is proved beyond doubt that for slow, continued work the Arab is immeasurably superior to his English brethren. that distance is the mileage that one of Mr. Quin’s Arabs at Tarella, New South Wales, bought of me, went day after day during the great drought about the end of the nineteenth century, with, I believe, only native grass, or what was left of it. Is that properly to be called ‘slow’?

“Thormanby’ can, clearly, have meant ‘slow’ only as opposed to short sprinting with light weights; in fact, he admits as much in almost the very words that I hears applied to Mr. Quin’s stallion, that an Arab seems at his own pace to be able to go for ever. But I deny that his pace is slow; it is very fast, as many a defeated army has discovered. ‘Thormanby’ describes two Arab horses sent to him from Bombay to Lucknow, which did not reach him for five months, having marched continuously, with many vicissitudes, continual forced marches, and irregularly and scantily fed, still arriving in perfect trim, and continuing to do fast work throughout the hot season. I note particularly the word ‘fast,’ which is the author’s. ‘Thormanby’ might therefore have said more in the previous passage than to say the Arab was immeasurably superior for ‘slow’ continual work! He fairly enough says that, all things considered, he sould prefer in the Indian or Egyptian climate an Arab to any other horse, habituated as he is from infancy to scanty food and water, and to enduring heat and rough usage, and above all with sounder legs and feet — a good tempered, willing and docile slave, and a rare agent to traverse a distance in an open country. Another passage from “Thormanby’ shows how ill adapted the ordinary horsey man, used to the ‘leggy, weedy creature who would fall over a straw,’ is to judge of the merits of the Arab. Says ‘Thormanby’ of five Arabs of the ordinary stamp — by ‘ordinary,’ I take it, he means Bombay Arabs of the old style, not pure-breds of the desert —

‘To an eye accustomed to European horse-flesh they would have looked, perhaps, at the first glance like a lot of screws; but when you came to examine them closely, you found undeniable points about them, and a look of gameness that showed it was, at any rate, no plebeian animal that you had before you.’

A former Duke of Newcastle, one of the best judges of horse-flesh then in England, shows how few people can judge an Arab accurately. He thought very little of the Godolphin Arabian!

‘Thormanby’ points out that the wild-horses of America, both North and South, have descended from Andalusians imported by the first settled Spanish settlers, and that they are fine animals, very hardy, and when caught soon docile. He describes the common amusement of the Mexicans and South Americans in charging like lightning, and stopping so suddenly that the horses’ feet will exactly touch the wall, and even at times will tremble over a precipice, and yet wheel round in safety.

This is of a piece with the description given by Layard and many others of the Eastern Arabs, who would stop in full charge with their spears so close to his face that an accident would have caused his death. I have cited Major-General Tweedie’s references to this, and those of several others.

‘Thormanby’ relates a story of Sir R. Gillespie on the Calcutta racecourse, when a tiger had escaped. A Bengal tiger is no kitten to play with. Sir Robert called for his Arab, a small gray, and attacked the tiger with a boar-spear, which was in the hands of one of the crowd. Immediately the tiger saw Sir Robert, he crouched for a spring, at which Sir Robert instantly put his horse in a leap over the tiger’s back and thrust his spear through the animal’s spine.

This grand and fearless little fellow was afterwards given as a present to the Prince Regent. Though he was like all his race, a born war-horse, cool in the presence of the tiger under a rider that he knew, and not afraid of jumping over him, et, alas! he could probably not have won a half-mile race with 5 stone on his back! How sadly degenerate! Nevertheless, he was not quite ‘so extinct as the dodo‘ on that occasion!

Mr. W.K.Kelly, the traveller, in his book on ‘Syria,’ 1844, says that the Bedouin and his horse should be seen together. When the rider’s feet are on the ground, he creeps listlessly about, and the horse stands tamely, looking hungrily after the few blades of grass. but when the Bedouin springs into the saddle an electric energy seems breathed into the man and horse. The horse makes the air whistle with his speed, while his streaming tail often lashes his rider’s back.

This is exactly what Madam Ida Pfeiffer writes in her ‘Travels in the Holy Land,’ about fifty years ago. She said that at first sight they looked anything but handsome. They were thin, and generally walked at a slow pace, with their heads hanging down. But when skilful riders mounted them they appeared as if transformed. Lifting their small, graceful heads with fiery eyes, they threw out their slender feet with matchless swiftness, and bounded away over stock and stone, with a step so light, and yet so secure that accidents very rarely occurred. It was quite a treat to see them.

Madam Pfeiffer and Mr. Kelly both dwell on the arab’s powers of endurance. Mr. Kelly says they are most remarkable. His on more than one occasion carried him for sixteen or eighteen hours at a stretch without food, and once he cantered him from Hebron to Jaffa, nearly fifty miles, without pulling bit. At the end of such a journey, Arab horses, he says, get only a few handfuls of barley, no bedding or grooming, and generally the saddle is not removed. They are sure-footed and exceedingly sagacious, and exhibit a wonderful degree of activity and fleetness. then he cites Baron von Taubenheim, first equerry to the King of Wurtemberg, who, writing to a friend, reminded him what an anglomaniac he (the Baron) was, but said that nevertheless from henceforth he should set the Arab horse above every other, from experience of his extraordinary performances. The Baron describes the horrible roads of Lebanon — rocks over which the horse has often to mount or descend two or three at a step, loose rolling stones, a track running jaggedly and unevenly along the verge of a precipice. Yet along such roads as these the Arab goes on without flagging from six in the morning till eight at night, and he averred that he never discovered the least flagging, even in the last quarter of an hour, and for many days he literally never took hold of the reins.

The Rev. Dr. Porter, in his “Five Years in Damascus,’ refers to these dreadful roads of Leganon, which, he says,

‘are startling when your steed assumes a vertical attitude or passes along a precipice brink, where a false step would hurl him hundreds of feet below.’

After many other instances of endurance, cleverness, bottom, and docility, Baron Taubenheim says that he knows that vanity would make him in his own country again seek out a six-foot-high English horse, but that he also knows that the Arab is capable of doing much better service. For the day of battle he should, perhaps, make choice of an English hunter, but for a whole campaign, says he,

‘give me one Arab in preference to two English horses.’

He also says that a traveller feels amazement ot think that in such a country men can trust themselves upon horses where you would expect to see them mounted only on goats. Those horses don’t fall over a straw. The Baron’s vanity which he speaks of gives you a part of the key to the Anglomania vanity, the desire of being on a tall horse — the vanity of the horsey youth in top-boots and knee-breeches, whom the Times satirizes as a ‘tendollar amateur’; the vanity of the Piccadilly masher prancing before the dames in the Park; the arrogant vanity of the insular mind, which thinks that nothing can be good which is not English. The other part of the key to this absurd Anglomania is the gambling.

In another place Mr. Kelly says that it is only in the East that you can form a just idea of the Arab horse, and he devotes a full page to enlarging on his merits, his beauty, his gentleness, his picturesque form, his caressing manner to his groom, his playfulness, his inquisitive attention, evincing as much certainty, force of character, and varied play of feature, as the emotions of mind on the face of a child. Many of my guests have noticed and spoken of this caressing manner shown by my young horses, as also their inquisitive attention and wonderful appearance of intelligence. It has been stated that an Arab would prefer his horse to be stolen rather than injured in a long and heavy chase, and that he has been known to rejoice, by reason of his pride in her, when his favourite mare has carried the thief safely away from his pursuit. If he is to be kicked, he hopes that it will be by a horse of pure breed!

Dr. Porter writes of the arrival of a stranger who drew up after a very rapid pace, whose mare stood patient and gentle without symptom of weariness or quickness of breathing, but with expanded nostril and proud eye.

‘I could see,’ said Dr. Porter, ‘why the Arab loves his horse.’

Mr. Frederick Drew, in his book ‘The Northern Frontier of India,’ says that Baltistan is one of the homes of polo, which is so ancient a game that it was played in Constantinople in the middle of the twelfth century.

‘The ponies of the Baltis,’ he says, ‘may be taken fairly enough to embody the experience of generations of players as to the right kind of animal. They stand about 12.3 or 13 hands, rather large-boned for their size, of compact make, broad chest, deep shoulder, well-formed barrel, well ribbed-up, good hind-quarters, and a small, well shaped head.’

This well describes a small Arab; anyhow, the creature to which Mr. Drew refers is an Eastern horse, and certainly more or less crossed with the Arab.

Mr. W.P.Hogg, an American gentleman, in his book ‘The Land of the Arabian Nights,’ After several casual and cursory remarks as to ‘handsome Arab horses,’ ‘a mettled Arab.’ ‘a beautiful full-blood Arab horse,’ and their ‘wonderful endurance,’ and so on, describes his inspection of the stables of the Pasha at Babylon, where there were a score of the finest Arab horses, and naively says that, although he is not especially a horse-fancier, he would fully appreciate the present were the Pasha to give him one of those beautiful animals, so intelligent, docile, and graceful in every motion. Everybody seems to notice their beauty.

