Who was the George O’Brien who imported *Munifeh and *Munifan from Saudi Arabia in 1947? Was he a US politician? or an ARAMCO executive?
Folks from the Jazirah area of Syria have been sending me pictures and stories of horses that remain there. This beauty is one of them. I also saw pictures of other gorgeous horses of the Rabdan, Rishan, Saadan, Jilfan and Khallawi strains. You would be stunned. It would seem like the Bedouin’s pool is bottomless, despite the civil war including the most recent Turkish attack on these specific areas.
Another surprise from this past week’s visit to my horses was little Barakah (Wadd Al Arab x Jadah BellOfTheBall). She is now three years old. I left her a little filly. She is now a young mare who cycles and all. She measured at just above 14 hands, which is a good size for this age. She has a deeper girth than her dam and a straighter back. That’s her sire Wadd’s influence. But she lost her dam’s beautiful level croup and inherited instead her sire’s short slopey croup and short hip (which Wadd in turn inherited from his dam Wisteria CF). She also has attitude, unlike her dam. She may outgrow some of that, and still has a lot of growing to do.
In other news, Monologue CF is back home in Pennsylvania, after spending several months at Laura Fitz in Michigan. Two of her mares are in foal to him for this spring. Laura took great care of him, and he has never looked better in many years. This horse has been moved around so often over the years, and it has affected him. Born at Craver Farms in Illinois in 2001, he was bought by Jackson Hensley then of New Mexico, then went to Pamela Klein in Virginia. Pamela gifted him to Darlene Summer. We took him back to Craver Farms, before shipping him to Pennsylvania. From there he gave him to a promising preservation breeder from Ohio where he was unlucky, so we took him back. Laura Fitz then took him on and brought him back in shape. Here is a shot taken off the fly by Sheri of JNS Equine Transport, who transported him back from Michigan to Pennsylvania. His eye is huge and bright, his neck is long, his shoulder has a good slope, his croup is level and his tail is set very high. He throat has a clean arch, and his nostrils are large and elastic.…
Last Thursday, I managed to take a day off while in the US for work and drove out to Pennsylvania to see my horses. I had not seen them in a year. I feel terrible about that. The young ones have grown so much. Jamr, at seven, is now a fully grown stallion. He certainly IS small. We measured him at 13.3 1/2, just under 14 hands. I am not a fan of 16 hands Arabians, but under 14 hands is too small for my taste. I am more than 6 feet tall. His neck is also too short. Or the withers are pushed forward and eating at the neck. The crest is nice through, and so is the arch of the throat. He has other qualities: he looks very masculine; his back is short, his hip is long, his girth is moderately deep, his coupling is strong, his chest is broad enough and his jowls are very deep. His eyes are expressive and soulful, without that troubled, anxious expression of some show horses. His profile is very straight, but he makes it up with a broad forehead, deep jowls and a fine muzzle. His ears are short, which is…
If only I did not have enough horses, the Kuhaylah Hayfiyah filly ADA Tharwat al-Awdah (Porte CF x Pirouette CF) would have found a way to my barn.. Photo by Michael Bowling.
I am irked that we still know so little about this horse. We know his color (chestnut), his name and his date of birth (1885). I also read somewhere that he was thought be a “high caste Arabian”. Probably a race horse, or an army horse. Probably exported from Basrah, or Kuwait to Bombay. Bombay/Mumbai may have kept customs documents. The British army too, perhaps. We know a lot more about Lord Herbrand Russell, 11th Duke of Bedford, who brought him from India to England in 1892. He served in Egypt in 1882, which is probably why he gave the horse this name. Mameluke sired the mare *Shabaka for another important Englishman, Lord Arthur Cecil. Shabaka was imported to the USA by Spencer Borden, who bred her influential son Segario. My 2013 mare Mayassah Al Arab is the last living Al Khamsa horse tracing to him. If a stallion is ever to rise from Mayassa’s line, I better start finding more information about Mameluke. India is the right place to start, but where in India?
I am back in Washington, D.C. for a few days. How I miss that place, especially in the fall season. I biked by the statue of General George Henry Thomas on the circle that bears his name. I wonder which horse served as a model for this statue. It looks nice, but certainly not as nice as Ibrahim Pasha’s equestrian statue in downtown Cairo. Now that’s a horse I would have liked to have seen. He must have been belonged to the collection of Viceroy Mohammad Ali.
Bev Davison posted these photos on Facebook. They feature the white belly spots of DA Ginger Moon (top) and her full sister DA Moon Sister (bottom). This follows an intense discussion on this blog about extreme white markings.
and Ginger is still wonderful. What a grand broodmare she is. Neck, hip, withers, ears, and what style on top of that. Jabbar is also a very good sire, and I think he deserves to be used more. Photo by Bev Davison who keeps her for me. I always quote this passage from Lady Anne Blunt’s Journals, on March 15, 1887, about her selection criteria when purchasing new horses: “He [Zeyd] is to be very particular about plenty of bone, height of wither, length, of course everything else perfect and origin mazbut.
This is Nahaab, a yearling born March 2018. I just love the “son of the desert” look and feel on him. The level croup. The high set tail. The authentic lineage. He looks like he came straight out of a black tent of Arabia. He would be a good match for my Kuhaylat. Might even help preserve their desert bloodlines. (Just messing with you, in case you were still wondering) For comparison, this is Najm Yarob, the Syrian stallion of Jose Manuel Meizoso in Spain. I just love the “son of the desert” look and feel on him. The level croup. The high set tail. The authentic lineage. He looks like he came straight out of a black tent of Arabia. He would be a good match for my Kuhaylat. Might even help preserve their desert bloodlines. Some “Arab” horses have diverged so much from the original desert horse that it is high time to recognize they have become a separate breed. That applies to horses of the extreme race type as well as horses of the extreme show type, regardless of pedigree.
Thanks for Kate for sending me this beautiful video.