The sire of my Mayassah Al Arab still looks good at 26. Photo by his owner Kirby Drennan, in Virginia, IL.
Haykal is my 2015 Ma’naqi Sbayli colt, by Monologue CF out of CSA Baroness Lady, which has one of the breed’s rarest tail female in Asil form, back to Lady Anne Blunt’s Ferida. Both parents went to preservation homes last year, but I regret letting Monologue go so early without leaving more offspring behind, in light of what he has produced. Haykal is for sale, because I need to bring numbers down, keep the fillies (which will have more colts!), and focus on the old American lines. Of the six horses I have bred to so far in this country, he is the one with the best action and disposition. His head and tail carriage and his flying, aerial trot stood out since he was a foal, as has his joy of being alive. He was the one born prematurely, could not stand up on his own, and just as I was ready to give up on him, Sue raised him every two hours for the first three days of his life so he could nurse. Since then he has grown by leaps and bounds, and never ceased to want to remind everyone that he was present. He would make a good riding horse,…
A Syrian friend of mine is doing painstaking, courageous and tireless under-the-radar work tracking the remaining Syrian Arabian horses, identifying them, reconciling their registration markings and imprints with the video or photo evidence, and keeping count of what’s in the hands of thugs and militia groups of all kinds and what remains in their rightful owners’ hands. He operates from a Turkish town near the Syrian border, and spends his days on social media liaising with a broader network of informants in the Jazirah (Upper Mesopotamia part of Syria), the area around Aleppo, and the the Euphrates valley. Sometimes I am tempted to write about the details of what he does, and how he does it, because I am just so proud of him, but I won’t, for his sake and for the horses’. I will however work so he and his network of friends get the recognition they deserve. If there was a Nobel Peace prize for horses, he’d deserve it. Many have died from starvation and neglect, some have been killed, but all hope is not lost. Some lines remain, at least for now. Some of those stolen from the farms and the studs and the backyards have survived.
One feels he can walk right into it.. too bad the mare (“Belle”) is hiding the black filly behind her.
This morning I received my copy of Judi Forbi’s latest book “Ansata Hejazi: Born to Rule” in the mail. It is a tribute to one of the best stallions she ever bred, Ansata Hejazi, a Dahman Shahwan. His owner Mohammad al-Marzouq showed him to me at his stud in Kuwait in 2012, along with more than a dozen of his daughters. I wrote an article in this book upon Judi’s request, about the historical origins of the Dahman Shahwan strain. I showed how it was – by far – the oldest attested Arabian horse strain, and I traced it back to north eastern Yemen in the XIIIth century AD. I also found that Shahwan was an historical figure, a Bedouin leader from the ‘Abidah tribe who played a prominent role in supporting the military conquests of the Rasulid dynasty of Yemen between 1270 and 1290 AD. It is original research based on evidence from three types of sources: a set of four Yemeni chronicles from Rasulid times; analyses of oral Bedouin epic folk tales, consisting of various versions of the “the epic of the Dayaghim” as recorded by Alison Lerrick in Central Arabia and Nino Van Reisen in Jordan in the 1980s, and in Lady Anne Blunt’s Journals from…
March 28 2017 update: he has found a home. More later. Reposting from Aug 2016: I am putting Wadd, my 5 year old Davenport stallion, up for sale. He is the youngest offspring of the grand Triermain CF, out of Wisteria CF, one of the prettiest Triermain daughters and a favorite of Charles Craver. He is a Kuhaylan Haifi by strain, bred within the strain for four generations. His sire was the main Kuhaylan Haifi stallion at Craver Farms in the last period of its activity, as was the sire of his sire before him. He would be best used to perpetuate his breed, preferably within the asil group of horses, including the Davenports, Saud, straight Syrians, North African, Bahraini, Sharps, and other Arabian horses lines that came directly from the Arabian and Syrian deserts. He sired one offspring for me, a filly now two months old, and is an easy breeder. He has a curious and playful disposition. He leads easily but is not broken to ride. For readers from the Arab world where these things matter, almost every one of his ancestors came from the desert with a certificate of authenticity (hujjah) from its Bedouin breeder or owner.…
This is a photo of the 2004 Hamdani stallion Laura’s Major WA, a horse of Davenport bloodlines. A closely bred stallion by Sergeant Major CF out of Miss Laura SHF by Mimic out of Kestrel by Saluation out of Trill by Tripoli. I saw this stallion last summer at the farm of Dawn Woods in Parker, CO. He was bred by Mary Gills from horses tracing to the program of Fred Mimmack. Fred was asking me about this horse, and at the time I did not appreciate enough the combination of power and refinement he exudes. The muzzle is small, the eye placement low, and the eye big and expressive.