The Hon. F. Wallpole, in his book’The Ansayrii,‘ writes of an Arab mare he was shown of the Anazeh:

‘She was worthy of the pen of a Warburton or a Lamartine: clean gray, with black mane and tail, silvered at the end; her skin thin as a kid glove, and the long hairs fine as that which drops over the shoulders of beauty. The eye was bright, wild, and flashing; the nostrils full, almost bell-shaped; tall and strong, yet light and active, she well deserved her name — The Beautiful.”

In ‘Modern Persia.’ C.J.Wills, M.D., describes a fourteen-hand pure-bred Arab which he bought, with a huge scar of a spear-wound a foot long on his shoulder, otherwise perfect, of angelic temper, but small by the side of the Persian horses, as all pure Arabs are; his muzzle almost touched his chest as he arched his neck, and his action was very high yet easy; he seemed an aristocrat; his thin and fine mare and tail were like silk.

He says that he had that Arab ten years; he never was sick, and he never had to strike or spur him; a pressure of the knee and a shake of the rein would make him do his utmost. And he was a fast horse.

“Small as he was, he carried my 12 stone comfortably, and as a ladies’ horse he was perfect, having a beautiful mouth, while he followed like a dog, and nothing startled him or made him shy.’

He speaks, too, of the Arabs which come from Bagdad as all that the heart can desire, except as to size, being seldom more than 14.2. Which is the better — 14.2 that can carry one, or 16.2 that cannot?

The Australasian, April 2, 1904, in showing that the success of mule-breeding largely depends on the sire, says that the best mules in America are by Jacks descended from Catalonian sires imported from Spain — introduced to Spain centruies ago by the Moors, and always carefully bred. Who can doubt that this excellence is owning to the Arab stock owned by the Moors, which made the Andalusian jennet celebrated? Who can doubt after this the prepotency of the Arab sire, and his ability to benefit any breed he mates with, when even his hybrids became famous? Mr. Sydney Galvayne also testifies to this excellence of the American mule.

Captain R.V. Davidson, formerly of the Indian Staff Corps, writing of boar-hunting in India in the Wide World Magazine, says that

‘he and Bethune Temple were on Arabs, and could count on their turn if it came to jinking,’

and that when again and again

‘the active brute, scenting danger, jinked away to right or left, his stanch little Arab followed him like a cat.’

Mr. F.C. Webb, M.I.C.E., in his “Up the Tigris to Bagdad,’ relates that they took on board three splendid Arab horses, which he would not have written if the Arab is only what some of the racing gentlemen affirm. An observation like this — by the way, as it were — is almost better testimony than a designed panegyric.

Professor A.B. Davidson gives a very celebrated line by Imrulquars, an ancient Arabian poet, describing the skirmishing of the horse and the irresistible impetus of his charge:

‘Attacking, fleeing, advancing, backing at once,

Like a block of rock swept down by the torrent from a height.’

He gives part of another poem, in which is the line:

‘My heart is with the horsemen of Yemen.’

The reader asks why I cite this. Because I am not writing for the ‘knowing ones,’ and I desire to show beyond all cavil that, at all times, in all countries, amongst all peoples, the Arab horse was famous. Such fame could never have been achieved for a breed that did not deserve it.

M. Tisset, in relating his travels in ‘Unknown Hungary,’ says that all along the Turkish frontier, and especially in the upper military borderland, a small race of horses of Barbary origin is found well suited to those rugged and rocky countries, which corroborates the statements that the Hungarian horses are largely indebted for their excellence to Arab blood.

Count Henry Krasinski, a Polish soldier, in the ‘History of the Cossacks of the Ukraine,’ says that their horses are small in make, but extremely vigorous, and proof to all kinds of fatigue, clear all difficulties of the ground, carry their riders everywhere with facility, and are, like their masters, content with the most meagre fare; and he describes them as hovering round the enemy like a vapoury cloud, augmenting, fading away, or dissipating entirely again, to form into shape when required. This fortifies the accounts I have given of the Arabs of Tunis in the third Crusade, and of the Arabs of Algiers recently in the time of General Daumas.

These Ukraine horses are Eastern, and, if not pure Arabs, have been imporved by Arabs, and are of a kindred race. Count Krasinski states that at the great annual fair in the government of Volhynia 1000,000 horses often to be seen from all parts of Russia, Poland, Austria, and Turkey, and even Persia. The Kurdish mountains as well as Asia Minor were celebrated for their breed of horses in the time of the prophet Ezekiel (xxvii. 14).

In Mr. E.H.Parker’s ‘Thousand Years of the Tartars‘ it is stated that Tukuhum of Koko-nor, one of their rulers, who reigned in the sixth century, obtained a number of splendid Persian mares for breeding purposes, and their young obtained great repute for swiftness. Of course, these were ‘Eastern horses,’ and yet not up to the level of the pure desert-bred Arab.

Mr.W.B.Harris, in his ‘Journey through Yemen,’ states that the Arabian King Tubba-el-Akran took an expedition to Samarcand, and afterwards, in A.D. 206, Abou Kariba, another Arabian King, invaded Chaldea, and defeated the Tatars of Adubijan, so that all this country from Arabia to China was saturated with the blood of Arabian horses.

I see by the London Daily Telegraph, February 6, 1904, that the Sultan of Morocco sent a present of six pure Arabs to President Roosevelt from Fez, one for the President himself, the others for his wife and children, the one for himself being a pure white thoroughbred. In ancient times white horses were most esteemed; e.g., Herodotus says that the Sicilians paid an annual tribute of 360 white horses, Arabs or Arab crosses, to Darius, King of Persia. Sicilian horses, of course, came from Africa (Barbary, etc), just opposite. Other instances are given of the preference for white horses; Arab horses have always been deemed worthy of being gifts from royalty to royalty. Incidentally several instances appear in this little work. I may summarize a few more which I have come across in casual reading:

In the year 800 Haroun al Raschid sent a present of five Arabs to Charlemagne. In the tenth century the Grand Vizier presented to the Caliph fifteen Arab horses of the best breed.

In 1131 Alexander I. presented an Arabian horse to the Church of St. Andrews. Mehemmed Khan, governor of Balk, presented Shah Abbas, amongst other presents, with fifty horses of Turkestan. The Imaum of Muscat sent a present to King William Iv. of some horses of the purest breed of Arabia.

Megder, a Tartar Prince, one of the great conquerors of history, sent a present of Tartar horses to the Chinese Emperor about 200 B.C. In A.D. 635 the Turkish Khan sent a present of horses to the founder of the Tang Dynasty in China.

When Ibn Batula visited Sarunda in Asiatic Turkey in 1332, the Sultan presented him with a dress of honour and riding-horses. They never thought of sending pigs or oxen or Suffolk punches, admirable in their way as these creatures may be, and all these horses from Cyprus, and Edward III. purchased fifty Spanish steeds (of course Barbs), and got special permission for their safe transport through France and Spain.

Edward III. was a great warrior. Did he not know the value of the creature he purchased?

Major Butler in his Great Lone Land, describes a wonderful little horse of the prairies whose endurance could not be excelled day by day. He feared that he must give out; but not a bit of it! he still held gamely on, seldom traveling less than fifty miles a day, nothing to eat but the grass, and no time to eat but the frosty night. these prairie horses were descended from Spanish importations — Andalusians, i.e., Arabs or Barbs.

Count Rziewuski (Russian ) says that Asiatic horses are of one family, different from the European horses, except the English, which have much Arab blood, and that Napoleon did his best to improve the horses in France, but they were far inferior to English horses. This was in the middle of last century. The Count could not say that now. The Count also stated that the Poles had spared no expense in introducing Arab stallions, and gives many instances. Why were the English horses of that day superior to the French? Plainly, because up to that time the English had used the Arab very much more than the French, as the Stud-Book shows and as Count Rziewuski states. Why are thy inferior now? Because they have fallen off from the use of the Arab.

M. Chateaubriand, in his Travels in Greece, testifies to the hardihood of the Arab horse, and enters at length into what hardships he can stand, and says that a horse of well-known noble blood ‘will fetch any price,’ while you can get an ordinary horse for 80 or 100 piastres.

Major Denham, on losing a fine Arabian, describes how keenly he felt the loss, and says that although he was ashamed of it, yet he was some days before he could get over it; the animal had been his support and comfort through many a dreary day and night. Almost all riders of Arabs have felt the same sort of affection. As several authorities have observed, ‘the Arab is always a gentleman.’

