Guest blogger and friend Ambar Diaz in California is now the proud owner of the very pertty Kuhaylah Hayfiyah mare Pirouette (Javera Thadrian x Piquante by Plantagenet), one of the jewels of the Craver breeding program.
It is that season of the year again, and new asil Arabians colts and fillies are being born all around the world. Here is the filly, now two weeks old of Walid Maazaoui’s Tunisian very asil 1992 chestnut mare Ezzina (Chaabane x Ouilayah by the handsome Egyptian stallion Ragheb). Walid is a modern preservation breeder, one of those few like-minded breeders around the world who pay special attention to keeping their horses’ bloodlines pure and protected. He goes to great pains to select the right stallion for his mare, and is now considering a breeding to the Syrian desert-bred stallion Mokhtar, the black Kuhaylan al-Krush, bred by the Shammar Bedouins and now in France. Walid’s mare Ezzina is particular in that she does not have any lines to the now ubiquitous (yet asil) Tunisian stallion Esmet Ali. Note the very close cross to Oramino 1947 (Masbout d.b. x Ramie by El Managhi d.b.), one of Algeria’s last asils.
Adrien Deblaise also sent me this recent photo of another Syrian stallion now in France, Hussam al-Shamal (Ra’ad x Rouba al-Shamal by Al-Abjar), a Kuhaylan al-Nawwaq bred by Saed and Raed Yakan in al-Bab near Aleppo, Syria. Hussam is owned by Damacus breeder Naji al-Chaoui, who has him stationed in France with Arnault Decroix. Adrien has a very nice filly from Hussam that will be featured here next, out a mare from an old asil Algerian line.
French preservation breeder Adrien Deblaise sent me this recent picture of the young Syrian asil stallion Nimr Shabareq (Zaarour Al-Barary x Yamhad by Al-Aawar), a Ma’naqi Sbayli of the marbat of ‘Atiyah Abu Sayfayn, bred by Radwan Shabareq of Aleppo. He is now in France covering mares at Louis Bauduin’s. See how much he’s changed from the last time he was featured here.
Rodger Davis of Desert Bred Arabians and Cindy Stafford, of Freeburg, IL, sent me the above pictures of a gelding they bred, DB Dahman (AHR*576605), out of the mare DB Jasidah by DB Shahhat. DB Dahman is currently owned by Paula Kaigh who has been competing with him an endurance since 2004. He has completed 1,230 endurance miles with a record of 10 first place finishes and 8 Best Condition awards. When they’re not doing endurance, Paula has been training DB Dahman at arena jumping and reining.
This is the well balanced and very correct stallion Saqlawi Jadran stallion Jadib (Ghadaf x Gulida by Gulastra), bred in 1954 by Ellen Doyle, with young Barbara Baird up. He carries ten close crosses to the Blunt’s Mesaoud (through his sons Seyal, Harb, Astraled, Abu Zeyd and Daoud, and his daughter Risala), and it shows.
Almost ten years after I became acquainted with the horses descending from the 1906 importation of Homer Davenport, one of the many things that still astonish me about them is the relatively large number of the grandsons and great-grandsons of *Wadduda (one of the stars of the importation, with *Haleb and *Urfah) who rose to prominence by becoming major breeding stallions at a time when the Arabian horse population in the USA was very small. Here is a list of grandsons: — Antez (out of Wadduda’s daughter Moliah); — his half-brother Dhareb; — their half-brother Mustakim (Oriental x Moliah). — Jadaan (out of her daughter Amran); … and great-grandsons: — Akil (out of *Wadduda’s grand-daughter Sedjur); — Hanad (out of her grand-daughter Sankirah); — Kasar (out of her grand-daughter Fasal); — his half-brother Salan; — their half brother Caravan. Wow. Below is the grear sire Caravan (Ribal x Fasal by Hamrah), at 32.
A few days ago, I began a thread on the early story of strain of Kuhaylan Abu ‘Arqub, as it was mentioned in the ‘Abbas Pasha Manuscript. The information is reconciled from two slightly different sources: first, my notes from the English translation of the Manuscript (a copy of the book is in my father’s library in Beirut); second, from the book “Usul al-Khayl” by Hamad al-Jasir, which contains excerpts of the original Manuscript in Arabic (and a xeroxed copy of which was given to me by my friend Hazaim Alwair). The story of Kuhaylan Abu ‘Arqub involves central Arabian tribes such as the Qahtan, the Bani Khalid and the Mutayr, as well as the House of Saud, who were major breeders of the strain in the 1850s. The Manuscript’s account of the strain stops around this time. There are conflicting accounts of what happened to the strain after that, but what is clear is that the strain reappears in areas of the desert further to the north, with the “northern” tribes of the Bani Sakhr in today’s Jordan and the Hadideen in today’s central Syria. More recently, and according to author Khalid Bakr Kamal in his book “the Arab Horses”…
Bill Biel, the owner of the desert-bred Kuhaylan al-Mulawlish stallion “Mlolshaan Hager Solomon“, told Jenny Krieg that he was open to shipping semen from his 25 year old Bahraini stallion, if his semen actually proved shippable. This is a unique opportunity to breed from the only Arabian horse currently alive in the USA that was actually born in Arabia. Kuhaylan al-Mulawliwsh is known as Kuhaylan Mulawlishan. Photo Jenny Krieg.
I have never seen these two pictures of the Saqlawi al-‘Abd stallion Tripoli (Hanad x Poka by *Hamrah), the foundation sire of the modern Davenport program. Both are from the Davenport Arabian Horse Conservancy website.
When I purchased my first copy of the Abbas Pasha Manuscript, I was surprised not to find a mention of the well-known strain of Kuhalyan Abu ‘Arqub (fem. Umm ‘Arqub). Its absence was particularly puzzling since it was listed as one of the ten favorite strains of the viceroy of Egypt Abbas Pasha Hilmi I. Upon taking a closer look however, I found it, “hidden” under the inconspicuous strain of Kuhaylan al-Fajri, which I had never heard of before. Here is what the Manuscript has to say about this strain of Kuhaylat al-Fajri or Umm ‘Arqub, around 1850, which is when the manuscript was compiled: — it goes back to Kuhaylat al-‘Ajuz, and is ‘to be mated in the darkest night’ (which means that the tribe could use males from the strain as stallions). — it is of a precious stud (or marbat in Arabic). — it is originally of the ‘Abidah sub-tribe of the great Bedouin tribe of Qahtan (where a lot of the best and most ancient strains seem to have hailed from — stay tuned for a list of these ‘Abidah strains). — it passed from the ‘Abidah to a man of the Bedouin tribe of Bani…