Sheykh Tahawi Saeed Mejalli al-Tahawi who is in his nineties was interviewed recently by Yehia Abdel-Satar Eliwa al-Tahawi. The old man, who is the memory of the Tahawi clan of Egypt, told him that the original Kuhayla Khallawiyah mare had come to Shaman Ghumah al-Tahawi from the Mawali Bedouins. I had hypothesized this connection of the Futna line to the Mawali tribe some seven years ago on this blog, here. It is now confirmed. This makes the Egyptian Kuhaylan Khallawi strain of Bint Futna one of the most prestigious strains of Northern Arabia, that of Khallawiat al-Nesswan [“of the women”, not sure why they are called this way]. A branch of the Mawali leading family, the Aal al-‘Aabed, who had settled in Damascus, and provided Syria with its first president, Muhammad ‘Ali al-‘Aabed, owned a Khallawi line that survived in Asil form until the late 1990s, in both Lebanon and Syria. I owned the last such mare in old age. These were quite the race horses. When Ottoman Sultan ‘Abd al-Hamid was on his way from Istanbul to Mecca on pilgrimage, he was hosted by the leader of the Mawali Bedouins near Hama, in central Syria, and presented with a Khallawia mare. In Syria,…
According to their own histories and the reports of British agents, the ‘Ajman are a Yemeni Bedouin tribe with an ancestral homeland around the city of Najran, today in South-West Saudi Arabia, but historically a Yemeni city until 1934. Their parent tribe of Yam still live in the Najran area. They trace further back to the Hashed, the dominant tribal confederation in modern Yemen. The ‘Ajman seem to have moved to the north-east first, to southern Najd around 1720 AD. Captain George F. Sadleir, the first Westerner to cross the Arabian Peninsula from shore to shore, encountered them in Eastern Arabia in 1819, and dated their settling thereto the end or the twelfth century Hijri, or around 1780. Around 1820, the ‘Ajman joined forces with Turki ibn ‘Abdallah, the 5th ruler of the Saud dynastty and the founder of the Emirate of Najd, which was seeking to reestablish control over Eastern Arabia, where the Shiite tribal emirate of the Bani Khaled held sway. In 1823, a large tribal coalition led by the ‘Ajman defeated the Bani Khalid and moved into their Eastern Arabian realm. The battle, known as al-Radhimah, reportedly lasted for three months, and unfolded over four phases: the first pitting the ‘Ajman on their own against the…
In his 1936 book “Rihlah ila Bilad al-‘Arab” about his journey to Arabia in search for Arabian horses, Dr. Ahmad Mabrouk of the Royal Agricultural Society of Egypt mentioned two mares of the Kuhaylan al-Kray strain in the stud of Prince Saud ibn ‘Abdallah Ibn Jalawi, governor of the Eastern region of the then newly established Kingdom of Saudi Arabia [translation mine]: “Krush al-Kray, golden chestnut, no white on the face, pretty head, nice legs but short neck, five years old, her dam the bay Kray, and her sire the bay ‘Ubayyan.” “Bay Kray, white on the hind legs, pretty, eight years old, not to be mated.” This seems to suggest that the strain of Kuhaylan al-Kray (or Karay), was actually an offshoot of the more famous strain of Kuhaylan al-Krush, but was not to be mated for some reason. As I came back from Bahrain where I saw representatives of this rare strain, I dug a bit deeper and found the following in the ‘Abbas Pasha Manuscript, in the section on Kuhaylat ibn Jarshan, the Jallabiyah: “and we [several elders from the ‘Ajman testifying] mated her to Kuhaylan al-Karay, the horse of Ibn ‘Ulbah of Aal Mu’yid of Al ‘Ajman” This reference constitutes…
I met Regina and Warren in Bahrain for the first time, after corresponding with them for seven years. They have been preserving the Dahman strain branch of the original Bahraini mare Sawannah in Germany, with their foundation mare Ghazalah (Ibn Taamrud x DB Jasidah by Desert Jalam) and her daughter Muharraq by Theeb. They also breed a Hamdani strain from Al Kamila (Desert Dhellal x Bint Amiraa). The ancient Dahman strain died out in Bahrain with the death of Dahmeh Umm Wajnah, and is now only represented by a stallion, the last of his line, Dhahmaan Hoobeishi, whose photo Matthias Oster posted below. So the Royal Stud of Bahrain sought a replacement for their lost line, and Regina sent three mares, and now a fourth is on her way. When in Bahrain, Regina was gifted an Ubayyan stallion (photo below, with the ruler’s brother) who will hopefully reach Europe sometime next month.