Some Last Words, Chapter VI of The Arab Horse by Spencer Borden(1906)

Articles of History:

Excerpted from: THE ARAB HORSE, CHAPTER VI – SOME LAST WORDS by Spencer Borden, New York, 1906 from The Khamsat Volume Seven Number Four Oct/Dec 1990

 

            No person who reads the books from which much of the information conveyed in these pages has been obtained can fail to be impressed with the idea that the blood of Keheilet Ajuz is a preponderating influence in the best Arab horses. The animals possessed of this blood are not a separate breed among Arabs–all pure Arabs are of one breed. but, as we know of the old Morgans in America, there were separate families, for example, Woodburys, Giffords, Bulrushes, and all were Morgans, so in Arab horses there is a choice; and of them all the descendants of Keheilet Ajuz are the first. Upton says in “Gleanings From the Desert” (p. 320):

                “It appears to me that although there are numerous offshoots from the Keheilet Ajuz, each with a specific name, there is still a main line or strain of descent carried on of Keheilet Ajuz is sufficient to mark any such horse or mare.”

            He also explodes the tradition that mares are not to be had of the Arabs, and makes evident the fact that if a man knows what he wants, and has the money to pay the price; he can get it, or could at the time of his visits (p.p. 365-6).

                “Before leaving this portions of-the subject, it is convenient to allude to an assertion which has been made, and so oft repeated that it has been accepted as an established fact–that it is impossible to obtain an Arabian mare; that the Arabs will not part with a mare; that they will sell horses, but nothing will tempt them to part with a mare. The least informed on the subject of Arabians will tell you this as glibly and with as much assurance as if he had been brought up in the desert. One certainly announced that there was a law forbidding the export of an Arabian mare; Now, I can assure my readers that it is not by any means impossible to obtain a genuine Arab mare. We visited the most exclusive of all Badaween tribes and never heard of such a law. If any law did exist, it would be against selling, not exporting; but we never heard of such a thing in the desert. I can assure my readers that among the genuine Badaween of the Arabian desert we found no prejudice against parting with or selling a mare. Difficulty there certainly is to induce such people as the Anazah to sell either horses or mares, for they do not traffic in horses; but if there be any difference, you might get a good mare with less trouble than a good horse.

                “I have the best of possible authority for refuting the statement that mares are not to be got, for mares were not infrequently offered to us, and among the Anazah (not the wandering people of Erack) we obtained both mares and horses, and the former without more difficulty than the latter.”

            The idea has also been given currency that Manakhi Hedruj was a strain so rare as to be seldom seen in these days, was no longer to be had even for large sums of money, and that they are always chestnuts, of a sizes o much above the other Arab families that these others are merely “pony Arabs.” Upton says of them (Gleanings p. 321):

                “The Manakhi appeared to us a favorite strain, for both horses and mares of this family are to be found in most tribes of the Badaween; and we thought, with the exception of Keheilet Ajuz, there were more horses and mares among the Anazah, certainly among the Sabaah, of the Manakhi family than any other.”

            The Blunts, four years after Upton, had no difficulty in securing several animals of the Manakhi family, which they brought with them to the Crabbet Arabian Stud. Of their colour and size Upton remarks (Gleanings p. 321):

                “There was a nice clean-made, lengthy, useful, and racing-like dark grey three year old filly of the Manakhi Hedruj family which belonged to Shaykh Jedaan ibn Mahaid. There were four mares of Suleiman ibn Mirshid picketed in front of his tent, the best of which he considered to be the bluish-grey (Azzrak) mare, four or five years old. She was also of the Manakhi Hedruj family, and stood fourteen hands, three inches high.”

            Finally, the question seems pertinent — Why, if Arab horses are so valuable, their value so well known, and they can be procured, have they not become more widely distributed?

            Various answers, all good, may be given to this question. In the first place the average horseman has come to believe their qualities and reputation to be figments of the imagination, like the Arabian nights tales, and having similar origin. He has never seen one of these wonderful horses, and none of his friends have seen one. Therefore, the horse as he is represented does not exist. Again, even if he becomes convinced there is such a horse he does not know where to look for him, does not feel certain he can secure the genuine article if he parts with his good money to obtain one, and if he does find what he becomes convinced is what he wants the price is sure to be a stiff one. The fact is the whole business involves the question of supply and demand, which is the key to all economic calculations.

            From this time forward it will pay less and less to breed anything but the best horses, and those which will yield the safest return will be such as will be best adapted for use under the saddle, either for pleasure or as cavalry mounts. In either of those forms of utility no horse that ever lived can compare with one of Arab blood, and the supply of animals of that kind is extremely limited. The people possessing them, whether the Bedouins or those who have bought from them, have never had an over supply.

            A reason for this is perhaps to be found in one statement of conditions for which Mr. Wilfrid Blunt is authority namely: that the pure Arab is not a prolific breeding animal. He thinks one cause for this may be his intense inbreeding. Inbreeding is the only way to secure fixity of type in any form of animal life; but the penalty carried with it is limitation of the reproductive tendency. Mr. Blunt informed one inquirer that if fifteen mares out of twenty-five produced offspring each year at Crabbet Park, he felt satisfied.

            The tendency of this condition of affairs is to make the supply of pure Arabs always short, and the price high. A careful study of the lists presented to the readers of this book, however, will show that certain mares have been consistent and uniform producers of numerous and valuable offspring.

Washington’s Best Saddle Horse

By BEN HUR (Western Horseman Jan/Feb ’46)

Yankee ingenuity and frugality gave General George Washington his best and most illustrious saddle horse during the trying days of the Revolutionary war — a beautiful, half-bred Arabian stallion.

George Washington was fundamentally a man of the soil, a country squire and Virginia gentleman who loved his country home, his dogs and blooded livestock. The great necessity for protection of his and his neighbors’ estates and their way of life in the colonies was the only thing that drove him from his role as an agriculturist and breeder of horses and livestock to that of military leader of the revolutionists and, later, to become first president of the newly formed republic. He was a great admirer of fine horses and loved speed contests. Before the Revolution he went regularly to the races at Annapolis, attended the theatre and the balls given on those occasions, and was entertained by the social leaders of the town.

Prior to the Revolution there was in Connecticut a noted imported horse called Ranger, later known as Lindsay’s Arabian, that was brought to the colony in 1766, when four years old. He is described as a light grey or white horse, of the most perfect form and symmetry, above 15 hands high, possessing high and gallant temper, which gave him a lofty and commanding carriage and appearance.

The history of this horse is interesting. He was presented by the Emperor of Morocco to the commander of a British frigate for some important service rendered by the latter to the son of the emperor, whose stables contained some of the finest blooded horses from the Bedouin tribes of the Arabian desert. The horse was shipped on board the frigate with the expectation of obtaining a great price for him if safely landed in England. For some reason the vessel crossed to the West Indies on the way home, where, being obligated to remain for some time, the captain in sympathy for the horse allowed him to range for exercise in a large but enclosed lumber yard. In a spirit of playfulness the horse ascended one of the piles of lumber and fell, breaking three of his legs.

Veterinary science and surgery was not perfected to any extent at that time and even today it is almost the universal practice to put to death a horse that has the misfortune to break one leg, much less three. In the same harbor, however, at the time there happened to be an old acquaintance of the British captain from New England to whom the horse was offered as an animal of inestimable value, if he could be cured. The Yankee captain’s boyhood training in economy and frugality would not permit him to see the horse destroyed without an attempt to save his life. He accepted the gift of the horse and brought him on board his New England vessel. He had him secured in canvas belt slings and very carefully set and bound his broken legs. The horse was finally landed in Connecticut, his young bones having knitted satisfactorily during the slow voyage northward on the sailing vessel.

General George Washington had his attention attracted to the superiority of the horses ridden by the Connecticut cavalry when he took command of the Continental Army at Boston, 1777-1778. Calling General Harry Lee (Light Horse Harry Lee) of the American cavalry into conference, he found that these horses were the sons and the daughters of Ranger. Captain Lindsay was thereupon sent to Connecticut to purchase Ranger, and the horse which survived three broken legs was taken to Virginia where he was afterward known as the Lindsay Arabian. General Washington, in the meantime, obtained one of the stallion’s fine sons for his personal mount.

The horse that General Israel Putnam rode when he galloped down a hundred steps at Greenwich, Conn., to escape the British, was a full brother to Washington’s charger. The artist’s conception of Putnam’s daring exploit is found to this day in most school histories of the founding of the United States.

As Washington was 6 feet 3 inches tall and weighed more than two hundred pounds it is evident that the famous charger, (half Arabian), son of Ranger (Lindsay’s Arabian), must have been a weight-carrier. After the revolution, General Washington directed that the services of Lindsay’s Arabian be extensively used on his blooded mares at Mount Vernon. The four famous grey stallions that drew Martha Washington’s coach to Philadelphia, the first capital, when congress convened, were bred on the Washington plantation and were half-bred Arabian sons of Lindsay’s Arabian.

Type in the Arab

by Ben Hur (Western Horseman March 1951)

IS THE ARABIAN horse a gift of nature, a natural , primary type like the wild beast of the fields and forests? Or is it a modified and developed type, created under man’s influence?

