This very old mare is a Kuhaylah Trayfiyyah from the Middle Euphrates valley in Syria, near the small town of al-Mayadin. This area general is home to the tribe of al-Aqaydat (Ageydat), a wealthy and powerful semi-nomadic tribe of cultivators and small herders whose Shaykhs obtained a number of really good desert-bred mares in the first part of the twentieth century, sometimes through ghazu (raids) and sometimes through purchase and gifts. They bred these mares well, and protected them by using only asil stallions, and hence came to own reputalbe marabet. Today some of the prettiest and typiest Syrian horses came from these Ageyday marabet. One of the most well known Aqaydat marabet is that of Kuhaylat al-Trayfiyyah, which is an old strain the history of which I don’t know well. All I know is that it might – just might – derive its name from Matarifah clan of the ‘Anazah tribe. The strain is mentioned in the Abbas Pasha Manuscript, in connection with events that took place in Eastern Arabia, either in Bahrain, Qatar or the al-Ihsaa region of Saudi Arabia. The Kuhaylah Trayfiyyah is the photo was not registered in the WAHO Syrian Studbook and I don’t know the reason. Perhaps…
Ghuzayyil was a famous desert-bred horses from Syria, whose bloodlines are present today in a number of modern pedigrees from Syria, including that of the stallion Hussam al-Shimal now in France. This is his entry in the Aldahdah Index: GHUZAYYIL: a grey desert-bred stallion, born c. 1952; [no picture available] Strain: Saqlawi Nijm al-Subh, of the marbat owned by the Maraziq clan of the Shammar tribe, also called Saqlawi Marzaqani. Sire: Hamdani al-Jhini a Hamdani Simri of the Shammar tribe, a celebrated horse among the Bedouins, sometimes simply referred to as al-Jhini; sire of sire: Hamdani Simri of Shammar, known as al-Malkhukh, also a famous horse; dam of sire: Hamdaniyat al-Jhini of Shammar; Dam: a Saqlawiyah Marzaqaniyah, from the Maraziq clan of the Shammar tribe. According to Fawaz al-Rajab, a horse merchant from Hims, who told Hazaim al-Wair, who told me, the dam of Ghuzayyil and the dam of Mawj al-Athir were maternal sisters. Racing and Breeding Career: Ghuzayyil raced in Beirut starting in 1956, in the ownership of the Marquis Musa de Freije and won at least eight races (he is recorded as having won eight races in one of my notebooks, based on notes I took from one of…
Ghaddar is another desert-bred race-horse mentioned in the newspaper clipping below. He was racing at the same time as Mawj al-Athir. The Aldahdah Index happens to have an entry on him as well, with all of the information coming from old horse merchant Abd al-Qadir Hammami. GHADDAR: a gray desert-bred asil stallion; Strain: Hamdani Simri of the marbat owned by ibn Ghurab, also called Hamdani Ibn Ghurab; bred by ‘Ajil ibn Ghurab. Sire: al-Marzaqani al-Adham, “the black Marazaqani”, a Saglawi Marzaqani bred by the Shammar and later taken by the ’Anazah; Dam: a Hamdaniyah ibn Ghurab of Ibn Ghurab of Shammar. Racing and breeding career: Ghaddar raced successfully in Beirut in the 1950s, where he won 14 races. Races were held on both Saturdays and Sundays at that time, and Ghaddar was one of the very few horses that were entered and won races on two successive days. He was later used as a stallion. He died within the first year of his breeding career, and only left a few produce, and none of them have left lines today.
If you follow this blog regularly, then you must have already heard about the chestnut desert-bred stallion Mawj al-Athir: he is in the pedigree of the bay stallion from Syria, Hussam al-Shimal, now in France. He is also the sire of the pretty mare below, whose photo you have already seen before. Joe Achcar also scanned and sent this old Lebanese newspaper clipping from Nov. 11, 1954, which has a picture of Mawj al-Athir on the racetrack, with the mention, in French: The “strongest horse of the Middle East”. Note the mention in the clipping of two other desert-bred asils, about which there will be more on this blog, soon: Chatt el-Arab and Ghaddar. Now here is Mawj al-Athir’s entry in the ‘Aldahdah Index’: MAWJ AL-ATHIR: a chestnut desert-bred Asil stallion [photo available]; Strain: Saglawi Nijm al-Subh, of the marbat owned by the Maraziq clan [or guild] of the Shammar tribe; the strain is also called Saqlawi Marzaqani. Sire: a Saqlawi Marzaqani; according to Abd al-Qadir Hammami, an old horse merchant from Aleppo, his sire was al-Marzaqani al-Adham (“the black Marazaqani”), a celebrated stallion of the Saqlawi Marzaqani strain, bred by the Maraziq clan of the Shammar tribe, used by them as a…
I wish to thank Troy Patterson for sharing with me this rare picture of the asil stallion Zairafan (Alwal Bahet x Maarah by Taamrud), from Mrs. J. E. Ott’s breeding. Zairafan is a Ubayyan whose tail female goes back to the mare *Mahraa, bred by Prince Saud ibn Abdallah ibn Jiluwi, governor of the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, and imported to the USA in 1950. Zairafan is a true son of the desert.
In 1971, H.R.H. Prince Salman b. Abd al-Aziz Aal Saoud, brother of the present king of Saudi Arabia, and then and now governor of the Province of Riyadh (which more or less corresponds to the historical region of Najd), presented the bay Hamdaniyah mare Gazala to a Dr. Klaus Simons of Germany. The latter imported his prized mare to Germany, where the Asil Club accepted her and her offspring, three mares by Farouss (Kaisoon x Faziza by Fa-Turf) and two stallions by Hamasa Arslan (Farag x Shar Zarqa by Negem) Jeanne Craver forwarded me her typewritten hujjah, which is signed by the hand of Prince Salman, and exists in both the original Arabic, and an awkward English translation. Here is the English version as it appears in the original document, word for word (capitals mine): [Printed Letterhead for Prince Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud] To Whom It May Concern We certify hereunder that Gazala is Thoroughred Arabic (Assila), she is of Hamadaniah Kuhaylan family, she is brown colour, white line of the face, white spot on the upper lip, white line between the nostrils, white colour on the lower extremities of the limps. Her father Saker and her mother is…
This striking bay stallion who recently came to France from Syria has already been featured here before. Hussam Al-Shimal is a Kuhaylan al-Nawwaq from the old-established Stud of Saed Aghan Yakan in al-Bab, Syria. His sire is a desert-bred Kuhaylan al-Mussin called Raad who has also received a lot of visibility on this website. Hussam traces to some of the best desert-bred horses that were sent to the Beirut racetrack for racing: Ghuzayil, Mawj al-Atheer, and al-Malkhoukh. More on all three later. You can view Hussam’s near-full pedigree here. Joe Achcar of Lebanon has arranged for Hussam to come to France to be training for endurance racing with Arnault Decroix in Normandy, where these photos were taken by a professional.