Zayn al-Khayl, a desert bred Rabdan stallion from the breeding of the Sheykh of Tay, was one of the main stallions in Syria before the war. He was something of a sensation. Everybody wanted to breed mares to him, and his daughters were superb, and correctly conformed as he was. He was standing at the farm of the sons of Mustafa Jabri when ISIS-affiliated thugs came and took him away, along with most of the herd. Later on information filtered that he was kept in an ISIS-maintained stud in Albu Kamal, on the Euphrates valley near the Iraqi border crossing, and that he may have died there about six months ago. I don’t know who took the photo and when it was taken.
In the same vein as this note in 2014: Fadlallah Jirjis, a Syrian Christian from the area of Wadi al-Nasara, and a close friend of Dr. Iskandar Qassis, owned a precious Hamdaniyat al-Simri mare from the Qassis herd. He would never be tired of repeating that she was from the breeding of ‘Ajaj (Ajaaaaaaj as he would say it) ibn Shibib, one of the Sba’ah leading Shaykhs. She was a bay daughter of Sahab, the beautiful bay Ma’naqi Abu Sayfayn head stallion of Qassis; her daughter Zabia, was by Qassis’ other stallion, Kharuf, a Ma’naqi Zudghum. Ma’naqi Abu Sayfayn and Ma’naqi Zudghum are the two most precious branches of Ma’naqi Sbayli, the first from the Fad’an and the second from the Sba’ah.
Suwaiti Mamdooh M671 at the stud of Sh. Muhammad B. Salma in Umm Jidr. From a strain recently received from Saudi Arabia after the original Bahraini line of Suwaitia Kuwaitia had died out. He looks different from the other Bahraini horses. Photos Amanda Jane Smith.
Ubayyaan Azheer M361 at the Stud of Sh. Muhammad B. Salman. Photo Amanda Jane Smith.
Mlolesh Wesaal M654 at the stud of Sh. Mohamed b. Salman. Photo courtesy Amanda Jane Smith.
Putting together information from Judi Forbis’ series of articles “Pearls of Great Price” on Bahraini horses as reproduced in Classic Arabian Bloodstock, with information from Dana Al Khalifa’s introduction to her “Living Treasures of Bahrain”, and comparing these with the current strains existing at the Bahraini Royal studs, one can list the Arabian horse strains lost to Bahrain in the course of the last 80 years: Shuhayban, which is Kuhaylan ibn Waberah (mare gifted to Egypt in 1930s, as reported in Forbis, strain died out before 1970s) Kuhaylan Om Soura (in Forbis, strain died out before Forbis visit in 1970s) Dahman Najib (in Forbis, strain died out before Forbis visit in 1970s) Kuhaylan ‘Ajuz (reported as current in Forbis and Danah, died out before WAHO conference of 1998) Hadban (reported as current in Danah, died out in 1980s) Hadhfan, which is Ubayyan Umm Al-Ardaf (last stallion featured in 1998 catalogue, strain died out in early 2000s) Wadnan (last stallion featured in 1998 catalogue, strain died out in 2000s) Suwaiti (last stallion featured in 1998 catalogue, strain died out of 2000s, replaced with a branch from Saudi Arabia) Krushan (strain died in 1990s or 2000s, replaced with non-asil branch from UK) Dahman Umm…
From Kina Murray: I always find it interesting how much the Bahraini horses, especially the stallions, somehow change when in motion. This is Jellaby Kher, from 1998 WAHO conference visit to Umm Jidr stud.
