Announcing Zalfa Al Arab, 2019 Hadba Enzahi filly
This morning Carrie Slayton announced to me the birth of a filly out of her grand old broodmare RL Zahra Assahra (Portent x Antezzah by Grand Pass).
She is to be named Zalfa, with the suffix Al Arab. Zalfa means “the one who draws near” in Arabic. That’s because she came from so far away, and just about everything about her was far fetched. I am so excited about her.
Notice the low set eye, the deep girth, the far-extending withers, the short back and the croup typical of this dam line.
I obtained her elderly dam from the late Marilyn McHallam, at her farm dispersal, and had her brought from Canada to California. First to Northern California, where she was bred to Michael Bowling’s Latitude but did not take. Then to Carrie Slayton’s in Southern California, who first boarded her for me, then asked me if she could have her, and if I would take a filly from her. Carrie bred her to Porte CF (Portico x Recherche), for three close crosses to the grand Portia, and other crosses further back.
A colt would have remained Carrie’s, and Carrie will get, if she wants, the first filly from this filly. She is a ray of hope for the Hadban Enzahi strain in Davenport Arabian horses.
In the uninterrupted female line, this filly is the daughter of the daughter of the daughter of the daughter of the daughter of the daughter of the daughter of *Hadba, the war mare of the Shammar Bedouin leader ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan al-Jarba, who was killed by an Ottoman militia force sometime in the late 1890s. The mare was acquired by Homer Davenport who imported her to the USA in 1906, 113 years ago.
Congratulations! What a journey Zahra went on, to produce Zalfa! May she be everything you hoped from this breeding.
Oh how fabulous! I do love her generous white, and those grey goggles are pretty striking. Congratulations, Edouard, and Carrie, thank you so much for all your hard work with this mare. Getting a live foal on the ground is an achievement in and of itself! <3
You deserve some good horse luck, Edouard, and I am glad that Carrie, Zahra and Porte could give it to you! May Zaifa live long and be a fertile war mare for you.
Congratulations!! Davenport Hadban Enzahi, very cool. Jeanne I know it was a long time ago that Homer Davenport stated that the Hadbans had very good angles, but still I have to ask Edouard is that what you meant when you pointed out,” the short back and the croup typical of this dam line.”
It would also be very cool if you could get a colt so you preserve these genes, and he could be frozen too.
best
Bruce Peek
Awesome and very special little girl !! Congrats again
“*Hadba, the war mare of the Shammar Bedouin leader ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan al-Jarba, who was killed by an Ottoman militia force sometime in the late 1890s.”
Sorry Edouard, but that’s an anachronism. *Hadba wasn’t foaled until circa 1900. She couldn’t have been the war mare of a man who died in the late 1890s.
Hi RJ, that she was his war mare is a fact, referenced in her hujjah. That he died in the last years of the 1890s decade is conjecture, based on my recouping events. By the start of the 1900s decade, the Ottomans’ struggle with the Jarba Shammar had already come to an end.
The Arabic (front side) of the hujjah does not mention a birth date. The English version (back side) says she was six in 1906. My sense is that she may have been older by three to five years.
RJ and several of us were just discussing the date issue with *Hadba. The hujjah doesn’t mention a date, does it, Edouard? Perhaps her foaling date of c1900 is off?
I don’t dispute that *Hadba was a war mare. Davenport’s catalog gives *Hadba a birth date of 1899, while the stud book has 1900. So the date I concede is an approximation of within a year or two.
What the hujja actually says, per your own reading Edouard, is that *Hadba was taken from Ujaybil Ibn Zaydan Shaykh of Shammar. That Ujaybil is a misspelling for ‘Ajil might well be right, but that is only your own speculation. Nothing in the hujja says *Hadba was actually ridden in war by Ujaybil, whoever he was. The hujjah does name two owners in between Ujaybil and Davenport who could have ridden her in war. We know someone did. And pushing *Hadba’s date of birth back to the early or mid-1890s is stretching the facts to fit a narrative that is already speculation.
RJ, your reading of the hujjah is literal. The convergence of evidence goes beyond speculation:
1) What you read is a first attempt to write the name as (‘)-J-Y-B (‘Ajib), then an (L) was added at the end of the name, on top of the B to correct the name, resulting in (‘)-J-Y-B-L (‘Ujaybil or ‘Ajaybil), a name that does not exist, and does not go back to an Arabic root. It would be like someone writing your English first name as Roberft. A correction to take out the F and read Robert jumps out readily.
2) ‘Ajil (root ‘-J-L) is a name specific to the Jarba family of the Shammar (like Louis for the Kings of France). There was indeed an ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan Al Jarba, Sheykh of Shammar, who was involved with the Ottomans in an episode of violent conflict. His close relative Samir ibn Zaydan Al Jarba appears in the Abbas Pasha Manuscript as one witness at majliss so was alive ca. 1850. Try translating the first entry on this link to a Shammar discussion chatroom, from the top, for the story of this ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan: http://www.allshmr.com/vb/archive/index.php/t-42064.html, if Google Translate or an Arabic-speaking acquaintance of yours can manage with the Bedouin dialect.
Or let me translate it for you. The title of the thread reads: “short story about the Shaykh ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan al-Jarba”. Then the first entry, by someone writing under the nickname “Sinjar” and published November 13, 2009, reads:
[ ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan al-Jarba; ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan had deeds against Ottoman forces; a large force of Ottomans surrounded the Shammar camp, they sent the Shammar someone who spoke Arabic, who told them: “You are surrounded, either you surrender ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan to us or we overtake the whole camp; ‘Ajil was told (ie, by his men): “Hide from them! Run away from them! God will take care of us”; ‘Ajil said: “How can the camp be overtaken because of me?” and he recited a verse by poet Radhan ibn ‘Anka (i am not translating the verse here). Then he told them (ie, his men): “I am bidding farewell to you and I am not coming back, don’t take to the wastelands”; and ‘Ajil went off and surrendered to the Ottomans to spare the camp and was executed.]
3) The other two people mentioned have names of sedentary people, not Bedouins. One is specifically referred to as Hajj, not a Bedouin title, and as Sheikh of Sfireh, which was a Circassian settlement. The Circassians were settled by the Ottomans on the fringes of the Northern Syrian desert including Sfireh after their and their Chechen brethen’s Caucasus exodus in the 1870s. The objective of settling them there was to police the Bedouins. Read Norman N Lewis’s book: https://www.bookdepository.com/Cambridge-Middle-East-Library-Nomads-Settlers-Syria-Jordan-1800-1980-Series-Number-9-Norman-N-Lewis/9780521103275
3) The English version says: “The mare was taken in war from the Shammar”. This means that it was ridden and owned by a Shammar when it was taken. The Arabic hujjah uses the verb “akhadha”, meaning “to take forcibly”, or “to confiscate” in referring to the action taken by the two people between Davenport and the original person the mare was associated with, ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan Sheykh of Shammar. This means it was not their mare originally, but that they took it from him.
4) The Jarba Shammar still own the strain.
Bottom line: the English version says the mare was “taken in war from the Shammar”; the Arabic version and the convergence of information above point to the original person it was associated with (before the two middle people and before Davenport), ” ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan Sheykh of Shammar”, actually being ‘Ajil ibn Zaydan al-Jarba Sheykh of the Shammar, killed by the Ottomans in an episode of violent conflict.