I finally found a couple good photos of Marwah, the Saqlawiyah Jadraniyah of Ibn Amud. The top photo was taken at the entrance of Basil Jadaan’s old farm. Marwah was sired by the grey Hadban Enzahi of Fazaa al-Hadi al-Jarba, the son of the old bay Hadban Enzahi of Fazaa. Both Hadbans stood in Garhok in North Eastern Syria, and were widely used by the neighboring Arabs. She was small, but otherwise impossible to fault. Her croup and hindquarters were among the best I have ever seen in desert-bred Arabian horses. NOTE: Please, if you feel the urge to share on social media, link to the entire blog article, but don’t download and share as if the photo were yours. I don’t want Facebook to own these photos or others.
Both taken by an unknown photographer at the old farm of Basil Jadaan. He had a lot of style, and when ridden, he would prance sideways rather than walk straight. Critics would fault his sinuous, snake-like middle of the body, but he did not transmit that.
The more time passes, the more I cherish those precious few horse photos that also happen to show a glimpse of the people around the horses. I used to believe that good horse conformation shots should not show the handler, and certainly not the people in the background. When they did, I would relentlessly crop the people out. I now realize that the people, some of them now gone, are an integral part of the story the photo is telling. Below, a filly at Mustafa al-Jabri’s farm in 1993, with Radwan Shabareq and Kamal ‘Abd al-Khaliq standing in the background, and me sitting on the grass. My father wanted to buy the filly, and took many photos of her. Below, a youthful Chris Bauduin on Murad Hadiya in 1994. In the background, from left to right, Jean-Claude Rajot, myself in the green jacket, a lady whose name I forget and Louis Bauduin near Nemours, France. Below, my father standing near his beloved Ubayyan Suhayli stallion Dahess, then standing at the Jabri farm outside Aleppo in the mid 1990s. And below, me taking notes behind a young Jabri mare whose name and strain escapes me now. Either a Hamdaniyah or a…
I spent the morning digging through old photos, which also bring back stories. I like this photo so much. It features a Tai Bedouin horse breeder, Muhammad al-‘Abd al-Sulayman al-Rhayyil, putting one of his toddler sons on his Saqlawiyah mares near Al-Qamishli, North Eastern Syria. The photo belongs to the sons, now grown men in their thirties and fourties. I believe it is from the early 1980s. The mare is a Saqlawiyah Jadraniyah from the breedeing of al-Rhayyil. He or his father obtained what would have been the granddam of this mare in 1952 from the family of the Shaykh of the Tai, Abd al-Hamid (a.k.a Hamid) al-Talal al-‘Abd al-Rahman. The latter got the line from the family of the owner of the marbat, Hasan al-‘Amud, the Shaykh of the ‘Amud section of the Northern Shammar. According to ‘Abbas al-Azzawi (in his encyclopedic book “The Tribes of Iraq”, in Arabic), who quotes the Shaykh of the ‘Amarat Bedouins Mahruth ibn Haddhal, the ‘Amud had obtained the prized original mare in war from the Frijah section of the Ruwalah. This piece of information makes this line one of the most authenticated Saqlawi lines in the desert, because the Frijah are the…
The first one was taken at the desert festival of Palmyra in the mid-1990s, so before its destruction by ISIS. You can see Mobarak in Bedouin gear, standing by one of the tower tombs (now destroyed), next to a female performer in traditional Bedouin costume. The second photo was taken at Basil’s old farm in the suburbs of Damascus. It is now the site of a hotel. Both photos belong to Basil Jadaan and were first published on Hazaim Alwair’s web page, now defunct.
Christine Emmert is a great photographer of horses. She took this photo of Bonnie Duecker’s Davenport gelding Mai Raisuli (Indie Star x Pretty Fancy by Lysander). You see the resemblance with Anita Westfall’s iconic photo of Lysander (below): the ears, the jaws, the forehead.
They are from Basil Jadaan’s pre-war breeding. I believe, but I am not sure, that the one to the right is Yaqut, a daughter of Marwah, a Saqlawiyah Jadraniyah. The one to the left would be Bent al-Sham, but I forget who her dam was. Professional photo by Rick Van Lent, for Basil, who gave it to Hazaim, who shared it with me. Marwah’s lineage somehow survives in France today. Qokriyah El Shatane, by Mokhtar out of Hijab, by Ward Al Mayel out of Nisreen, by Mobarak out Marwah, still lives.
Latif is best known as the sire of Denouste, and as such a premier French racing sireline. I had written about him here, some ten years ago.