This one is Thank Heaven, a 2003 grey mare (by Mlolshaan Hager Solomon x Llanys Winddancer by Ru Serr Llany), owned by Cathie Fye in the USA. As far as I know she is the only progeny of the Bahraini asil (heck, super-asil) stallion Mloolshaan Hager Solomon who has been in this country for 22 years now…
Dick Reed of Toskhara Arabians in Texas shared this photo of the Ubayyah mare *Hamra Johara which was imported by Lewis Payne (pboto) to the USA in 1961. Dick’s stallion Line Dancer, who won 24 races in 30 starts in the USA and the UAE, traces four times to this mare which was bred in Najd, Saudi Arabia, by the House of Saud in 1952. Thanks Dick for sharing this photo and the information on this precious mare.
Recently, Jeanne Craver was able to access the hujjah and supporting documents about the mare *Hamra Johara, a desert-bred Arabian mare imported to the USA in 1961 by Lewis Payne. *Hamra Johara has no asil descendents, unfortunately. Jeanne obtained the documents from Gari Dill-Marlow, who got them from Dick Reed, who breeds Polish Arabians in Texas. I don’t know where Dick got them from. The mare’s hujjah in Arabic, and its very accurate English translation are part of the documents. I am reproducing the English translation here, which was originally done by James C. Stewart, “Acting Translation Analyst of the Translation Division of the Local Government Department and the Arabian American Oil Company [ARAMCO], in the offices of that company at Dhahran, Saudi Arabia”: In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate Village of Khufs Dhughurah, Province of Nejd, Saudi Arabia 6 Rabi’ II 1978 (Corresponding to 20 October 1958) I, the undersigned, Turki Al-Hashishi, a citizen of Saudi Arabia, residing in the village of Khufs Dhughurah, Province of Nejd, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, declare the following to be true: The mare Johara described as chestnut with a white left hind foot and a white stripe from her jibbah…
Lebanese-American Amin Rihani (1976-1940) was a man of many talents. He is best remembered as the man who introduced free verse into Arabic poetry. He was also one of the early figures of the Arab literary movement known as “kuttab al-mahjar” or “writers of the diaspora” to which Khalil Gibran and other Arab-American intellectuals also belonged. He was one of the first intellectuals to support Arab nationalism. He was also a close friend of Saudi Arabia’s king Abdul al-Aziz al-Saud, and wrote a number of accounts of his travels in Arabia such as “Muluk al-Arab” (Kings of the Arabs), which won critical acclaim, and “Tarikh Najd al-Hadith” (the Modern History of Najd). The historians of oil discovery in the Middle East will also remember him as one of the first brokers of the enduring relationship between the House of Saud and the American businesses in general and oil business in particular. It was perhaps through this latter role that he became acquainted with Arabian horses. Rihani was influential in the importation of four Arabian mares bred by the House of Saud and imported to the USA by Albert Harris of Chicago in the early 1930s. He was also a key…
This morning I woke up to find these two pictures of horses from snowed-in France in my inbox.. the first one is from Clothilde Nollet of Maarena Arabians, and features her new acquisition Bint Fay Amy (Mahrouf x Fay Amy by Ibn Fa-Serr), a Saqlawiyah Jadraniyah born in 1995 at the Babson Farm. The second features the stallion Hussam al-Shimal (Raad x Rouba Al-Shimal by Al Abjar), a Kuhaylan al-Nawwaq bred in Syria at the Yakan Stud near Aleppo, Syria, and now on lease from Al Fadi Stud of Damascus, Syria, to Arnault Decroix in Normandy. By the way, Hussam’s ears are a direct legacy of his maternal grandfather, the old stallion Al-Abjar, a Saqlawi Jadran of the marbat of Ibn Zubayni, who was famous for this pricked ears, and whose dam Malakah was featured here. If you have more pictures of horses under the snow from Europe or the USA, feel free to send them to me.
Since the subject entry below was the Dandashi horse breeding clan of Tall-Kalakh, Syria, here is a 1958 YouTube video of Dandashi family members celebrating the union of Syria and Egypt into one single state with horse fantasias and other equestrian games with swords and spears. Note the pretty grey horse from 2.20 to 2.40 PS – the Arabic title of the video mentions the Dandashi clan as a part of the Shammar tribe. That’s a modern fabrication since the Dandashi are known to be Kurdish origin.
My father took these two photos of the grey Lebanese stallion Malek in the mid 1980s, at the farm of Husayn Nasir in Rayak, Lebanon. Malek (Achchal x Bint Ghazwane by Ghazwane) was the last stallion of Lebanese breeding that did not trace to the infamous Iraqi-born part-bred Arabian racehorses thath flooded the Beirut racetrack in the 1950s and 1960s, and ultimately led to the demise of the Lebanese Arabian horse breeding, after they were crossed with Lebanese (and some Syrian) asil Arabian mares. Malek was used mostly on non-asil part-bred arab mares tracing to these Iraqi stallions, and bred only one asil mare: a bay 28 year old Tuwaysah mare from Syria, which we owned and which traced to the horses of the ‘Anazah tribe. That old mare settled, and her daughter was my favorite mare while I was growing up. I recall hearing that Malek ended his life pulling a cart in the northern Lebanon city of Tripoli. His strain was Saqlawi Jadran from the horses of the Dandashi landlords of Tall Kalakh, in Western Syria. This wealthy and powerful clan of chieftains of Kurdish origins, who had the title of agha were the premier asil Arabian settled (i.e., non-Bedouin) horse breeders of Syria.…
Pure Man tells me there is one more horse to be added to the list of desert-bred stallions born in Arabia Deserta, and now in Europe or the USA. This is Jellaby Bin Ambara, a bay 1989 stallion, bred in Bahrain by H.H. Shaykh Muhammad Bin Salman Aal Khalifa, the uncle of the present King of Bahrain. Jellaby Bin Ambara (M62) is by Saidan Lazaz (M29), out of Jellabieh Anbara (M28), and was exported to Austria in 1991. He is AAS*823 in the Austrian Studbook. Not sure he is still alive.