Type is that distinctive, familiar shape which immediately identifies a horse and classifies it with its breed. Type makes the breed. The type of your favorite breed is as familiar to you as the type-faces and typography of your favorite newspaper and magazine which you can identify at sight at a distance long before you are near enough to read the print.

Zobeyni, Seglawi strain, desert bred Arabian stallion, imported to Egypt about 1840 by Abbas Pasha I, founder of the most successful and dominant Arabian male line.
Zobeyni, Seglawi strain, desert bred Arabian stallion, imported to Egypt about 1840 by Abbas Pasha I, founder of the most successful and dominant Arabian male line.
Aabab No. 741, Kehilan strain (1945), sired by Hanad, he by *Deyr, most successful sire of the Davenport importation. Aabab bears a striking similarity to Zobeyni.
Aabab No. 741, Kehilan strain (1945), sired by Hanad, he by *Deyr, most successful sire of the Davenport importation. Aabab bears a striking similarity to Zobeyni.

What is Arabian type and what is its origin? You know it when you see it, but there are so many variations in the type. What is the explanation? Which is the most desirable?

Most Arabians fall within two type classifications:

1) the larger, longer, coarser and more masculine type;

2) the smaller, shorter, finer formed, “strength and beauty” type.

The larger, coarser type was used mainly as foundation for our present day light breeds. The smaller, finer type has been largely the foundation of the Arabians as a breed, bred in their purity during the past century in Egypt, Poland, England and later in the United States. This type, known as the elite in Egypt, as the classic in America, when highly bred, it that of a horse of transcendent beauty. It is more than that. It is the beauty of an ancient Grecian statue come to life. It is not sheer beauty alone, at one extreme, or sheer brute strength at the other. The ideal represents a blending of animated strength and beauty, a degree of perfection not achieved in any other domestic animal.

Gulastra No. 521, Seglawi strain; dam, Gulnare; sire, *Astraled by Mesaoud, great grandson of Zobeyni. Gulastra has proven a highly important sire.


The ideal Arabian type is recognizable at sight to the experienced horseman and novice alike. It falls short of the ideal if it reminds one of another horse or breed. It falls short of the ideal if it is so plain and uncertain of type as to require a sign: “This is an Arabian horse.” It falls short of the ideal if it is so coarse and masculine as to remind one of a small Percheron, at one extreme, or so highly animated and elf-like as to remind one of a gazelle at the other extreme. The ideal type stands out alone. You know it immediately when you see it.

Because of its beauty and perfection, the most common error is the assumption that Arabian type is a natural gift of nature, a type that is as fixed as that of the bison, squirrels or bob cats. With that erroneous assumption as a premise, the new admirer of the Arabian dreams of the day he could visit the desert, make friends and barter for a few Arabian horses. From then on, with his horses safely back home, all that would be necessary, with a little feed, time and care, would be the multiplication and addition of the offspring. It would be as simple as starting with a pair of guinea pigs or white rabbits. Like would beget like and soon there would be many more of these wonderful Arabians. The idea still persists today, in spite of the history of the development of the breed and evidence all about of the bloodlines and skill required to produce the desired type.

On scores of occasions, elaborate and adequately equipped trips have been made to the desert (in some instances years and fortunes have been spent) in an attempt to bring back several of the “dream horses.” The results have been disheartening at best. The horses dreamed about could not be found, or an occasional one found was not for sale. After these many attempts, it is generally conceded that Abbas Pasha I of Egypt all but stripped the desert of the best horses a century ago and that the overwhelming majority of Arabians of the much preferred type desired today are of these bloodlines combined with and developed by the Blunts and later their daughter, Lady Wentworth.

There are three familiar proofs we may cite that Arabian type is not a gift of nature, a natural, primary fixed type:

1) the horses of Cortez and De Soto, of Spanish origin, were of the same root stock as the early Arabians. Left to run wild on the plains of the southwest, they grew smaller, lost most of the early type and good dispositions and became, in fact, untractable, rough ponies.

2) The Thoroughbred in England, on the other hand, under proper care, skill and environment, was moulded and developed from about the same root stock, about the same time as the reversion in type was making the wild mustang in America. Taking advantage of the variations in type found from time to time, and with selection and care, a new type, the thoroughbred, was created.

3) As further proof that the Arabian horse, as found in the desert, was moulded and pliable, a highly developed creature from the remote early type, we may cite that there was no universal, fixed type.

Travelers visiting the desert, from earliest recorded accounts, found variations in the distinctive, over-all type. They found some six or more main strains among as many main Bedouin tribes, and numerous sub-strains of each main strain, each further specialized to the liking of the families among the tribes breeding them. The five main strains were the Kehilan, Seglawi, Abeyan, Hamdani and Hadban, all more or less closely related, and many maintained that from the Kehilan the others were offshoots.

Azkar No. 1109, Kehilan (Seglawi) strain; sire, Rahas by Gulastra; dam, imported *Aziza, Egypt, out of Negma, finest recent representative of the Jellibiet Feysul mare line. (Today this line has been shown through mtDNA analysis to be Seglawi-Jedran)

These five strains were of the finer, elite or classic type. The sixth strain, the larger, coarser, was the Maneghi, seldom, if ever, crossed with the other strains. Breeding and identifying type followed the mare through these strain and sub-strain names. Stallions from one strain of the first five were often used on the other closely related strains, but his strain name was dropped in his offspring, which carried the strain of its dam. Pedigrees in the modern sense were unknown among the Bedouins.

Of the many horses imported from the desert to Egypt, England, Poland and the United States, early pedigrees and stud books reveal that many desert-bred horses had sires and dams of different closely related strains. The practice of continuing the identifying strain names in present day stud books, to give an idea of type origin, has continued in England, Poland and Egypt. In many instances in the United States, after 30 years of indiscriminate inter-mixing of strains from so many different sources, without regard to type or family origin, the resulting offspring was “neither fish nor fowl,” had so many different strains in the pedigree as to belie claim to any one of them in particular. So strain names were dropped in our stud books. There are, however, in this country important bloodlines that have been continued along the same early system of family line breeding and have a concentration of the blood of the type foundation sires and dams.

A study of importations of Arabians to this country for the past 50 years reveals many interesting facts relating to present-day type trends and influences. In no other country has thee been so much enthusiasm for imported Arabians. More than 200 have been accepted for registry from the desert, Lebanon, Egypt, India, Turkey, Spain, France, Germany, Russia, Poland, South America and England. Many of these have the same type root origin and are not as unrelated at the mere name of sire an dam would indicate. Some imported from Egypt credit sire and dam as “desert bred,” when in fact they are of Abbas Pasha and Blunt origin in Egypt with highly significant pedigrees. Numerous importations from various isolated sources from which high hope was held when the importation was made have left issue of little or no value. It is astonishing to note the toll that time has taken of some lines and how others more dominant have been preferred and have gone on and on.

The Maneghi strain or courser type Arabian was preferred for several centuries by those who thought of the Arabian as the best original seed-stock with which to improve and make new breeds. This strain was the foundation for the Thoroughbred and accounts for his type today.

The “strength and beauty” or elite type, later called the classic type, was first highly esteemed and collected from the desert with great fervor by Abbas Pasha I of Egypt (1803 – 1858), who used his knowledge of the desert and horses ,his immense fortune and his friendship with the Bedouins to make his vast collection of horses. He had as many as 600 head at one time. It is doubtful if the Bedouins ever again had the horses they had before he carried on, over a period of years, his systematic combing of the desert for the finest classic type Arabians, regardless of price, which he boasted he collected for their perfection of beauty like others in Europe and elsewhere collected priceless paintings.

Three of the Arabians of Abbas Pasha are among the most highly esteemed foundation of present day bloodlines, here and abroad. Zobeyni (see illustration), a grey Seglawi stallion, bred in the desert, used by him with great success, is founder of the male line that has been the most successful in England and the United States.

*Rifala No. 815, Kehilan strain, imported from England; sire, Skowronek, grandson of Mahruss, Zobeyni line. Rifala is of the Rodania female line, and dam of *Raffles by Skowronek.

Aarah No. 1184, Kehilan, and foal Aarafa. She is representative of the female lines of Ghazieh, Rodania and Jellibiet Feysul.

The line has been of preponderant importance in contributing to other lines in other countries, notably Egypt and Poland. Zobeyni’s most celebrated son was Wazir, which has by some been considered the best stallion secured in Egypt by Wilfred and Lady Ann Blunt. Wazir was sire of many important mares for the Blunts at their Crabbet Stud; also the stallion Shahwan, famed for his beauty and perfection, imported to this country in 1895 by J.P.Ramsdell. Thus in this country was obtained some of the early Zobeyni blood. Zobeyni was also sire of Mahruss, sire of Ibn Mahruss No. 22. Mahruss was sire of Heijer, grandsire of Skowronek (Poland)(1), whose blood has been the largest contributing factor to modern classic type in England and the United States. Zobeyni was great grandsire of Jamil El Achkar, highly important foundation sire in Egypt; also Mesaoud, taken to England by the Blunts and the most successful sire at Crabbet Stud before the coming of Skowronek. Thus it will be seen that the United States shares richly in the early blood sources of the most important progenitor of Arabians in the modern world.