One of the main reasons why some strains do not appear in the Abbas Pasha Manuscript is that they had not been formed or named yet. One example is Kuhaylan Hayfi in Northern Arabia, and another is Kuhaylan Al-Aadiyat in Bahrain. The latter strain is peculiar to Bahrain, stemming from a Kuhaylah Ajuz of the Bedouin Shaykhs of the ‘Ajman tribe, gifted to Bahrain at the turn of the XXth century. The story of how it was named is told here. Note that both Kuhaylat al-Aadiyat and Kuhaylat Umm Surayyir/Zurayr both came to Bahrain from the ‘Ajman tribe of Eastern Arabia. Lady Anne Blunt already noted the ‘Ajman original provenance of many of the Bahrain strains.
Again, elevating this other quote Laszlo relayed from Valerie Noli-Marais’ 1972 article in Arabian Horse News, because it’s very relevant to the discussion about the pronounced male-female difference in Arabian horses, but also to other earlier discussions on dished profiles: ”The stallions are between 14.3 and 16 h.h., very masculine, short-backed and compact, with long powerful necks, with prominent crests, good withers, broad and deep chests, and tremendously powerful quarters. Top-lines are good and tail carriage is truly magnificent. the legs apart from disfigurement by the shackling,are excellent and dry with large flat knees,short pasterns and large strong hooves… The mares are smaller, 14.2 to 15 hands high, feminine, with finer heads,more to our western taste. Some had quite good dished profiles, although this factor is not mentioned in the traditional standards. When questioned about the “dish”, it was apparent that this was not sought after or bred for, but happened to be present in some horses. It is tolerated in mares but not in stallions.”.. She certainly knew how to identify and describe the good points in an Arabian horse. Her last sentence, about the dish being tolerated in mares but not in stallions, certainly rings a bell, in…
In a comment on an earlier post, Laszlo reminded us of this quote from Valerie Noli-Marais in an article from a 1972 Arabian Horse News issue about the horses of Bahrain: “When a Bahrain Arabian horse is taken off its hobbles and proudly bursts into motion, with mane flying, dark kohl ringed eyes flashing, tail straight up like a banner and arching his long neck, it is a sight to bring tears to the eyes of any horse lover – for truly it is he – the real Drinker of the Wind… The wonderful photos Matthias Oster has been featuring here over the past two days are an illustration of this. So is this photo of Saidan Gharib at the 1998 WAHO conference in Bahrain. One of the things I loved the most about these Bahraini horses is how different stallions are from closely related mares, often their sisters and their mothers. Just as in wildlife, there is a differentiation between the male and the female, which has almost been erased in the show horse. Bahraini stallions exhibit strong primary masculine features like thicker necks, while mares’ neck are much thinner.
I came back from Bahrain with my head swirling with images of desert-bred Arabians, which still look like the way Arabians ought to look like (read: not like China dolls or sea horses or “living art”). One of the strains that survive over there — and nowhere else — is that of Kuhaylah Umm Zorayr, with a precious few mares left at the Royal Stud (below, a yearling from that strain in 1998, second photo credit Kina Murray). In her “pearls of great price” article series, Judi Forbis mentions the strain in passing among the many strains Bahrain had preserved by the early 1970s, but without elaborating further. There is a bit more information on the website of the Royal Stud, which relates the wonderful story of an old black mare of that strain that was first believed to be way past breeding age, but when put back in training in 1969, produced a daughter that carried the line forward. I thought this was all there was. Then, while flipping through the Abbas Pasha Manuscript — that bottomless treasure — I came across “the History of Kuhayla om Sareer”, and Her Name is Dahma”, on pages 580 and 581, and it occurred…
This camel statuette is in the British Museum, and came from the Hadramaut area around 1907. It has a short dedication in Sabean to the god Wadd-Ab, “Wadd is the father”. From the 2nd or 1st century BC.