*Samirah is a Hamdaniyah Simriyah from the stud of the House of Saud in Najd, which was imported to the USA by Albert Harris in 1921. She has a very thin line that was the focus of a number of courageous, almost desperate preservation efforts over the last fourty years. The result is that the tail female line still goes on, albeit barely. A first line tracing back to *Samirah through her daughter Koweyt was discussed earlier, here. The second line to *Samirah is through her other daughter Kerasun, by the desert-bred stallion *Sunshine. *Sunshine was also from the Saud studs, and was imported in utero to USA in 1931 by Albert Harris, along with his dam *Nufoud, *Samirah, and two other mares. Kerasun in turn had two daughters, both bred by Albert Harris: Kaleta (by Alcazar) and Karamia (by Kulun, a Kuhaylan al-‘Ajuz stallion from really old bloodlines tracing to *Nedjme). Through Kaleta runs a very thin line high in desert bred blood straight from Najd and the Syrian desert, with the arrows indicating a mother-to-daughter link: Kaleta –> her daughter Faleta (by Ibn Fadl, another Kuhaylan al-‘Ajuz and a son of the desert, his dam being *Turfa) –> Faleta’s…
A friend who is around fifty years old just told me that he used to ride the grey mare who is the grand-dam of the chestnut Abu Junub colt when he was young, and that his grand-father had bought the original Kuhaylat Umm Junub mare from the Bedouins on the basis that she was asil, and on the basis of her hujjah which he said contained the seals of tribal Bedouin shaykhs. He said they had bought the original mare from Ibn Rakhis of Shammar who was settled in Rafha to the north of Hafr al-Batin. He also told me that they will look for her hujjah and if they find it, they will give me a copy. So fifty years ago, the tail female of the few Abu Junub horses now in Saudi Arabia were were with Ibn Rakhis from Shammar.
Footage from Bahrain’s celebrations of Aid al-Adha in 1958. At 00.25, you see the current King of Bahrain, Sh. Hamad b. Isa Aal Khalifah, then aged 8. At 00.10, his grand-father, then ruler, Sh. Salman b. Hamad Aal Khalifah, who passed away in 1961.
I have always felt considerable sadness whenever an Arabian horse strain dies out. With it, part of the rich and colorful history of this breed vanishes forever. I can’t really say why, but to me it feels just like losing the last copy of a rare manuscript. Most of the best-known and most important Arabian strains are still represented today in asil form, and we are lucky to have them. A number of really significant ones were lost in Arabia Deserta over the last fifty years. These include Kuhaylan Tamri (known to US breeders as the strain of the Davenport import *Houran), Kuhaylan al-Kharas (the strain of the Blunt import Proximo), Kuhaylan Harqan (the strain of the grandsire of the Ali Pasha Sherif stallion Mesaoud) and Kuhaylan Om Soura. Until last week, I thought Kuhaylan Abu Junub was one of these. Kuhaylan Abu Junub is a strain I have always been interested in. There are some indications it is somehow ‘related to’, in a way I am not yet in a position to explain fully, to Ma’naqi, Jilfan, and Frayjan, all of which are ultimately Kuhaylan branches as well. It is on the list of Abbas Pasha’s ten favorite strains,…
Blog reader Elena Latici who lives in Italy recently bought this young fellow from Louis Bauduin’s farm in France. Murad Mandour (by Shuayman El Badawi x Murad Ouffah Habib by Jahir) is a bay Shuwayman Sabbah yearling who combines modern desert-bred blood from Syria (through his paternal grand-sire Mokhtar, bred by the Shammar Bedouins) with older desert-bred blood through imports Tunisian/ Algerian bloodlines. He also carries a hint of old French blood, and has a distant line to the desert-bred import Nibeh, featured here, and whom French master-breeder Robert Mauvy really liked. Mauvy was a big advocate of the idea of re-invigorating old European Arabian bloodlines with fresh desert-bred blood at leart every three generations, as as to sustain the physical and mental characeteristics of the Arabian horse of Arabia Deserta. Mauvy’s friends and students adhered to this theory early on, and bred some of their mares to desert-bres stallions such as Mokhtar, and now Mahboob Halab.
Yesterday night there was a fascinating one hour program from 2.00 am to 3.00 am Mecca time on the first Channel of Bahrain TV on the Bahrain horses and their history.