The 1987 Hamdani ibn Ghurab Mobarak was Basil Jadaan’s foundation stallion. The photo was taken at Basil’s farm, and first published online by Hazaim Alwair. I first saw Mobarak at the farm of Hisham Ghrayyib in Damascus as a three year old. He had come a few days before from his native Shammar Bedouins, and was on his way to Basil Jadaan’s farm. Mobarak was not without defects, but he had such style, such fine skin and such desert looks that it was impossible not to be smitten by him. He did not walk, he pranced, sideways. He oozed Arabness.
The 1983 stallion Mas-huj stood at the farm of Basil Jadaan near Damascus for one season, when this photo was taken. Basil gave a copy of the photo to Hazaim Alwair who published it online for some time. Mas-huj was from the city of Hama, from an old lineage of Ubayyan Sharrak tracing to the Sbaa tribe. I remember Mashuj well, from seeing him in Hama year in year out during the late 1980s and early 1990s at the farm of Fuad al-Azem. His sire was a Saqlawi Jadran of Ibn Zubayni from another old Hama lineage (that of the family of al-Khani). He raced in Beirut under the name of Zad al-Rakib. My father recalls seeing him — the Saqlawi — pull a cart on the streets of Beirut in the early 1980s after his racing career was over. I was in the car apparently but too young to remember.
At the old farm of Basil Jadaan near Damascus. Note the short back, the strong coupling, the arched neck, and the huge eye. The overall balance. Stare at him: he is a concentrate of Arabness.
The findings of recent genetic research by Dr. Barbara Wallner on the sire lines in Arabian horses is likely to cause a lot of stir in the Arabian horse world, from racing “industry” circles to purist ones. The research points to, among other findings, English Thoroughbred ancestry in the sireline of the Saudi/Qatari stallion Amer. Amer was the most successful sire of “Arabian” racehorses of his generation. The information is part of a larger study titled “The horse Y chromosome as an informative marker for tracing sire lines”. It shows the y chromosome in Amer’s offspring displaying the same unique genetic mutation that characterizes the offspring of the English Thoroughbred stallion Whalebone. This mutation is not present in the y chromosome of other English TB male descendants of the Darley Arabian. The Darley Arabian is the sireline for Whalebone, and the main foundation sireline of the English TB breed overall. This means that the face-saving argument of “both Amer and Whalebone/Darley trace to an Arabian horse sire line” does not stand. Many purist breeders must feel so vindicated. I do, for one. Thank god for genetic advances, and for the freedom of expression in some countries that allow such studies…
A recent entry on this blog witnessed a discussion between two French breeders on the notion of “le sang” as applied to Arabian horses. I would like to come back to it, as I believe it to be fundamental to understanding the kind of Arabian horses this blog advocates. This notion is not well captured by the literal translation of the French term “sang” as “blood”. It is not about purity of blood, nor is it about bloodlines. A closer English approximation is perhaps “stamina”. Robert Mauvy offers the best definition, in my opinion (in French, followed by Mr Google’s version): “Le sang! Ce mot en matière hippique ne désigne nullement ce liquide de vie qui anime celle des êtres vivants; ce muscle liquide qui amène a l’organisme les éléments nutritifs et ramène les déchets de cet organisme, non! L’expression hippique “sang” résume, dans un tempérament nerveux, sanguin au paroxysme — le concentre d’énergie, de force, de solidité des tissus, de densité des os, de résistance a toute épreuve, de volonté et de courage. Le cheval arabe de sang pur est l’expression la plus haute du “sang”. C’est lui le “sang”! The “sang”! This word in equestrian matters does not…
A thought had in passing the other day: one notices a significant increase in the use by French and other European horsemen of the term “Nedjdi” (among other spellings) in the first decades of the XIXth century, to refer to some Arabian horses. I believe this increase was probably associated with the influx of Bedouin tribes, mostly ‘Anazah, from Central Arabia (Najd/Nejd/Nedjd) to Northern Arabia that was taking place around the same time. The first decades of the nineteenth century were indeed the time when the Ruwalah, under al-Dray’i ibn Sha’lan, the Fad’aan and other ‘Anazah tribes migrated to the north. In doing so, they came in contact with the Ottoman centers of Damascus and Baghdad, and with other Bedouin tribes already present in the area. People in these urban centers and Northern Arabian Bedouins alike must have referred to the new arrivals and their horses as “Nedjdi” — the ones from Nedjd. What I believe this means — and here lies the crux of my argument — is that the “Nedjdi” horses are essentially the Arabian horses of the ‘Anazah gone northwards. In the North, they would have been contrasted with Arabian horses maintained by the Northern Arabian tribes…
Mardschana Bint Mahra traces tail female to the Dahmah Shahwaniyah mare Malacha, foaled at the EAO in 1955, and imported to Germany with her dam Moheba (pedigree here). Moheba, like Marbach’s other EAO Dahmah Shahwaniyah import Nadja, traces tail female to Farida, the 1921 daughter of Nadra El Saghira; Moheba descends from Farida’s daughter Ragia (by Ibn Rabdan), while Nadja traces to Bint Farida (by Mansour). Photos shared here by kind permission of Oliver Seitz. Mardschana’s dam Mahra is a daughter of Malik El Nil, who traces tail female to the mare Bint Karima, whom Edouard has written about before.
