Photo of the Day: Salamie, desert-bred import to Algeria
One more picture of old desert-bred stallions from Algeria, from Adrien Deblaise. This is Salamie. I don’t know his strain, nor his breeder. His name suggests an origin around the steppe area east of Hama, in Central Syria, where the town of Salamie lies, and which is a grazing ground for the Sba’ah, Mawali, Hadideen Bedouin tribes.
The French imported well over a hundred stallions and mares to their studs in Algeria. Not all of these were equally good. Some were outstanding, like Ghazi. Some were average, like Salamie here. He does have a short back, deep girth, strong legs, a nice hindquarter, and a well placed neck. That said, his eyes are placed too high and his head is somewhat plain. The French, who were seeking stallions to produce cavalry horses (typically Arab-Barb crosses) to police their Algerian possessions, couldn’t care less about a good head, although they sometimes imported pretty typey individuals such as Aziz, featured earlier.
Salamie left some progeny at the French government stud of Tiaret, in Algeria. Most notable is his daughter Kabla, out of the Aziz daughter El Kaira. Kabla is the dam of the stallion Bouq (by the desert-bred Hellal), really influential in early Tunisian pedigrees, and the maternal grand-dam of the stallion Fendeq (by the desert-bred El Nil), represented in Algerian pedigrees.
For me a verry good Horse. A war Horse!
He looks like a horse from the old lithographs.
Straight head without a dish, rather coarse.
Such type of horses, but were not sought by the Pshas and Amir ……… such as Nazeer were in demand on the studs of the dukes and princes.