One more picture of Omar Anbarji’s now deceased desert-bred Kuhaylan al-Musinn stallion Ra’ad, this time by a professional photographer. I think this is the fourth picture of him I post. I would like to familiarize readers with the foundation stock of the Syrian Arabians, because I feel they will become more and more significant in the future. You have already seen pictures of some of the most influential Syrian Arabian stallions, many of which are personal favorites: Ra’ad, a Kuhaylan al-Musinn; al-Aa’war, a Hamdani Ibn Ghurab; Mubarak, another Hamdani Ibn Ghurab; Mokhtar, a Kuhaylan al-Krush; Marzuq, a Ma’naqi Sbayli, etc. Look them up in the search function of this blog on the right hand column, and you will see the relevant entry with their photos. Ra’ad was bred by Jamal al-Turki al-‘Ilyu of the Saw’an clan, which is the leading clan of the settled, part peasant, part sheep-herding tribe of al-Sabkhah, on the banks of the middle Euphrates. Jamal’s family also bred Ra’ad dam Nawal al-Kheil, and her grand-dam as well. The Sabkhah, who occupy the area of same name (click here to see it on Google Map) are themselves part of the larger peasant confederation of the Bu Sha’ban.…
I took this photo of the venerable Malakah in 1990, at the stables of Syrian breeder Salih Khaddam al-Sruji, south of Damascus. She was more than 30 years of age, which explain why her croup and legs look the way they do. Malakah was bred by the Mudarris family, an old Alepine – ie, from Aleppo, Syria – family of great social standing and influence. The Mudarris family owned one of the most famous city marabet of Saqlawi Jadran ibn Zubayni, which the ‘Anazah Bedouins from the area around Aleppo recognized as ‘mazbut’ (well-ascertained, well-authenticated). I have Malakah’s hujjaj somewhere and will need to dig it up for you to read. There is a very thin tail female line to Malakah left in Syria today. That said, Malakah’s blood is mainly present in Syria through her son al-Abjar, who was standing at the Yakan studfarm in al-Bab, north of Aleppo. Many people in Syria thought that Malaka’s was the only line of Saqlawi Jadran ibn Zubayni left in Syria, and this is certainly how the Syrian Studbook presents it. Fortunately, there is at least one other equally mazbut line of Saqlawi ibn Zubayni left there. That’s the line of Mabrouka, a Saqlawiyah Jadraniyah…
Click here for an informative article on the Jordanian Bisharat family, by one of its scions, George Bisharat, a professor of law at Hastings College in San Francisco. The article appeared in a political journal, and is not concerned with Arabian horses but it nonetheless offers interesting background information about the Bisharat family, which may be of interest to those of you who breed Arabian horses of Egyptian lines. The Bisharat family is a Christian family of merchants and entrepreneurs, orignally from the area around the palestinian city of Nablus. Like several other palestinian christian familties, the Bisharat moved to the eastern bank of the Jordan river at some point in the late 19th century, and settled the area of al-Salt and then moved to the south of Amman. They rose to economic and social prominence in the first part of the 20th century. At some point in the 1940s, a member of the Bisharat family, Shibli Bisharat (who may or may not be the Shibli mentioned several times in the article), sent three horses as a present to King Faruk of Egypt. Two of these, the mare Badria and the stallion Besheir (also known as Besheir El Ashkar) left modern descendents, and famous…
Amr Allah al-Hafi is my three year old stallion of my breeding, a desert bred Hamdani Simri, sired by al-Sarim (#1820 in the Saudi Arabian Stud Book) and out of al-Majmulah (#3164 in the same).
Don’t know who took this beautiful, sweet, human-like picture of the Hamdaniyah Simriyah mare Fragrance CF, bred at Craver Farms in Illinios, and owned by Michael Bowling of California, but the photographer was certainly inspired. I just couldn’t help stealing the picture from the Davenport Conservancy website. Fragrance traces to *Galfia, imported to Chicago by the Ottoman Hamidie Society in 1893, but otherwise descends from horses brought from the Syrian desert by Homer Davenport in 1906. To learn about the horses of the Hamidie Society, click here.
In 1931, Chicago businessman Albert Harris imported four desert-bred mares from Arabian ruler Abd al-Aziz Ibn Saud with help from the Lebanese poet Amin Rihani. The mares were obtained through Mohammad Eid al-Rawwaf, Consul of the Sultanate of Najd and Hijaz in Damascus (this Sultanate would take the name of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in the following year, in 1932). Thee of the four mares left asil descendants here in the USA, and two of these have tail female descendants: *Nufoud and *Samirah. *Nufoud’s descendants, which include some of my favorite horses here in the USA (that is, LD Rubic and Belladonna CHF) were already featured in an entry sometime last year. Let us talk about *Samirah’s here. Two of her daughters left asil progeny: Koweyt by Alcazar, and Kerasun by *Sunshine, the latter being *Nufoud’s son, imported to the USA in utero. The mare Koweyt produced a daughter, Konight, by the Kuhaylan al-‘Ajuz stallion Kaniht (Katar x Niht). Kaniht in turn produced the mare Amira Moda, by a Kuhaylan al-‘Ajuz from another line: Fa-Turf (*Fadl x *Turfa). According to the Al Khamsa Roster, there are only three asil mares left from this branch of the *Samirah’s family, all…
Click on the YouTube link below to listen to a story and poem (in Arabic) about ‘Arar ibn Shahwan, the original owner (ra’i) of the marbat of Dahman Shahwan. The audio was prepared by Sa’d al-Hafi al-‘Utaybi. ‘Arar is the from the very noble and ancient Dhayaghim clan of the Abidah section of the Qahtan Bedouin tribe. The poem records an episode of the Dhayaghim saga, when this clan and others left their original home of Wadi Tathlith in Southern Arabia after a sequence of severe droughts, and moved northwards to settle in the mountains around the central Arabian town of Hail, which were then inhabited by Tai tribes and were known as Jabal Tai. There the Dhayaghim and other southern clans merged with some Tai tribes to form the core of the Shammar confederation, which gave Jabal Tai it’s new name: Jabal Shammar. By the way, the Ibn Rashid ruling clan of the Shammar of Jabal Shammar traces to the Dhayaghim clan.
Joe Achcar recently circulated the following list of stallions imported by the mission of Mr. de Portes to the Syrian desert in 1819. The list comes from the book written by the veterinarian of that mission, Louis Damoiseau, which appeared in 1832: Abou Far, Abou Arkoub, Abjar, Abou Seif, Berek, Cheleby, Choueyman, Bedouin, Daher, Aslan, Addal, Sakkal, Haleby, Tadmor, Saraf, Ourfali, Hachmet Bey, Meckawi, Orkan, Gazal, Massoud, Mahrouk, Hadji,Richan, Medani, Durzi, Effendi, Diva, Kebeche, Hadeidi, Houteif, Munki, Mahama, Frigian, Drey, Kelle. All these stallions were apparently imported from the Anazah tribes. The list is interesting because at least six of these stallions (Abou Arkoub, Choueyman, Kebeche, Richan, Munki, Frigian) carry recognizable strains names, which means that these strains were well-established at a relatively early date. Of course, the most famous stallion of this importation was Massoud, who contributed significantly to the founding of the Anglo-Arab race.