I finally saw the Arabian horses of Bahrain, those “Pearls of Great Price”, after a 30 year wait. Thanks to Jenny Lees who arranged the private visit to the Stud of the late Sheikh Mohammad Bin Salman Aal Khalifah, we, my father and I, had the privilege of seeing these horses two days before their presentation. In an unforgivable episode of forgetfulness, I only brought my camera phone, the battery of which died after snapping photos of the third stallion. The others are in my head, just like hundred of other horses seen but not photographed. Most impressive among the horses of the late Sh. Mohammed was a grey Hamdani (no photos). An older Rabdan, a chestnut Sa’eedan, a grey Tuwaisan, a grey Shawafan, and a dark chestnut Radban, many of these sons of the older Radban. The three below were among my favorites: from top to bottom: a very showy ‘yellow Ubayyan; a very balanced and powerful Jellabi; and a more refined, drier speckled Mlolshaan.
This was taken in 1980 or 1981, near the town of Rayak, in the Biqa’ valley of Lebanon. Rayak, more specifically the village of Hawsh Haala, outside Rayak, was where we put our horses. We had a partnership with the Hindi family over the horses, since the time of my grandfather, Edward Al-Dahdah, in the late 1920s. The young man holding me is Shafiq Hindi, a longtime family friend, who had taken over the partnership after the passing of his uncle Subhi Hindi. The mare, the mare, was my father’s all-time favorite, Zanoubia (III). A mare of great style, refinement and beauty in her heyday, gazelle-like, from an noble, prestigious and storied origin, and a notoriously difficult producer. She was born in 1976, by Ash-hal, a Kbayshan, out of Bint Wazzal, by Wazzal, a Ubayyan, out of Su’ad, by al-Jazzar, a Kuhaylan Nawwaq, out of Umm Mash’al, by Ghazwane, a Kuhaylan al-Kharas out of a ‘Ubayyah, by a Saqlawi al-Aama (the blind), out a ‘Ubayyah by a Kuhaylan Nawwaq out of a ‘Ubayyah Sharrakiyah of the Sarraf family of Ba’albek in the Biqa’ valley, who had obtained the strain from Ibn Thamdan of the Sba’ah ‘Anazah. Another photo of the same mare, ten year after the first…
This Syrian mare bred by Basil Jadaan in 1994 was exported to France at a young age. Photo from owner Chantal Chekroun. Hijab met an untimely death, but leaves behind a son, Manjad Maram Al Baida, by Mokhtar, and a daughter Quokriya Al Shatane, both by Mokhtar, another of Basil’s horses imported to France. Mokhtar if still alive would be 30 today. She was a Saqlawiyah Jadraniyah by strain, from the breeding of Ibn Amud of the Shammar. The pedigree of the maternal grand-dam, here, is incorrect. Marwa’s father was a Saqlawi Jadran and her sire’s dam a Ubayyan Suhayli (branch of Ubayyan Sharrak, originally from the horses of the Sharif of Mecca. Below, her daughter Quokriya Al Shatane, by Mokhtar. Photo courtesy of breeder Chantal Chekroun.