Abbas Pasha brought from the desert two mares that are tap root dams of the most important female lines. They are Jellibiet Feysul, a Kehilan, for which a fortune was paid, and Ghazieh, a Seglawi, as important possibly as the former. She is great granddam of Bint Helwa, dam of Ghazala, brought to the country by Spencer Borden. Through her daughters, Guemura and Gulnare, many Arabians share in this line.

The Bunts devoted their resources and many years of their lives bringing Arabians from the desert to England and Egypt and to world acclaim and favor. Through their daughter, the bloodlines have been further extended. Of all the many important sires they have owned, Mesaoud, great grandson of Zobeyni, bred in Egypt, and Skowronek(1), bred in Poland, both of the Zobeyni line, have contributed more than any others to the high esteem in which the classic type Arabian is held the world over at the present time.

The mares Rodania and Dajania, both Kehilan, obtained in the desert by the Blunts, have proven tap root foundation mares comparable to Ghazieh and Jellibiet Feysul. Their blood, too, is found generously in many pedigrees in this country.

Nejdme No. 1, of Chicago World’s Fair 1893 fame, has established an important female line here not found in other countries.

Of the Arabians imported by Homer Davenport from the desert, one stallion and two mares have contributed new lines that are increasing in popularity. Deyr, an Abeyan, bred in the desert, is founder of the male line. Sire of Hanad, his most illustrious son, and Tabab, and grandsire of Antez and Aabab (see illustration) and others of note, the line is noted for its vitality, personality and robust type. It blends well with and compliments the Zobeyni line. The most important of the Davenport mares were Wadduda (the war mare) and Urfah, both of the Seglawi strain. They have established female lines not found in other countries.

It will be seen that the type preference for the classic type had its beginning with the selections made by Abbas Pasha early in the 19th century, which were later augmented and supported by the desert selections of the Blunts and their development of the type and breed at their Sheik Obeyd Stud in Egypt and Crabbet Stud in England. The spark that kindled the enthusiasm and preference for this same type was the occasion of the (1893) World’s Fair. Numerous small, highly significant importations of the Abbas Pasha and Blunt bloodlines were made from England in the succeeding years. More than 20 years later, Wm. R. Brown made large importations from England of this same type and blood source and added them to his stud of Borden and other importations which he had painstakingly collected and saved for posterity. He did more than any other person to put the Arabian horse on a firm, consistent type breeding foundation by specializing in the production of the classic type and publicizing the type qualifications and standards. Ten years later, through the importations from England by W.K.Kellogg and Roger Selby of considerable numbers of horses of the same important bloodlines, the foundation for this type was broadened and strengthened vastly and to a degree which assured the future of the breed in the U.S. A few years later, Henry Babson and Wm. R. Brown made highly significant importations from Egypt of closely related bloodlines, selected particularly for the type they most esteemed. These important additions gave the breeders in this country the same type sources and foundation blood as those of Egypt, England and Poland.

There are in the United States more living registered Arabians than in England, Egypt and Poland combined as proof of the popularity and acceptance of the breed here, although this number is infinitely small, and no doubt always will be, compared to the total horse population of the country. There are among the registered Arabians in this country a substantial number bred true to the preferred type and from the bloodlines which are of the same origin and loosely related to the same families abroad. Because of the ravages of war and the difficulties under which horses have been bred in these other countries in recent years, it is now apparent from their stud books that we have here a larger number and wider selection of the type sources which originated in these countries than they now have. It is doubtful, after a study of their latest stud books, that they now have anything that would materially aid in further extending our type base of bloodlines.

Conclusions:

In a study of type influences and origin in the Arabian horse we must conclude that:

1) there is no natural, fixed, primary type.

2) There are numerous type variations from the over-all, general type.

3) These variations can be divided ito two main classes.

4) The type generally preferred and held in highest esteem has its origin in one breed foundation desert bred sire of a century ago.

5) Four desert bred mares of the same period and type have had a tremendous influence in sustaining and propagating the type.

6) This type, through these bloodlines, has an inter-family relationship among Arabian horses n the United States, England, Poland and Egypt.

7) This international one type ideal and relationship has been carried on from generation to generation through the skill of breeders that comes from years of study and experience with the breed.

8) The United States has had important additions to this type influence by bloodlines of desert bred horses not directly related to the previous group.

9) The type is produced and sustained by following the same family or strain plan of breeding followed for centuries in the desert, more commonly known as line breeding where pedigree breeding is in practice.

10) A study of all the importations from the desert entering into our present day bloodlines clearly indicates there have been no Arabians from this source equal in influence and importance with the stallion Zobeyni, the mares jellibiet Feysul, Ghazieh, Rodania and Dajania.

((1) Today Ibrahim is accepted as a desert-bred stallion. For more information see:

Lady Wentworth’s THE AUTHENTIC ARABIAN HORSE

Schile,Erika THE ARAB HORSE IN EUROPE

Potocki, Count Joseph (son of Skowronek’s breeder) “Skowronek’s Pedigree and the Antoniny Stud” The Arabian Horse News, Feb. ’58.

Blunt, Lady Anne JOURNALS AND CORRESPONDENCE 1878-1917

Guttmann, Ursula: THE LINEAGE OF THE POLISH ARABIAN HORSES

Dickenson, J.M. A CATALOG OF TRAVELERS REST ARABIAN HORSES

Seward’s Arabians

Seward’s Arabians By Ben Hur (Western Horseman Sept/Oct ’45)

Maanake Hedroge

Abraham Lincoln, as a youth, may have been too poor to own a horse. Historians invariably picture him as walking long distances through southern Indiana and central Illinois. Lincoln has been sculptured more often possibly than any other American, but never astride a horse as so many of the other immortals. Do you recall a single statue of Lincoln where he is astride or beside a horse?

Lincoln, as president of the United States, aided, although indirectly, in the importation of purebred Arabian horses. He selected as a member of his cabinet a very able and well known New York lawyer, William H. Seward, whom he sent shortly after to Syria to adjust some difficulties between the two countries. The matter was finally settled amicably, and os satisfactorily adjusted that the Syrian government, to show its appreciation of Mr. Seward’s diplomacy, asked him to express some wish. Mr. Seward, always interested in the agricultural needs of his country, especially his own New York state, replied that if the Syrian government would help him procure some pureblooded Arabian horses to send home, they could not only confer upon him a personal favor, but would benefit the United States immeasurably.

Siklauy-Gidran

Ayoub Bey Trabulsky, assistant of the Criminal Court of the Ayalet of Sayda was delegated to act on behalf of the Syrian government. He selected a blood-bay stallion, eight years old, of the Maneghi strain or family, and a chestnut colt, two years old, of the Seglawi-Jedran strain; also a grey mare, which unfortunately died on the way. Shipped from Beryout, the two stallions arrived in New York in 1860, expenses of their journey amounting to ten thousand dollars.

Mr. Seward offered them as a gift to the New York State Agricultural Society, if the society would pay the expenses of their importation. It was a poor return for Mr. Seward’s generosity — even when excused by the great excitement attendant upon the breaking out of civil war — that the society refused to comply with his proposal. In this emergency, Mr. Seward presented the two-year-old colt to Mr. Ezra Cornell of Ithaca, New York and the older stallion to the Hon. John E. Van Etten, of Kingston, New York. Standing 15 hands high the latter was noted for depth of chest and shoulders and “withers as strong as that of a bull,” quoting from a description shortly after his arrival in this country. He was known to be the sire of only two foals. One was a grey filly, bred by Judge Westbrook of Kingston, and the other a colt, bred by a nephew of Judge Sackett of Auburn, New York.

The younger stallion stood 15 hands high when two years 10 months old. He was described as “a noble specimen of the Arabian horse. Beautiful as a statue, fiery as the sun that tints his native sands, he awakens in the mind of the beholder a sense of admiration and wonder; while a glance at his graceful head and neck is sufficient to confirm all that we have heard or read of the superior beauty of the Arabian horse.” He was shown as a three-year-old at the state fair held at Rochester, and won a special gold medal for being the handsomest horse on the grounds. Subsequently he was sold to a breeder at Canton, Ohio, where he died, leaving only two fillies. The chestnut stallion died from neglect. The war was causing such absorption of all men’s thoughts that all else seemed of little importance.

At that time many of our best and most noted trotters were always spoken of with pride as coming from Arabian ancestry. No doubt the blood of the two half-blood Arabian fillies bred from the chestnut stallion and the grey filly and horse colt sired by the bay stallion flows in the veins of many well known American harness and saddle horses today.