This morning Troy Patterson of Texas sent a few pictures of a yearling colt of his. The colt is by the Ubayyan stallion Zairafan (Alwal Bahet x Maarah by Taam-Rud) and out of the Canadian-bred Hamdaniyah Simriyah mare Saideh (Bahri x Qaisumeh by Qaisum). Below is one such picture. In the USA and Canada, these horses are called BLUE STAR (with the caps). While I don’t adhere to this denomination (BLUE STAR = no recorded Ma’anaghi strain in the pedigree), and don’t buy into the underlying assumptions (e.g., recorded Ma’anaghi blood = not pure) behind such a denomination, I love these horses, and value them for what they are: real horses straight from the heart of Arabia Deserta, straight from the stables of the House of Saud. The antecedents of these horses were in their original desert homeland as late as the 1960s. I feel that horses such as this yearling would bring new strength and stamina to many of the older lines of asil Arabians (e.g., the Egyptian lines).
Above is a distant photo of another son of the desert-bred Kuhaylan al-Musinn stallion Raad. This is Hussam al-Shimal, a Kuhaylan al-Nawwaq stallion from the marbat of Sa’ed Ameen Yakan, in al-Bad, north of Aleppo. Hussam is going to be sent to France where he will stand at stud with Arnault Decroix. I am no fan of the show-ring. I firmly believe that an asil Arabian horse was not born to be paraded around like a puppet, and that among all asil Arabians, the Syrian asil horses deserve this ridiculous treatment the least (these were war and endurance machines, remember), but I thought it was worth noting that Hussam, this son of a desert-bred, was twice Syria’s National Reserve Champion.
Note again the huge expressive eye, the big jowl, the tipped ears, and the small muzzle. All that in a desert-bred stallion. I will dig his hujja out and translate it for you.
To follow up on the earlier entry on the desert-bred Kuhaylan al-Musinn stallion Raad, here is a picture of one of his sons and one of his daughters at the Anbarji farm some seventeen years ago. The colt, either a Kuhaylan al-Khdili or a Hamdani al-Ifri by strain ( I don’t remember, even though I am in the pic), was recovering from an illness, and the photo is not to his advantage, but you will no doubt notice the refinement that his sire Raad transmits, as well as the fine muzzle, the deep jowl and the big eye. Note also the dark, full bay color which Raad passed on to his progeny. The filly is a Hamdaniyah Ifriyah (a well esteemed branch of Hamdani Simri from the ‘Amarat Bedouins, more on it later), and in my opinion, is the epitomy of refinement and feminity. I don’t recall her name either, but Omar Anbarji, her breeder, can perhaps refresh my memory. Omar, you were standing behind my father who took the picture..
Blog reader and friend Omar Anbarji of Aleppo, Syria, sent me the following picture of his foundation stallion Raad, a desert-bred (yes) asil Kuhaylan al-Musinn, born in 1982, and now deceased. Raad was bred by Jamal Turki al-Saw’an, out the mare Nawal al-Kheil, and traces back to the famous marbat of Ibn ‘Amayir of the Fad’aan Bedouin tribe. Back in the early 1980s, Omar’s father, civil engineer Munir Anbarji, was working on projects in the Syrian desert. He purchased this young Kuhaylan al-Musinn colt to use on his desert-bred mares. The handful of Aleppo horse breeders who cared about asil arabians at the time knew that this colt, Raad, was of mazbut (authenticated) origin.
I just got word that two asil mares of the Kuhaylan Hayfi strain, from the horses tracing to the desert-breds imported by Homer Davenport to the USA in 1906, were exported to the United Arab Emirates. Both are now owned by Mohammed Bin Humooda of Al-‘Ain, UAE. They are Affinity CF (Javera Thadrian x Audacity) bred by Craver Farms and Jadah Beshan (Baile La Bamba x Cinnabar CF) bred Randall and Mary Sue Harris. Mr. Bin Humooda already owns a number of asil Saqlawi Jadran horses bred by the Doyle family, as well as an asil Hadban Enzahi stallion bred by the Dirks family who is being used in endurance racing. This exportation is encouraging news for the asil Arabian, and a sign of Arab breeders’ emerging interest in old USA-bred, asil bloodines. May there be more of these. Below is a picture of Audacity, Affinity’s dam, and another of Javera Thadrian, Affinity’s sire, with Nancy Becker on top.
Below is one of the first photos I took, at age 12 in 1990 or 1991, with my father’s Nikon. The mare in the picture is Tahirah, then a 25 year old ‘Ubayyah Sharrakiyah from the marbat of the Saffaf family of Hama. Hama is an ancient city in central Syria, just west of the Syrian desert, and as such was the main marketplace for the Sba’ah Bedouin tribe, which was famed for its many marabet of ‘Ubayyan Sharrak (‘Ubayyan al-‘Awbali, ‘Ubayyan al-Usayli’, Ubayyan Ibn ‘Alyan which by the way is Queen of Sheba’s marbat, ‘Ubayyan Ibn Thamdan,’Ubayyan Ibn Duwayhiss, ‘Ubayyan Labdah, etc). The Saffaf family were in close business contact with the Sba’ah Bedouins, from whom they obtained a number of desert-bred mares. One of these mares was Tahirah’s maternal grand-dam, a chestnut ‘Ubayyah Sharrakiyah, bred by Ku’ayran al-Amsa’, a Bedouin of the Rasalin section of the Sba’ah tribe. She was by a famous Ma’naghi Sbayli stallion, then the herd sire for the Rasalin section. Tahirah’s sire was a Kuhaylan al-Krush, also from the Saffaf family, who owned a Krush marbat as well. Her dam’s sire was a Hamdani Simri, also from Hama. Tahirah has many of the features…
Don Hernan Ayerza, a well-to-do Argentinian landowner imported desert-bred Arabian horses from France, Hungary (Babolna) and the UK (Crabbet) into his El Aduar Stud. He also went to the Middle East (but not the Arabian desert itself) and bought a number of Arabian horses from there. He also bought two stallions for his friend Leonardo Pereyra. I leave you to ponder this quote about the reliability of hujaj (authentication certificates), from a letter Ayerza wrote to Pereyra, quoted from “the Crabbet Heritage in Argentina” an article by Mary Lockwood in the the Crabbet Journal – Winter 2006 No. 7: “I am sending you the only kind available in all Arabia and anyone who says he has a legal certificate, like the ones used in Europe, lies! I’ve insisted on being shown something with every horse I inspect and they jot down more or less whatever occurs to them at the moment of sale in front of witnesses. I have seen over 500 such ‘certificates’!” Hmmm.. lets debate that one over the next few days..