From the Abbas Pasha Manuscript — that bottomless treasure — page 546: “and we mated her a second time to the Hadban horse of Saffuq al Jarba, and he is of the horses of al Jaless of al Kawakibah” Elsewhere in the Manuscript it is recorded that the stud/marbat of Hadban Enzahi of the al-Kawakibah section of the Ruwalah belonged to Nahi al-Mushayteeb of al-Kawakibah, and that it was an old stud. Al-Mushayteeb obtained them from al-Nazahi of the ancient Bedouin tribe of al-Fudul. That Hadban stallion in the testimony was the great-grandfather of a horse that was three years old in the early 1850s. This means that in the 1830s or early 1840s at the very least, there was already a branch of the Hadban strain of the Kawakibah with the Jarba leaders of the Shammar, and that one of the horses of this Shammar branch of that Hadban strain was used as a stallion. Saffuq al-Jarba, nicknamed “al-muhazzam”, meaning “Saffuq of the belt” because he was so warlike that he reportedly never left his military gear, died in 1843. This is very consistent with the testimony of the Jarba leaders of the Shammar in the mid 1980s about their prized Hadban strain…
When I started this blog, more than eight years ago, it was out of a need to connect American breeders and lovers of desert Arabian horses with facts, stories, and like-minded people from the rest of the world. I believe this task has now largely been fulfilled, not necessarily by this blog, but mostly by the advent of social media tools that connect people across the globe. With the endless loss of life, heritage, culture and horses engulfing the Middle East — Syria, Iraq, Yemen, others maybe soon — I have been feeling the increasing need to switch gears and reach out to those who live in the cradle of the Arabian horses, especially the youth. Amidst these tragedies, those who are normally the reference and the source of the knowledge, expertise, tradition about desert horses, and the original source of the horses themselves, are at risk of losing faith in what they have and in who they are. So pervasive is the influence of Western lifestyles, media, ideas, so overwhelming is the destruction of ancient centers of knowledge, tradition and culture — including about Arabian horses like Aleppo, Homs, Mossul, Sanaa, so large is the flow of refugees who lost everything, that the time has come…
Coat colors in old Arabic treatises on horses pose a big challenge not just because of their sheer number — close to a hundred — but also because they do not follow quite the same pattern as color coat definitions of Arabians in the west: grey, chestnut, bay, and black. I having been trying to look for an internal logic to color classification by the ancient Arabs and Bedouins for some years now. I am now certain of a few color correspondences. One of them is ablaq (feminine balqaa), and its roan. It’s defined in the old Arabic dictionaries as the appearance of white hair in any other coat color which does not fade as the animal ages (ie, grays). It’s also further qualified by the base color: so you have “ashqar ablaq” which is the equivalent of a chestnut roan, or a “kumayt ablaq”, which is a bay roan. Then you have different types of “ablaq”, depending on which part of the body the roaning occurs.
I had never seen this photo of Beteyen Ibn Mirshid of the Sbaa Bedouins before. It is apparently featured in Von Oppenheim’s book. Can anyone confirm? He was the owner of Queen of Sheba, of the Blunts.
This is with respect to the discussion on the color “yellow” in Arabian horses in the preceding entry. This mare (Pirouette CF) would qualify as “yellow” in Bedouin parlance. This is confirmed in old Arabic dictionaries (“Lesan al-Arab” which dates back to the 14th century AD), and also by Tweedie and Raswan.
Kirby Drennan owns this beautiful in Virginia, IL. He is by Pageant CF out of Anthesis, and a half brother of Lexington CF, below. PS: Everything out of Anthesis CF is outstanding, including Fragrance CF at Michael Bowling’s, Chancery CF with Debbie Jessen and Firebolt CF, also with Kirby.
There are only four mares and filles from the *Nufoud tail female accounted and all are in PA. Linda Uhrich owns AB Dafinah (HHA Manabi x LD Rubic), and Monica Respet owns her daughter, Niina Nufoud. Then there is “Belle” and her daughter Barakah, with me. Jadah Necessity, 1997 gm, is unaccounted for, last with Randal and Mary-Sue Harris in IL. MSF Rubie, 1993 cm (EA Salute x LD Rubic) is I think still with Pam Baker in SC, but she has never had a foal, and is now 23.
Kim Davis bred his superb Kuhaylat al-Krush yearling filly of Davenport bloodlines. She is by by HH Tantalus Krush (Quantum LD x Kashmir Krush LD) out of HH Nadira Krush (RC Janub Krush x Naufali Al Krush). She has 14 crosses to the original desert import Kuhaylat al-Krush *Werdi, and 10 out of 16 ancestors at the fourth generation. If she looks that great at this growthy stage, I wonder how she will look like when she matures fully. I had already written about her when she was born.
From the same Billy Sheets photo collection as the ones in the entry below. I don’t think these had ever been published before.