Justin Morgan was undoubtedly an Anglo-Arabian. The dam of Dolly Spanker was an inbred Morgan mare. Sherman Morgan and Buckshot were doubly inbred to Morgan. Gano was by American Eclipse, also of Arabian strain. Thus it was that the Arabian blood was spread throughout the United States from many different sources before the civil war. Arabian blood was not only known and most highly valued by intelligent breeders, but was considered absolutely essential to the making of a perfect horse. It should be noted that the early importations were invariably stallions, and the pure blood of the Arabian was in each instance lost upon the death of the imported stallions. Had the grey mare lived which Mr. Seward attempted to import she, rather than Naomi, might have had the distinction of being the first Arabian mare in this country as progenitor of pureblood Arabians bred in the United States.

The portraits of the Seward Arabians were drawings made by the well known artist of his day, mr. T.C.Carpendale, and are pen sketches highly embellished in Oriental fashion as if the horses were being shown upon a stage and the curtain drawn to one side. The drawings were then engraved in wood, which also required the services of a skilled artist, as those wood blocks were used by Harper’s Weekly in full page illustrations in their issue of January 12, 1861, before photography made it possible to record more lifelike pictures and reproduce them by the modern halftone method. Artist Carpendale may have been a noted artist of his day, but his drawings fell short of his word descriptions of these two horses quoted above, for his drawings are rather stilted and fail to portray the beauty he saw in the horses before him. Worthy of interest is the euphonious spelling of the strain or family names of the horses appearing below the pictures. The young stallion is a “Siklauy-Gidran,” more properly and correctly spelled today Seglawi-Jedran, while the older stallion is called a “Maanake-Hedroge,” which to the modern student of Arabic is known as a Maneghi-Hedruj.

Polish Arabians May Have Been Saved

by Ben Hur (Western Horseman Mar/Apr’44)

Raffles, by champion Skowronek, out of champion Rifala.

Friends and students of Arabian horses will be deeply interested in the report that the castle and estate of Count Potocki in war-harassed Poland have been saved from destruction. A deep American interest in the Arabian horses of Poland arises from the fact that during the past ten years or so the bloodlines of some of the best Polish bred Arabian horses have proven extremely popular in this country. There was a time when very little, if any, contact was had with Arabian breeders of Poland, and little was known of their methods of breeding and the quality of their horses.

It will be recalled that Wilfred S. Blunt and his wife, Lady Anne Blunt, established the Crabbet Arabian Stud about 1880 with horses they imported from the desert and, later, others from Egypt. They became the most extensive breeders of Arabians in the British empire, and Arabians bred there were exported to the far corners of the world. Many importations have been made by breeders of the United States.

Commenting on the later work of Lady Wentworth and her Crabbet Arabian Stud, William R. Brown, former president of the Arabian Horse Club of America, said in his book, The Horse of the Desert (1936): “In recent years, a white stallion, Skowronek, bred at the stud of Count Potocki in Poland, has been introduced in order to freshen the blood.”

Skowronek, a few days after he was brought to the U.S. [sic] from Poland. The famous stallion later turned white.

Through the fact that Lady Wentworth deemed it necessary or expedient to freshen the blood of Crabbet Arabians by the importation of Skowronek from Poland shortly after the first world war, a deep interest in Polish Arabians was created in breeders in America. Arabian horses have been bred intensively in their desert purity in Poland for several hundred years. It has been the practice there of certain breeders to obtain a new desert bred stallion every five or ten years and this rule has been followed for many generations. The sire of Skowronek is Ibrahim, desert bred, and his dam is Jaskolka, on her dam’s side from a long line of Polish bred Arabians.

Skowronek’s blood has been disseminated to two continents. Several of his get were imported to the United States — the first possibly being the grey stallion, Raseyn No. 597, and the grey mare, Rossana No. 598, imported in 1926 by W. K. Kellogg. The grey mare Rifala No. 815, by Skowronek, was imported in 1928 by Roger Selby, followed by a double son, Champion Raffles No. 952, imported by Mr. Selby in 1932.

It is significant that the mare, Rifala, was bred back to her sire, Skowronek, and foaled Raffles while still in England. Raffles then is the in-bred son, the son and grand-son of Skowronek, and three quarters of the blood of his sire rather than the usual one-half.

Rifala and foal. Her blood is potent in passing on extremely desirable qualities to her offspring.

Possibly for this reason the blood of Raffles has been found unusually potent in passing on the extremely desirable qualities, from the Arabian breeders’ point of view, to the offspring. From these two sons and two daughters of Skowronek in the United States, in the relatively short period of about ten years, the get and bloodlines have gone to a surprisingly large number of Arabian breeders from coast to coast.

After the importations of the two sons and daughters of Skowronek from England to the United States, the interest in Arabian horses from Poland grew. J. M. Dickinson imported seven Arabians direct from Poland to the United States in 1937, the most prized mare possibly being Przepiorka No. 1309, her dam being Jaskolka II (no doubt a daughter of Jaskolka). In 1938 Mr. Dickinson imported eight more Arabians from Poland, while Henry Babson made a visit to Poland and personally selected five which he imported into the United States. Mr. Dickinson then imported still another in 1939 and Mr. Babson two more.

Dickinson had the honor and distinction of exporting in the meantime to Poland the American bred Arabian, Antez No. 448, a stallion representing some of the best blood lines of the Homer Davenport (1906) importation from the desert to this country. Later, Antez had the distinction of being imported back to the United States from Poland after being used successfully as a stud there.

These importations from Poland were from a number of different estates and breeders as well as the Polish State Stud. With the invasion of Poland by Germany early in World War II, most of these estates and studs were liquidated, the horses confiscated, some being taken to Germany and added to breeding establishments there. So it has been with deep sorrow that many breeders of Arabians in America have followed the ebb and flow of the war across Poland, realizing that the breeding of several hundred years had been wiped out.

Recently, however, more welcome news has come from Polish Vice Consul Jozef Staniewicz in Chicago who reports that despite the terrific destruction in Poland there is one estate which stands untouched, Lancut, the historic castle of the Potockis, fifty miles from Cracow. The ancient house, the only one in Europe remaining intact as it was in the Middle Ages, stands in the center of 150,000 acres of fields and forests.

At the time of the German invasion in 1939, members of the German general staff lost no time in getting to Lancut and making themselves comfortable under Count Potocki’s roof. German Minister of Foreign Affairs Joachim von Ribbentrop and Reichs-marshal Herman Goering have engaged in boar hunting on the estate. The upshot of it was the famous castle and its historic properties and collections remained intact under the German high command. Other castles and country houses, universities and churches were sacked, but Lancut was saved.

This information from the Polish vice consul gives added assurance that the Arabian horses owned by Count Potocki were also saved and can be used as a nucleus for re-establishing the studs for which Poland has long been famous.

See also:

Skowronek — Magic Progenitor

Pedigree Breeding

by Ben Hur (Western Horseman Mar/Apr’45)

Nadirat No. 619, chestnut Arabian mare owned by Ben Hur Farms, whose pedigree is presented on this page, is a striking example of the result of many generations of pedigree, line-breeding. It will be noted that nine names appear more than once in her pedigree. Nine (marked with asterisks) of the 16 ancestors in the 5th generation have as a common ancestor the famous tap-root Arabian stallion Zobeyni (desert and Egypt) thus further concentrating this line of breeding.

Pedigreed, pure-blooded, Thoroughbred, registered — what do they mean to you with reference to a horse? All too often they are used interchangeably and only add to confusion in an attempt to describe a horse.

If you own one or more mares, and contemplate raising colts, then you are interested in the possibility of improvement in the offspring. Improvement can be made by the intelligent choice of a sire. You are interested not only in the horse himself, but for an intelligent understanding of the sire, you are interested in his pedigree and the kind of registration papers belonging to him.

If you are interested in the purchase of a horse or colt for saddle or breeding purposes or both, then you are interested not only in the type and conformation of the individual you are considering, but you are also interested in his background, what he came from. To understand these things, it is necessary to study pedigrees. From these you will get a better idea what you can expect in disposition, performance, endurance and off-spring.

A pedigree is the family lineage of an animal extended for several generations in an accurate, chronological, genealogical form. In addition to the names and registration numbers, other information of value may be added.

You may have a cetificate of registry for your horse, dog or other livestock, but it is of little value to you from a breeding standpoint unless you can draft or obtain an accurate pedigree. Even then a pedigree with names and number only is worth little more than the paper it is written on unless you are personally familiar with pedigrees and have seen or have pictures and accurate descriptions of the animals listed in the pedigree form. The simple pedigree form is like a surveyor’s plot to a lot or farm — without the abstract or detailed description it is practically meaningless. For this reason many people who have given serious thought to pedigree breeding hopelessly throw up their hands in despair before they ever get started, for it seems an impossible job to get started right.