In the 1990s, Syrian breeder Mustapha al-Jabri, of Aleppo, owned a sturdy, deserty little mare that was bred by the Shammar of Mesopotamia. He name was Mouna, and her strain was very precious: ‘Ubayyan Hunaydis (Lady Anne Blunt: “Mutlaq [her Mutayr stud manager] says mazbut strain”). She had at least two sons and one daughter by Jabri’s then head stallion Mahrous, a ‘Ubayyan Suhayli – another precoius marbat of the ‘Ubayyan strain. Both sons stood in Jabri’s stallion barn, but I don’t know whether he used them or not. I don’t recall their names, either, and I used to call them Ibn Mouna I and Ibn Mouna II. Below is Ibn Mouna I, with a youthful Edouard in the background. This horse had some defects, including longer cannon bones and a slightly thicker neck than I’d like, but he oozed real, bold, masculine, desert type. If he could roar he would.
Jeanne Craver sent me this photo a few days ago, in reference to the discussion on this entry.
Wilfred Thesiger (1910-2003) is known as the last of the great Western explorers and travelers. He was the first European to have crossed the heart of the lifeless Empty Quarter (al-Rub’ al-Khali), the great South-East Arabian sand desert. Before him, Bertram Thomas and Harry St-John Bridger Philby traveled around the edges of that desert, which Thesiger crossed twice, on foot and camel back. Thesiger, who is otherwise known for two books, “Arabian Sands”, and the “Marsh Arabs”, both classics of travel literature, was also a talented photographer, who donated his extensive collection of negatives to Oxford University’s Pitt Rivers Museum. A hundred of Thesiger’s less know photos for Arabia, Asia and Africa, is available for viewing on the museum’s website, including the one just below. Note the 1948 picture of a youthful, bare-footed Shaykh Zayed B. Sultan al-Nahyan, then Shaykh of Abu Dhabi, and later (as of 1971) ruler of the United Arab Emirates. Also note the nice picture of the Yemeni port of Mukalla (below), which I visited in the summer of 2008. Also, read Thesiger’s 2003 obituary in the Guardian, here.
Another desert-bred imported to Algeria in the XIXth century is Ben Chicao. I don’t know his strain or his breeder. He is represented in modern pedigrees through his daughter Addresse (x Pervenche), to whom the stallion Madani (Souci x Sissana by Mossoul) has a line in the middle of the pedigree. He was otherwise rarely used. Is that a good Arabian horse conformation wise, judging from the photo? What do you think?
This beautiful mare with big, black, femine eyes is Kokhle, the daughter of two desert-bred horses imported from the Syrian desert to the USA in 1906. Her sire, Hamrah is a Saqlawi al-‘Abd, and her dam, Farha, is a Ma’naghiyah Sbayliyah. I know I sound like a broken record, but who said Ma’naghis did not look like classical Arabian horses? Unfortunately, Kokhle’s tail female no longer survives in asil Arabian horse breeding, but she does have a line in modern pedigrees through her son Kokhleson (by Ashmar), whose son Ralk (x Halloul) sired Ibn Ralf and Bint Ralf.
The more I browse through the Al Khamsa Online Roster, the more I realize the importance of the desert-bred mare *Wadduda. She was a chestnut Saqlawiyat al-‘Abd, and was the war-mare of the Bedouin chieftain Hakim Ibn Mhayd of the Fad’aan tribe, before she was imported to the USA by Homer Davenport in 1906. There is even a series of children books about “Wadduda of the Desert”. *Wadduda has left a lot of asil offspring in the tail female, mostly through her descendent Sahanad (Abu Hanad x Sahabet by Tanatra), a mare that started a dynasty of her own. Sahanad has an active preservation group of her own, and there are around 150 horses tracing to her today! However, there are other lines of asil Arabians to *Wadduda, too. These run the risk of being overlooked in part because of the success of the Sahanad preservation effort, and in part because they do not belong to any of todays breeding groups/silos within US Arabian horse breeding. Jeanne Craver recently mentioned on this blog that an attempt was currently being made to find a preservation home for a 21 year old mare from one of these lines. The mare is Jadiba (Dib x Jabinta by Jadib). Jadiba’s sire…
Teymur Abdelaziz of Germany sent me this photo of the 1993 grey mare Chira (Saymoon x Cylia by Madkour I), a great-great-grand daughter of Nafaa, the desert-bred Kuhaylah mare gifted by Ibn Saud to the king of Egypt in the 1940s. Chira is unique in the sense is that she is the last mare to trace to Nafaa through Nafaa’s daughter Bint Nafaa (by El Gadaa) and as such, the last mare to carry El Gadaa’s blood. Read more about Bint Nafaa and her sire El Gadaa here. I am glad to know Teymur is working on preserving this precious line, which is so close to some of the choicest desert bloodlines. Best of luck with that, Teymur.
This is another photo of the magnificient Dahman (a Dahman x a Rabda). He is to France what *Haleb, who was bred about the same time, is to the USA. Dahman, a Rabdan by strain, is by the far the best desert horse horse ever imported to France, in my opinion. He was a herd stallion with the Shammar Bedouins of Mesopotamia, when French Inspecteur Quinchez, noticed him and bought him in 1909. This picture was taken in 1914, and is courtesy of Adrien Deblaise. I wrote about Dahman earlier, here.
