Month: July 2017

I will never, ever tire of watching that mythical photo of the Kuhaylan Haifi stallion, Monsoon (Tripoli x Ceres). Thank you Anita Westfall, for taking it. My Thalia (Javera Thadrian x Bint Dharebah by Monsoon) is a Monsoon granddaughter.

This week, my beautiful Ginger (DA Ginger Moon) left for Idaho, on lease to Bev Davison. She will be missed, but I could not give her the chance she deserved over the past three years, for lack of a suitable stallion, and competing breeding projects (and programs). Her 2015 miscarriage after a successful breeding to the aged Bahraini Mlolshaan stallion in Michigan still haunts me. Bev will attempt a breeding to Buckner (photo below), on lease from Rosemary, Terry and Lyman Doyle, and then to one of her handsome Babson-Doyles, if all goes well. Buckner is double Greggan and double Subani, and it does not get better than that!

This beautiful photo of Pericles appeared on Facebook yesterday, courtesy of PG Gregory.

So much has been said about the five lumbar vertebra of the Arabian horse. Many authors still mention it up till now. But History and science reject this assumption. This feature was described by Auguste Rochau, then by his pupil André Sanson. Both of them were French veterinarians in the second half of the nineteenth century. This is a summarized translation of what Sanson said on the topic : — The aryan horse, with a straight frontal bone and rectilinear nose bones and six lumbar vertebra is from Asia. — The mongolic horse, with a convex profile and nose bones and five lumbar vertebra is from Africa.  Here under is the translated text of Sanson ( extract from Denis Bogros’s book) [Both brachycephalic, one has a flat frontal bone, rectilinear nose bones and six lumbar vertebra in the spinal column, with seven cervical , eighteen dorsal and five sacral. The other has a convex or rounded frontal bone, slightly curved nose bones, and only five lumbar vertebra, and seven cervical vertebra, eighteen dorsal, and five sacral;  and this one’s lumbar vertebra are not only different from the others by their inferior number, but they differ also by their transverse apophyses’s shape…

One of Hungary’s veteran Asil Arabian horse breeders, Laszlo really needs no introduction. Laszlo owns and edits a horse magazine owner and editor Lovas Nemzet, an historian of the breed, and a believer in the universality of Asil bloodlines. Suffice it to say he owns some of the last lines to Babolna’s Siglavy Bagdady VI and 25-Amurath Sahib, and the very last line to Abbas Pasha’s Selma that runs through Musgrave Clark’s Courthouse Stud, and that he has been successfully breeding them to some of the best Egyptian lines in addition to the Davenport bloodline of Delicate Air.

It is an honor for me to publish my thoughts and my experiences on the Daughters of the wind Blog from time to time. At the same time an honor and pleasure  knowing and learning from  the opinions of other people about our beloved Arabian horse. One of my experiences about the Arabian horses was a film from Bahrain. A long time ago, at the turn of the millenium, in 1998 or 1999 I received it as gift from a German friend, Jens Sannek. The film was made by an Austrian breeder,  Anton Tucek in 1985 (!). Today I learned that Anton Tucek died in 2004. I spoke with his very kind widow, who agreed to let me publish the recording. Anton Tucek was a breeder of Asil Arabian horses. I’m sorry I didn’t know him personally, but I knew about his horses. He imported two stallions from Bahrain in the 1980’s. One of them was Sarhan, whose 26-year-old son (out of an original Iranian mare) is still living, now owned by the family. It is not easy to identify the horses in the film. I only can guess the names of someone, but I hope there are people who knows them exactly. I…

This beautiful lithography of some of the stallions imported by the famous greek dealer Nicholas Gliocho in the 1820’s can be seen at the Tylers Museum in Netherlands and online here

Le débat autour de l’origine exacte et de la genèse du pur sang arabe date approximativement du XIXème siècle, en Europe du moins. L’hypothèse d’une origine purement arabe suppose l’existence d’un cheval préhistorique local dont descendrait presque sans changement le pur sang arabe actuel. Carl Raswan entre autres défendait ce point de vue. L’autre hypothèse rejette l’idée d’un cheval arabe préhistorique et situe l’arrivée du cheval dans la Péninsule arabique sous forme domestiquée très tardivement , vers le premier siècle après JC. Les premiers chevaux de par leur rareté auraient eu un statut prestigieux, semi divin, avant d’être utilisés pour la guerre ou la chasse. La croissance des effectifs, très lente, est évaluée à travers des inscriptions détaillant le nombre de fantassins, chameliers et cavaliers ayant participé à des batailles antéislamiques. Christian Robin et Saud Soliman Theyab ,(chevaux et cavaliers arabes, ouvrage collectif) résument ainsi une énumération d’inscriptions découvertes au Yémen et dans le Hadramaout :”Cette longue récapitulation n’est pas sans intérêt. Au Ier siècle les chevaux se comptent en unités; au IIIème siècle c’est par dizaines; enfin au IVème siècle c’est par centaines. Le cheval, très rare en Arabie méridionale au début de l’ère chrétienne, devient relativement commun trois…

A veterinarian by training who worked with Veterinarians without Borders in the Sahel, Yassine Jamali now breeds Arabians, Arab-Barbs and North African greyhounds (Sloughis) at his family farm in central Morocco, on the banks of the Oum er Rabiaa river. I have been enjoying and appreciating Yassine’s online contributions on the breeding of Arabian and Barb horses and Sloughis for many years now. His thoughts on function driving form in conformation and temperament, on the breed’s adaption and resilience to evolving market needs, and bringing equine history to bear, resonate with me. I am excited at the opportunity to share them with you here.