The various registry associations seldom have the time or inclination to furnish extended pedigrees covering the animals they have registered. The registration books they issue covering the animals registered from the Number 1 animal, on down, offer the means whereby anyone may draft their own pedigrees for any animal desired. It becomes a matter of methodical study and research and requires patience and time.

If you have a horse that is registered and you are giving serious consideration to breeding this horse to a registered horse of the opposite sex, it is then that pedigrees are of real value in the hands of students of breeding and the skilled and experienced breeder alike. It is then that membership in the registry club or association and possession of registry books become a valuable asset, for they are the key that unlocks the door to all the hitherto hidden past of the ancestry of your horse. Even these registry books fall far short of giving all the information you will eventually want to know about each and every individual in the pedigree of your horse. You may spend months and years accumulating all the information you desire on each of the animals in the pedigree and what is more important, that of extending the pedigree to the sixth, eighth or tenth generation.

A typical six generation Arabian pedigree:

NADIRAT no. 619 Chestnut Arabian mare Sire: *Rizvan No. 381 Ibn Yashmak Feysul Ibn Nura* Sottam
Bint Nura
El Argaa (Egypt)
Bint Jellabiet Feysul
Yashmak Shahwan* Wazir
Aziz
Yemama (Egypt)
(Egypt)
Rijma Rijm Mahruss II* Mahruss
Bint Bint Nura
Rose of Sharon Hadban
Rodania
Risala Mesaoud* Aziz
Yemameh
Ridaa* Merzuk
Rose of Sharon
Dam: Nusara No. 371 Abu Zeyd Mesaoud Aziz* Harkan
Aziza
Yemameh (Egypt)
(Egypt)
Rose Diamond Azrek (Egypt)
(Egypt)
Rose of Jericho Kars
Rodania
Noam Rijm Mahruss II* Mahruss
Bint Bint Nura
Rose of Sharon Hadban
Rodania
Narda II Rejeb* Mesaoud
Rosemary
Narghileh* Mesaoud
Nefisa
The ancestors of this American-bred American mare, as shown in the above pedigree, originated in the United States, England, Egypt and the desert. Note that nine names appear two or more times in the pedigree. The characteristics of these horses are thus multiplied and intensified.

What is the value of an extended pedigree? The extended pedigree, data and knowledge of each and every animal in the fifth, sixth and seventh generation may open the pages to “skeletons in the closet” of which you little dreamed, and may enable you to fortify your breeding program against glaring defects which would spring out to plague you in offspring yet unborn.

On the other hand you may find many “diamonds” in the extended pedigree, noted animals which you did not know were ancestors of your horse. As you carefully work out each generation you may find the same noted horse, or several of them, appearing again and again in the pedigree as the common ancestor of horses in the more immediate pedigree, and which you did not know were directly related. Thus you will be able to carefully weigh the proportionate strength and weakness of the horses that appear two, three or more times in the pedigree and get valuable, accurate insight into what the offspring will be like.

Khaleb No. 1168, grey Arabian stallion owned by Ben Hur Farms, is an example of combining the bloodlines of a number of important Arabians from different sources, originating from widely different importations from the desert. No name in Khaleb’s pedigree appears more than once, in contrast to Nadirat, who has nine ancestors appearing more than once. Khaleb is pure-blooded without being line or inbred.

Have you ever considered how many ancestors you and your horse have? Not until you take a piece of paper and pencil and make you your own diagram and do your own figuring will you begin to realize from what ancestors you and your horse came and how many there really were. It is overwhelming and appalling when you figure up the unknown ancestors and how little you know about the known ancestors in some pedigrees (especially your own.) In each generation there are double the number of ancestors there were in the preceding one. Thus:

Generation 2d 3d 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th
Number of Ancestors 2 4 8 16 32 64 128 256

Half of the above, of course, are males, half females, and regardless of how you may feel about it, you and your horse both have exactly the same number of ancestors. Fortunately, possible, the curtain has been drawn down on knowledge or information available about most of the ancestors in your own pedigree further than the fourth generation. Not one in one hundred of our readers, I dare say, can give the names of all his ancestors in the fourth generation. but it is not much of a horse, or rather not much of a pedigree of a horse, which does not give accurate information including at least the fourth generation.

“Why all this fuss and bother about all those distant ancestors in the fifth generation on?” you may ask. Because in the pedigree of livestock, horses and dogs, a sound breeding program can be founded on the information revealed in generations as far distant as the eighth and ninth.

Let us challenge that statement. If there are 64 ancestors in the seventh generation, what does it matter how one of them looked or was like — he or she would be only 1/64 and so infinitesimal in the sum total that it would not matter anyway, you might answer. In your own personal pedigree suppose one of the 64 in the seventh generation was a native of central Africa or the bush country of Australia? How would you feel about it and don’t you suppose characteristics peculiar to their race and foreign to your race would come to the surface ever so often in you or your offspring? You have the answer, then, why breeding certain kinds of horses and livestock still results in offspring entirely foreign to what you had expected.

A typical five generation Arabian pedigree:

Sire: *Nuri Pasha No. 517 Nureddin II Rijm Mahruss II
Rose of Sharon
Nargileh Mesaoud
Nefisa
Ruth Kesia Ben Azrek Azrek
Shemse
Borak Boanerges
Kesia II
Dam: Dawn No. 135 Nejdran Jr Nejdran (desert)
(desert)
Sheba Mannaky Jr
Galfia
Rhua *Haleb (desert)
(desert)
*Urfah (desert)
(desert)
The ancestors of this American-bred Arabian stallion originated in the United States, England, Egypt and the desert. The pedigree differs from that of the mare Nadirat on the opposite page in that the sire’s ancestors for a number of generations have been bred in England and Egypt, while the dam’s ancestors go directly to the desert. All but two in the 5th generation are desert-bred; the sire and dam of these two are desert-bred. These desert-bred ancestors represent three importations by Homer Davenport of the United States, Capt. Gainesford of England, Hadje Memmed of Damascus.

The word “pedigree” is all too often indiscriminately used as a synonym for “pure-breed,” “Thoroughbred,” or “registered.” Such is not the case and a thorough understanding of what each means is highly important to the owner and purchaser of a horse. For example, an accurate pedigree can always be furnished with a pureblooded or Thoroughbred horse, but a pedigree worthy of the name cannot be furnished with many present day “registered” horses. Many present day registered horses have few, if any, ancestors of pureblood or Thoroughbred origin. The ancestors in the third and fourth generation are seldom known, and if so may be known as simply Tom, Dick and Nellie — but from where, what or when remains a secret of the past.

A pedigree worthy of study and use in the improvement of offspring should show sire or dam, preferably both, with at least four or five generations of known ancestry of the same breed. This may seem simple and easy, but let us see.

A breed is generally considered as consisting of animals of a given kind which reproduce their kind with uniformity. The sire and dam have a background of many generations of definite similar breeding. This is about as broad and liberal a definition as can be given.

A PUREBLOOD is among the rarest of our domestic animals. It is a term, however, that is often incorrectly used. Most of our breeds of domestic animals today have at most one or two hundred years of known breeding behind them. In the distant past they were “bred-up” from ancient diminutive, primitive types. Few if any, can lay claim to being pure in the blood of any one species. The Arabian horse, recognized by registration, is the only pureblood species of a horse today. The fat-tailed, black, Karakul sheep, also from the desert, is the only other pure species of domestic animal that we can recall at the moment, that has not undergone vast changes through the introduction of the blood of other types and species. The sacred or Brahma cattle of India are no doubt a distinct species but not domestic animals under our flag.

Not all horses of the Arabian desert are accepted as pure-blood but those that are have some two thousand years of unbroken breeding for purity of blood and type behind them. Scientists have shown that the Arabian horse has one less lumbar vertebra, two less in the tail, than other horses and they agree it is a true sub-species.

The THOROUGHBRED horse is the English version of a running racehorse. He is not a pure-blooded horse. Back in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries gradual improvement was made in the running ability of the horses owned by royalty by the importation and use of stallions from the Orient, mostly Arabians.

Until the time of King Charles II (1660-1685) racehorses in England had been bred to a type or a distinct breed. Richard Blome, author of “The Gentleman’s Recreation,”1686) advised those who desired to breed race horses, hunter and road-horses to “choose a Turk, Barb or Spaniard (all horses of Eastern blood) as the stallion, and to select the mare according to her shape and make, with an eye for the work the foal might be intended.” King Charles imported Arab mares into England and they were bred to the stallion known as the Byerly Turk, having been imported in 1689 by Captain Byerly, who used him as a charge in his campaigns in the east.