One more picture of old desert-bred stallions from Algeria, from Adrien Deblaise. This is Salamie. I don’t know his strain, nor his breeder. His name suggests an origin around the steppe area east of Hama, in Central Syria, where the town of Salamie lies, and which is a grazing ground for the Sba’ah, Mawali, Hadideen Bedouin tribes. The French imported well over a hundred stallions and mares to their studs in Algeria. Not all of these were equally good. Some were outstanding, like Ghazi. Some were average, like Salamie here. He does have a short back, deep girth, strong legs, a nice hindquarter, and a well placed neck. That said, his eyes are placed too high and his head is somewhat plain. The French, who were seeking stallions to produce cavalry horses (typically Arab-Barb crosses) to police their Algerian possessions, couldn’t care less about a good head, although they sometimes imported pretty typey individuals such as Aziz, featured earlier. Salamie left some progeny at the French government stud of Tiaret, in Algeria. Most notable is his daughter Kabla, out of the Aziz daughter El Kaira. Kabla is the dam of the stallion Bouq (by the desert-bred Hellal), really influential in early Tunisian…
Today French horse-breeder Adrien Deblaise made my day. He sent me a set of very rare, old pictures of desert-bred Arabians imported to France, Tunisia and Algeria in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Some time ago, I started a series of blog entries featuring photos of some these outstanding and so little known desert-breds (Dahman, El Sbaa, Nibeh, Burgas, Taleb, Niazi, El Managhi, etc), but I ran out of original photos to share. I am happy I now have a few more pictures to resume this series. Merci Adrien! This is Ghazi. Chestnut; desert-bred; born in 1901; recorded sire: “Arkoubi”, a Kuhaylan al-‘Ajuz; recorded dam: “Zarifa”, a Kuhaylat al-‘Ajuz; raced successfully in Egypt; imported by the French government to Algeria (then a part of France) in 1909; head sire at the Tiaret stud for many years. Robert Mauvy, who knew him well, said of him: “Alezan dore, trois balzanes et liste, et dont presque toutes les juments nees a Tiaret descendent. Couvrant beaucoup de terrain avec de tres grandes lignes, il brillait par l’elegance de ces gestes et de ses allures … Ce fut, en outre, un excellent performer.” By 1954, on the eve of the bloody (more than a million dead) Algerian eight…
This is Nauwas, a chestnut mare born in 1967. Her sire is the Hamdani stallion Al-Khobar (Ibn Fadl x *Al Hamdaniah), and her dam is the desert-bred mare *Muhaira, a ‘Ubayyah from the horses of Prince Saud ibn ‘Abdallah ibn Jalawi Aal Saud. Her pedigree is interesting because the sire line is Egyptian, and all the mares are desert-bred imports to the USA from Central and Eastern Arabia. Fadl sired the stallion Ibn Fadl, out of the desert-bred mare *Turfa; Ibn Fadl in turned sired Al-Khobar (photo below), out of the desert-bred mare *Al-Hamdaniah (the “bloody shouldered mare”, who was featured in one of the first entries of this blog); the beautiful Al Khobar sired Nauwas, out of the desert-bred *Muhaira. You can’t get better bloodlines than these, so noble, and so close to the source. I love this photo of Nauwas. It blends two of the characteristics of the true Arabian mare: the sweet, soft look of a new mother; and the strength of a war mare. This is a mare I wish I had seen, and owned. PS: I just noticed, after publishing this post that Nauwas bears some resemblance in her body structure, her ears, and the…
Adrien Deblaise breeds Arabian horses of Tunisian, Moroccan and Algerian bloodlines in Western France. His father Philippe was a bookseller that specialized in equine literature. Philippe’s inventory contained one of the largest collections in France books on horses in general and Arabians in particular. Below are pictures of two of Adrien’s mares: B’Oureah Marine (by Ourki x Bismilah by Irmak), and Qhejala (by Fawzan x Jelala II by Abouhif). B’Oureah is shown here competing for a 60 mile endurance race (which she won). She is a Jilfat Dhawi by strain, tracing to the mare Wadha imported by the French government from the Fad’aan tribe in 1875. Qhejala traces to Cherifa, a Shuwaymat Sabbah imported by the French from the Sba’ah tribe in 1869. Note the resemblance between Qhejala (who is 75% Egyptian) and the Babson (a group of asil Arabians of Egyptian bloodlines) broodmatron Fada (Faddan x Aaroufa by Fay El Dine). Fada’s rare photo below is from the late Billy Sheets’ photo collection.
The bay stallion, Hadban, the sire of the two Crabbet foundation mares Rose of Sharon and Nefisa, comes from my tribe, ‘Utaybah. His strain was Hadban Enzahi. His breeder was Jafin (not Jakin as recorded) ibn ‘Aqil al-Da’jani al-‘Utaybi. The house of ‘Aqil are well known among us, and are among the Shaykhs of the Da’ajin section of the tribe of ‘Utaybah. The paramount Shaykh of the Da’ajin who yield great respect comes from the clan of al-Hayzal. Al-Hayzal Shaykhs such as Thiql al-Hayzal are cited several times in the Abbas Pasha Manuscript. For instance, Saudi leader Faysal ibn Turki gave a Saqlawiyah mare that had belonged to al-Hayzal to Abbas Pasha of Egypt.
A fascinating article on volcanic Arabic by Peter Harrigan, in the 2006 issue of Saudi Aramco World. I had the pleasure of meeting Peter at the 2009 Al Khamsa Convention in Oregon, where he gave a talk about the Czech explorer and writer Alois Musil. Peter is a director of Barzan Press, a publishing house “dedicated to promoting awareness of Arab history, literature, novels, heritage and school books.” Click here and scroll down for Peter’s bio. Check out Peter’s talk on Musil in the next Khamsat.
The archives of Gertrude Bell, sometimes referred to as the “Uncrowned Queen of Iraq” ( how I hate that title!), are at Newcastle University in the UK. If you do not know who Gertrude Bell is, or simply wish to know more about her, then click here. The archives include this first photo of a Shammar camel rider, with horses in the background, near the ancient Arab ruins of al-Hadr (ancient Hatra), in Iraq; and this second photo of Fahd Ibn Haddal, leader of the ‘Amarat Bedouins, and Gertrude’s “friend”.