These are from the photo collection Billy Sheets gave me. For more on this 1960 stallion, click here. Maybe someone can find more about Khalid Hamid al-Dawsari who was living and working in al-Khobar in the 1960s.
I am very proud of this 16 year old mare, which I acquired about a year ago. She is having some trouble conceiving but we will be working on that over the coming year.
I have been trying to get a photo of him. He was Miqhim Ibn Mhayd’s slave and one of his most trusted men. Following the relocation (exile?) of Miqhim from Syria to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in the late 1950s, he acted as Miqhim’s agent to acquire several hundreds of desert bred horses, mostly mares, and mostly from the ‘Anazah but also from other Bedouin tribes, as gifts to Saudi royals and other senior officials. As distressed ‘Anazah Bedouins from Syria gradually moved south to Saudi Arabia, they sought public sector and military jobs, registration and immigration documents, and various social and resettlement benefits in their new home country. They were eager to obtain the support and good will of Saudi officials and members of the royal family, and through Miqhim and his sons, presented them with their best mares. This explains the influx of hundreds of Bedouin mares in the Saudi royal studs in the 1960s. Several dozens of these mares found their way to the Saudi Arabian Studbook, where they were registered as “desert bred”. Back in Syria, Farhan al-Olayyan gained increasing influence with the ‘Anazah who had not left yet, to the point of speaking in the name of Miqhim and his sons.…
One of my favorite Davenport mares, based on photos I have seen, and on liking her two brothers: Pomp Charbonneau and Firebolt CF. Photo Christine Emmert.
The handsome 2005 stallion Chatham DE (Huntington Doyle x Gulida Tara DE by Maloof Najid), photo from DeWayne Brown.
The sweet Juans Aana (El Reata Juan x Suuds Juli Aana), a Ma’naqiyah Sbayliyah from the line of Haidee, 26 years old this year, left to what seems to be a good retirement home yesterday. I kept her 16 year old daughter which I still hope to breed this year. If it’s a colt, I will keep him as a stallion. There is nothing better than a Ma’naqi stallion for breeding. I say this, but Hakim ibn Mhayd also said it and wrote it to Davenport, and he knew what he was talking about.
Here you really see the Crabbet influence from his dam blending with the blood of his paternal grandsire Regency CF.
Pedigree here. She is six generations removed from the original desert import *Nufoud from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
I am in absolute awe of DeWayne Brown’s young Ma’naqiyah filly, DaughterofthePharaohs, a.k.a. “Pippa” (Chatham DE x SS Lady Guenevere by SS Dark Prince), photo below by DeWayne. She is a throwback to the old Crabbet type of a hundred years ago. She has crosses to three of the four Gulastra descendents in Al Khamsa, namely Julep, Gulida, and Nusi.
Belle (top) looks the most deserty of all my horses by far, and has the longest ears, Jamr (middle) has the crested neck of his Crabbet ancestors, and Wadha has the most “classic” head and largest eyes of the three. And there is only so much a smartphone camera can do.
This serves mostly as a note to myself: I found an intriguing reference to Farhan al-‘Olayyan in a Syrian hujjah of a horse born in the mid 1980s. I had long thought that Farhan al-‘Olayyan, a former black slave who had acted as an agent of the Saudi royal family for the purchase of hundreds of desert horses from Syria, was active in the 1960s and the 1970s, but this reference extends his activity up until the 1980s. It is from the hand of ‘Aissa al-Sallal, a stallion owner (in Arabic “hassan”, in french “etalonnier”), and in it he mentions that his main stallion, a Kuhaylan al-Khdili bred by Omar al-Huwaydi al-Mishlib, of the ‘Afadilah tribal Shaykhs, was bought by Farhan al-‘Olayyan for expert to Saudi Arabia, but had already sired a Ma’naqi Sbayli stallion in 1984. This is really interesting, and potentially establishes a connection with the horses registered in the Saudi Studbook and know to be coming from “the north”. Worth digging further.