The Darley Arabian, imported 1706, and the Godolphin Arabian, imported 1730, were exclusively used on the Arab mares which were directly descended from the Royal Mares and the Byerly Turk. Maj. Roger D. Upton in his book “Newmarket and Arabia,” published in London (1873) proves beyond doubt by his carefully compiled pedigrees, that the race horses on the turf of England descend from these three Arab sires and the Royal Mares. The last of these sires, the Godolphin Arabian, died in 1753, aged 29 years.

Breeders of Thoroughbreds in England, developed the running race-horse upon the above foundation. By their system of breeding, selection and racing they made a different type from the early Arabian ancestry and raised the height 1 inch every 25 years from a 14 hands horse on the average in 1700 to a 15 1/2 hands horse in 1900. It will be noted that British breeders of Thoroughbreds have never referred to their horses as “pure-blooded,” although they possibly could justify it if they chose to do so.

Thoroughbreds were, of course, exported to the United States from colonial days to the present time. But the breeders of Thoroughbreds in the United States were not, in the early days, quite so zealous of the purity of their horses. As a result their horses of largely American ancestry trace back in their pedigrees to out-cross, horses of unknown breeding. For this reason Thoroughbreds of American origin are not acceptable for registration in England.

The MORGAN, the American-made horse tracing to a single common ancestor owes its existence to the horse, Justin Morgan. It is quite generally agreed that his blood was largely Arabian. The early Morgan blood went into the formation of the trotting and pacing, harness race-horse. And the blood of the original Morgan horses might lay claim to being 50 per cent of the blood of the original Justin Morgan horse, at best, as no great effort was made to intensify the strain by inbreeding and line inbreeding until it was almost too late. Breeders of Morgans today, however, study their pedigrees very closely and they are making an effort to reclaim as much of the original blood as possible. Some are able to claim as much as 10 per cent or a trifle more of the original Justin blood in some of their hoses. Since Justin was not a pureblood to start with, and so many outcrosses have been made since, away from the original blood-lines, the Morgan cannot be referred to as a “pure-blooded” horse, although many of them have pedigrees back five or more generations in some branches of the family tree.

The AMERICAN SADDLE horse is a later creation, a combination of the blood of early day Thoroughbreds, Arabians and plantation ancestry. A study of a few pedigrees of these horses will quickly reveal that some branches of the family tree in the pedigrees ran into the factor of the unknown ancestor quite frequently. Thus the American Saddle horse is not a Thoroughbred nor a pureblood horse. The study of pedigrees has resulted in inbreeding and line-breeding to intensify the characteristics an and qualities of some of the more illustrious forebears. In time, this will bring about more uniformity of type and characteristics.

Registration certificates are issued by associations for the Arabian, the Thoroughbred, and the Morgan by associations devoted to their propagation. The Arabian, the only pureblood, is represented in this country by The Arabian Horse Club of America. The Arabian of primary unchangeable type, is bred from the same bloodlines (originating in the desert), in England, Poland, France, Spain, Egypt, Australia and a number of South American countries. Each of the registry associations in these various countries demands unqualified proof of absolute purity of blood back to the horses imported from the desert and authenticate by the oath and seal of the Sheiks of the desert. The Arabian of pureblood, registered in one country, is related to Arab horses in other countries and the horses and their certificate of breeding or registry are interchangeable and acceptable among the various countries and associations. The Arabian is alone in this distinction and honor. The rule of absolute purity of blood has made this possible.

The Thoroughbred of English origin is acceptable for registration in the General Stud Book of England, popularly called “Weatherby’s” after its founder, James Weatherby, when the applicant shows proof of registration of the sire and dam of the foal. About 150 years ago James Weatherby collected the pedigrees of English race-horses, purely as a study and personal enterprise. Breeders of Thoroughbreds were first to make use of the modern form of the pedigree and from this collection of pedigrees the plan developed into registration, officially recognized in England and the foundation of the General Stud Book or Weatherby’s. They have maintained a section for the registration of certain Arabians with the idea that after sufficient development of the pure stock in England it might be of assistance and form a “valuable new line of blood” for the future in revitalizing any strains of Thoroughbreds which might weaken and require revitalizing. It is not designed to improve racing stock, but to preserve it when threatened with decay. So zealously have the English guarded against any possibility of bringing in any new blood for their Thoroughbreds of the original royal mares and three Arabian stallions, other than the Arabians just referred to in the special section for them in Weatherby’s, that they will not accept Thoroughbreds for registry bred in the United States of American origin. When of American origin they are all not entirely of Thoroughbred ancestry, which gives you a practical example of some of the fine distinctions among successful breeders, who, without exception study and know pedigrees of their breed, as a preacher knows his bible.

THOROUGHBREDS in the United States are registered in The American Stud Book, owned by The Jockey Club (New York). Registered Thoroughbreds from England or Europe are acceptable for registration here but as noted, Thoroughbreds of American origin are not acceptable for registration in England because of the unknown breeding back in their pedigrees.

The HACKNEY, originally an English saddle horse, tracing largely to early English Thoroughbreds and Arabians, deserves to be mentioned here in passing, but today is considered a harness show horse. They are intensely line-bred and inbred and to this day are frequently fortified by importations from England.

Associations for the registrations of a number of other types and colors of horses have been formed in recent years. Among them are the PALOMINOS, TENNESSEE WALKING HORSES, PINTO, ALBINO, APPALOOSA, QUARTER HORSE, MOROCCO SPOTTED horse and others.

The PALOMINO is not a breed, but a color of horse only, and until recently color was the primary (if not sole) qualification. In his article in the October 28, 1944 issue of The Saturday Evening Post, “Horse of a Different Color,” Theodore Kesting states, “there is no certain way of reproducing them (Palominos) and quoting him further he states that “Pirate Gold — a magnificent stallion, whose ancestry is 25 per cent Arab, is so prepotent that he has produced Palominos out of a black mare.

It is significant that the most prepotent Palominos have as sire or grand-sire a chestnut Arabian or Thoroughbred stallion. A certificate of registration for a Palomino such as Pirate Gold or others of equal fame does not signify purity of blood or a breed, but a certificate originally based on color, regardless of the breeding origin of the various ancestors.

More recently, a group of breeders of American Saddle horses have formed the American Saddle Bred Palomino association, and will attempt to breed Palominos only from horses registered with the American Saddle Horse Breeders association. The American Saddle horse is so new, as breeds in their making go, and with so many different early horses of unknown breeding origin, that breeders are finding it possible by selection, to produce Palomino colors from the registered American Saddle horse. Thus a Palomino from ASHBA registered sire and dam would mean something entirely different than the certificate from the older Palomino association. American Saddle horse breeders of Palominos, from their registered stock in the ASHBA, can register and sell the offspring that are not Palomino, in the usual manner in which they sell American Saddle horses. Thus, they reason, they will have no off-colored or reject foals from their breeding operations, and the Palomino colored horses with this registration and line of breeding will have more uniform type, action and resulting prestige than Palominos of unknown origin.

The ALBINO is acceptable for registration because of his absence of color and pick skin — not on long authenticated bloodlines.

The QUARTER HORSE bears much the same relationship to the early history of the United States as does the Morgan. The Quarter Hose, so named because he was developed and used to run a quarter mile, was developed from early importations from England — Thoroughbreds and Arabians and possibility some Barb blood from North Africa and Spain. The quarter mile race first became popular in Virginia and the colonies on the seaboard to the south. He represents a very definite, distinct type which breeders today are intensifying and perpetuating by careful study of the bloodlines and pedigrees of their best horses. The Quarter Horse in its inception is as old or possibly older than the Thoroughbred or Morgan in this country and pedigrees in the male line run back many years. Due to the fact that there was no official registry association until quite recently many of the early pedigrees have been lost.

The TENNESSEE WALKING horse and the association devoted to its interests have had as a qualification for registration the way of going and gaits peculiar to this type of horse, most of which claim kinship to the Allan line of breeding. Developments of the gaits have been largely a matter of expert training rather than bloodlines. In the hands of experts, Arabians an successfully competed in the shows with Walking horses of the original Allan lines. Qualifications for registration have been changed from time to time and a certificate of registration does not have the significance of uniformity of type and breeding that it does with the older breeds.

The PINTO and APPALOOSA each have associations devoted to their interest and registration is based largely on color pattern. Some of their breeders have freely advocated the use of Thoroughbred and Arabian stallions to bette type and conformation. In time real progress should be the reward.

The MOROCCO SPOTTED horse is yet another, and the association formed in 1936 was “for the purpose of building up and developing the spotted general purpose horse, suitable for either saddle or harness, a farmer’s horse an and stock horse.” The key horses of the Morocco Spotted were Dessel Day and Stuntney Benedict. Dessel Day was a definitely marked piebald, foaled in 1887 in France, imported to the United States. Stuntney Benedict, a piebald Hackney, was foaled in England, 1900, and imported in 1907. Some of the Moroccos today are intensely linebred in these two key stallions, so we have here another breed in the making with pedigrees forming a more and more important part in the development.