I just noticed something while clicking through Al Khamsa’s online Roster. Of course, it may be a no-brainer to many of you: the stallion *Hamrah, a Saqlawi al-Abd imported by Homer Davenport to the USA in 1906, is the maternal grand-sire of at least five of the most influential Early American Foundation Arabian horses in the USA: Tripoli (dam Poka by *Hamrah); Dhareb and Antez (dam Moliah by *Hamrah); Hanad (dam Sankirah by *Hamrah) and Akil (dam Sedjur by *Hamrah). Wow. What a horse.
Some time last year, this blog featured the precious asil Kuhaylan al-Mimrah line to the mare Baraka (Ibn Manial x Gamalat) which has been flourishing in South Africa. The series of postings on Baraka and her descendents attracted a lot of attention from South Africa and Namibia, and is by far the most popular thread on this blog. Now is the time to feature another asil line that has survived in South Africa, and which carries crosses to desert-bred lines that are extinct almost everywhere else around the globe. That’s the line of the mare Rosina (Saoud x Ruth II by Bendigo), a 1950 Kuhaylat al-Rodan exported by H. V. Musgrave Clark to South Africa in 1953. The line is a tail female to Rodania, an 1869 desert-bred Kuhaylat Rodan imported by Lady Anne Blunt in 1881, and one of the most influential mares in Arabian (and asil) horse breeding. What’s so special about this line, will you ask? Kuhaylan al-Rodan asil horses are all over the place. Well, first of all, the absolute majority of Rodania tail female horses are within what is known as “Straight Egyptian” breeding, a sub-set of asil breeding which has branched out into a category – and…
Since I am back talking about Ma’naghi Sbayli stallions (see yesterday’s short post on RB Bellagio), I thought I’d bring up a picture of the stallion Dakhala Sabiq (Prince Hal x Sirrulya by Julyan), a 1975 stallion bred by Jeanne Hussong, when she was just about to become Jeanne Craver. A coouple of years ago, I was seriously considering to buy a daughter of Sabiq’s sister Soiree (Sir x Sirrulya): Dakhala Sahra is a lovely 1985 chestnut mare by Plantagentet out of Soiree, and is owned by Crista Couch. Perhaps I should have made a move. Dakhla Sabiq and RB Bellagio who was featured below, are closely related, since their respective dams Sirrulya and Sirrunade are sisters, both out of Jane Ott’s broodmatron Sirrulla (Sirecho x Drissula). Unfortunately, Sabiq never had the opportunity to be used as a stallion I have always had a soft spot for Ma’anaghi Sbayli stallions. It dates back to the time I read a story by Ali al-Barazi, an old-time Syrian horse breeder, about one of the last ghazus (Bedouin raids), in the early 1940s. That was just before the French, who were ruling over Syria at the time, put an end to all raiding activity and imposed peace…
I bought back the stallion Taj al-Muluk after having sold him at age 2. His strain is Ubayyan al-Suyayfi, his sire is the old Hamdani stallion Haleem (Saudi Arabian Stud Book #862); his dam is al-Hafna (#1915 in the same), a daughter of al-Barraq and Ghazwa. Here is a recent 6 minute video, the stallion looks at his best as of minute 2.30. You can see a video of his sire Haleem by clicking here.
Thanks Edouard for posting that picture of Al-Awar. I agree with you that he is much more impressive in person than in photos which explains my difficulty in getting a good photo of him at the Racing club in Aleppo, nearing dark time in November 1996. When a horse makes a good impression on me, I have great difficulty in wanting to take a photo because I want to spend every moment looking at the horse to record what I see in my mind, and taking photos requires me to think about the camera and capturing something quickly, which is an intrusion on the live experience, possibly missing an important moment. This is why in the 1970s we mostly took horse movies (before video) and usually Sharon was taking the movies as I was looking. But Al-Awar is truly a horse that one needed to see in person. Even as an aged horse, his wonderful expression and temperament, light free movement as he was being ridden in front of us, and the rich sheen of his deep chestnut coat resembling some rare earthen stone, was unforgettable. In his harmonious presentation, I was reminded of Homer Davenport’s quote about “nothing to…
You ought to read the absolutely lovely story of how a British breeder Jenny Lees of Peark Island Stud, got aquainted with Arabian horses while living in Bahrain. Jenny writes that her Hamdaany Kuwaiti was said to bred by the Anazah and had come to Bahrain through Kuwait, hence his name. Back in the 1960s, around the time when the Sheykhdom of Kuwait became independent (in 1961), it began imlementing a policy of inviting Bedouin tribes from the Syrian desert, which was then suffering from a severe drought, to settle in Kuwait and become Kuwaiti citizens. These were mostly Anazah tribes. This movement was part of a larger pattern of reverse migration of Bedouin tribes that had moved to the north some two hundred years earlier, back to the south. Most ‘Anazah Bedouins, mostly Hssinah, Sba’ah, Ruwalah, and Amarat, and some Fad’an, headed back south, trading the increasingly burdensome policies of the Syrian and Iraqi socialist regimes for the relative wealth of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar. They brought many, many horses back with them. Most of these ‘Anazah tribes settled in Saudi Arabia’s “Northern Border” province, around ‘Ar’ar and Hafr al-Batin, in the Eastern Province, and in the al-Jahra…
Now that’s my Zahrah (Dinar x Hanadi by Krush Juhayyim), a Kuhaylat al-Nawwaq from the marbat of Shaykh Abdul Jalil al-Naqabashbandi, a sufi leader from the area of Der al-Zor, in the Middle Euphrates region of Syria. My father and I picked Zahra from Kamal Abdul Khaliq’s herd when she was 10 days old, in 1994 I think, and we eventually sold her when I came to the USA in 2000. She is pictured here with her filly foal by Saad al-Thani, a Kuhaylan al-Khdili, and another favorite of mine, who is also a son of al-Aawar (and so Dinar’s half brother). The little, un-named filly was thus double al-Aawar. She died a few days after the picture was taken. I will talk about the origins of all these horses in more detail later. For now, I just wanted to feature four generations of Al-Aawar breeding (Al-Aawar, his son Dinar, Dinar’s daughter Zahra, and Zahra’s filly foal who was double al-Aawar).