The previous post triggered some memories, which I am eager to put in writing so they don’t vanish — especially as my father, now 86, cannot be persuaded to write his memoirs. Starting from the mid-1980s, my father, General Salim Al-Dahdah, would regularly take me with him to the Beirut racetrack, l’Hippodrome du Parc de Beyrouth. He was a longstanding member of the board of the racetrack’s supervising organization, the Societe pour la Protection et l’Amelioration de la Race Chevaline Arabe au Liban (SPARCA). Henri Pharaon had founded SPARCA in the 1920s and had led it most of his life. He also owned the largest number of racehorses at any given point in the racetrack’s history. Other notable SPARCA members and large owners included Moussa de Freige and Saudi Royal Prince Mansur ibn Saud. I only have faint memories of my earliest visits to the racing stables of Henri Pharaon and Moussa de Freige in the mid 1980s. These involve prancing horses, slender grooms, heaps of alfalfa, white plastic chairs, tea cups and endless conversations between adults, with their dose of foul language. They also involve sounds of neighing, horse farts, horses nervously pounding the metal doors of their boxes…
Just a note to say that the author of one of the obituaries of Henri Pharaon (1901-1993) in the Independent is wrong about him hailing from a Triestine family. The Pharaons are originally from Damascus, and one of their branches emigrated to Egypt then Trieste, which was then the only outlet of the Habsburg Empire on the Mediterranean Sea. Indeed a reader issued this correction: MAY I add to Professor John Carswell’s evocative memories of Henri Pharaon (10 August, further to the obituary by Robert Fisk, 7 August)? writes Rosemarie Said Zahan.Pharaon did not come from an old Triestine family which had emigrated to Egypt. The family came from the Bekaa in Lebanon, but one member, Antoun Kassis Pharaon, emigrated in the middle of the 18th century to Egypt, where he soon rose to become the substantial figure of Customs Master (Le Grand Douanier). He strongly advocated the Red Sea overland trade route from Europe to India via Suez (long before the canal was built), and in so doing, was helpful to many European traders. In 1784, he left Egypt and settled in Europe where he was given the title of Count of the Holy Roman Empire. His descendants are…
A previous entry by Kate McLachlan on the modern descendants of the Weil Stud foundation mare Murana I led me to the family of Cassis-Faraone of Trieste. Murana I was acquired in 1816 by Baron Fechtig for Weil by way of the port of Trieste. Some of Europe’s most illustrious foundation Arabian horses were associated with Fechtig: Tajar, Bairactar, Murana I, Warda, Koeyl, etc. But who was he? Lets pin down some places first: Weil was the royal stud of the King Wilhem I of Wurttemberg (1781-1854), whose capital was Stuttgart. Trieste, now in Italy, was at the time the main port of the Austro-Hungarian Empire on the Mediterranean sea. The trade of Austro-Hungarian Empire with the Orient, including Egypt and Syria, went through Trieste. Baron Ferdinand Fechtig Von Fechtenberg, the son of a senior magistrate in Vienna of same name, became a merchant when he married Teresa, daughter of a wealthy merchant from Trieste, Antonio Cassis-Faraone. This marriage marks the beginning of his trading association with the Orient. Antonio Cassis-Faraone was born in Damascus in 1745, the scion of a Greek-Catholic (ie, Melkite) family of traders. This is the same family as that of Henri Pharaon, who played such…
In 1955, the filly Nadja was imported to Weil-Marbach alongside Hadban Enzahi. Bred by the EAO, she was a daughter of Nazeer out of the mare Nefisa (pedigree here). The mares in this post all trace to her through her daughters Noha and Nabya, both sired by Hadban Enzahi. Photos shared here by kind permission of Oliver Seitz.
Daughter of the Pharaohs, aka “Pippa”, the 2015 Ma’anqiyah Sbayliyah filly I leased from DeWayne Brown, is confirmed in foal to Tamaam DE for March 2020. I am very much looking forward to this foal, whatever its gender. Terry and Lyman Doyle brought me the good news.
Excerpt from an Art Newspaper article: The Arab Image Foundation, Beirut’s pioneering non-profit archive of Middle Eastern photography, has launched an online platform that makes 22,000 images from the collection accessible and searchable for the first time. The foundation’s building, which has been closed to the public since 2016, will also reopen this summer, a spokesman says. I haven’t looked, but I hope there is something about Arabian horses there.
Photos shared here by kind permission of Oliver Seitz.