My Syrian friend Radwan — one of the persons from whom I keep learning — told me that desert mares from the Ma’naqi strain were characterizeda, among other features by long ears, large and long mouths that ran deeper into the muzzle than horses from other strains, and horizontally placed eyes, more so than horses from other strains whose eyes were parallel to the axis of the head. This was in connection with a discussion of the precious desert Ma’naqi Sbayli strain known as “Ma’aaniq al-Tanf” (after their location at the Tanf desert border crossing between Syria and Iraq) or “Ma’aaniq Abu Jarn” and its tracing to the Black Marzaqani (al-Marzaqani al-Adham), the famous Saqlawi stallion of the Maraziq of Shammar later owned by Alaa al-Din al-Jabri in the 1960s. These are the horses of ‘Affaat al-Dbeissi of the Fad’aan, a precious marbat which Jean-Claude Rajot and other French and German purists visited in the 1990s in the Syrian Desert (Jens Sennek has stories about that visit to them in his awesome book), but the Syrian Studbook does not show that the line actually traces to the Black Marzaqani. The old chestnut Ma’naqiyah mare which Ibrahim Khamis of Hama owned in the early 1990s…
Ahmad Saffar from Bahrain told me the other day that wealthier Bahrainis from the ahali — the population, so not royals — kept marabet of Shawafan and Wadhnan until the 1970s, when they turned to Thoroughbreds and part bred Arabs for racing. They had obtained these strains from Southern Iraq — presumably the area around Basra and al-Zubayr.
I never believed straight profiles were a defect. Most of the desert Arabian horses I grew up with in Lebanon and Syria had straight profiles. Very early on, I found that quote in Lady Wentworth’s “Authentic Arabian Horse”, perhaps taken from Lady Anne Blunt’s unpublished manuscript; it echoed what I was seeing and learning about around me: “A straight profile should not be a defect if the forehead is very broad, the eyes placed low and very large, and the muzzle small” I would add deep round jowls and prominent facial bones to this description. Together, a deep jowl, a small muzzle and a broad forehead form a head with a triangular shape in both the profile and the face. I am actually striving to breed an Arabian horse with all these characteristics, to make the point that the resulting outcome is an attractive, even “classic” head. Jamr’s head, below, approaches this description. The jowl is unbelievably large, and the muzzle is small. The eyes are placed low, but they are not large (a legacy of his maternal grandsire Dib). The facial bones are somewhat apparent but the face will be drier with age. The overall shape of the head…
This time it was hard to grab good shots of my young stallion Jamr, who kept prancing. His hindquarter is shaping into true old Crabbet style, and each time I see him he looks different. He is 43.5% old Crabbet lines, his dam was double that percentage.
This young filly is the happy outcome of a sustained preservation effort of the Kuhaylan ‘Ajz line of *Nufoud, and of the small number of Arabian horses without Crabbet bloodlines. Her name means “divine blessing”. May she be blessed and continue this precious line of royal horses. Her dam Jadah BelloftheBall (“Belle”) was rescued several years ago by Jeannie Lieb, who drove to Colorado to pick her up after the previous owner had fallen on hard times. Upon seeing her, my father, who was here visiting, told her she reminded him of the daughters of the great asil Lebanese stallion Machaal. He was very fond of these. I will breed her to a stallion from Saudi lines next time.
Jackson Hensley sent this photo of his stunning Monologue CF son, Inaam Al Krush. I had seen him a few months ago, and liked him, but he looks even better in this photo. Reminds me of that iconic photo of Kuhailan Haifi O.A. That Monologue CF, I should have bred all my mares to him.
Wadd, who is now five years old, is maturing into a handsome, masculine stallion in the line of the Kuhaylan Hayfi sires of Craver Farms. He is more reminiscent of his grandsire Javera Thadrian than he is of his sire Triermain CF. Large eyes, broad forehead, prickled ears, bony face, arched neck, curved throat, short back, deep girth, broad chest, sloped shoulder, silky hair, fine skin, solid tendons, short cannon bones, high tail carriage, and good movement. I would have preferred a deeper jowl, a longer hip and a straighter croup, but I can live with that, because when moving the slightly droopy quarter does not show. His daughter has both his many qualities and his few shortcomings.