The 1983 stallion Mas-huj stood at the farm of Basil Jadaan near Damascus for one season, when this photo was taken. Basil gave a copy of the photo to Hazaim Alwair who published it online for some time. Mas-huj was from the city of Hama, from an old lineage of Ubayyan Sharrak tracing to the Sbaa tribe. I remember Mashuj well, from seeing him in Hama year in year out during the late 1980s and early 1990s at the farm of Fuad al-Azem. His sire was a Saqlawi Jadran of Ibn Zubayni from another old Hama lineage (that of the family of al-Khani). He raced in Beirut under the name of Zad al-Rakib. My father recalls seeing him — the Saqlawi — pull a cart on the streets of Beirut in the early 1980s after his racing career was over. I was in the car apparently but too young to remember.
At the old farm of Basil Jadaan near Damascus. Note the short back, the strong coupling, the arched neck, and the huge eye. The overall balance. Stare at him: he is a concentrate of Arabness.
The findings of recent genetic research by Dr. Barbara Wallner on the sire lines in Arabian horses is likely to cause a lot of stir in the Arabian horse world, from racing “industry” circles to purist ones. The research points to, among other findings, English Thoroughbred ancestry in the sireline of the Saudi/Qatari stallion Amer. Amer was the most successful sire of “Arabian” racehorses of his generation. The information is part of a larger study titled “The horse Y chromosome as an informative marker for tracing sire lines”. It shows the y chromosome in Amer’s offspring displaying the same unique genetic mutation that characterizes the offspring of the English Thoroughbred stallion Whalebone. This mutation is not present in the y chromosome of other English TB male descendants of the Darley Arabian. The Darley Arabian is the sireline for Whalebone, and the main foundation sireline of the English TB breed overall. This means that the face-saving argument of “both Amer and Whalebone/Darley trace to an Arabian horse sire line” does not stand. Many purist breeders must feel so vindicated. I do, for one. Thank god for genetic advances, and for the freedom of expression in some countries that allow such studies…
A recent entry on this blog witnessed a discussion between two French breeders on the notion of “le sang” as applied to Arabian horses. I would like to come back to it, as I believe it to be fundamental to understanding the kind of Arabian horses this blog advocates. This notion is not well captured by the literal translation of the French term “sang” as “blood”. It is not about purity of blood, nor is it about bloodlines. A closer English approximation is perhaps “stamina”. Robert Mauvy offers the best definition, in my opinion (in French, followed by Mr Google’s version): “Le sang! Ce mot en matière hippique ne désigne nullement ce liquide de vie qui anime celle des êtres vivants; ce muscle liquide qui amène a l’organisme les éléments nutritifs et ramène les déchets de cet organisme, non! L’expression hippique “sang” résume, dans un tempérament nerveux, sanguin au paroxysme — le concentre d’énergie, de force, de solidité des tissus, de densité des os, de résistance a toute épreuve, de volonté et de courage. Le cheval arabe de sang pur est l’expression la plus haute du “sang”. C’est lui le “sang”! The “sang”! This word in equestrian matters does not…
A thought had in passing the other day: one notices a significant increase in the use by French and other European horsemen of the term “Nedjdi” (among other spellings) in the first decades of the XIXth century, to refer to some Arabian horses. I believe this increase was probably associated with the influx of Bedouin tribes, mostly ‘Anazah, from Central Arabia (Najd/Nejd/Nedjd) to Northern Arabia that was taking place around the same time. The first decades of the nineteenth century were indeed the time when the Ruwalah, under al-Dray’i ibn Sha’lan, the Fad’aan and other ‘Anazah tribes migrated to the north. In doing so, they came in contact with the Ottoman centers of Damascus and Baghdad, and with other Bedouin tribes already present in the area. People in these urban centers and Northern Arabian Bedouins alike must have referred to the new arrivals and their horses as “Nedjdi” — the ones from Nedjd. What I believe this means — and here lies the crux of my argument — is that the “Nedjdi” horses are essentially the Arabian horses of the ‘Anazah gone northwards. In the North, they would have been contrasted with Arabian horses maintained by the Northern Arabian tribes…
Mardschana Bint Mahra traces tail female to the Dahmah Shahwaniyah mare Malacha, foaled at the EAO in 1955, and imported to Germany with her dam Moheba (pedigree here). Moheba, like Marbach’s other EAO Dahmah Shahwaniyah import Nadja, traces tail female to Farida, the 1921 daughter of Nadra El Saghira; Moheba descends from Farida’s daughter Ragia (by Ibn Rabdan), while Nadja traces to Bint Farida (by Mansour). Photos shared here by kind permission of Oliver Seitz. Mardschana’s dam Mahra is a daughter of Malik El Nil, who traces tail female to the mare Bint Karima, whom Edouard has written about before.
The previous post triggered some memories, which I am eager to put in writing so they don’t vanish — especially as my father, now 86, cannot be persuaded to write his memoirs. Starting from the mid-1980s, my father, General Salim Al-Dahdah, would regularly take me with him to the Beirut racetrack, l’Hippodrome du Parc de Beyrouth. He was a longstanding member of the board of the racetrack’s supervising organization, the Societe pour la Protection et l’Amelioration de la Race Chevaline Arabe au Liban (SPARCA). Henri Pharaon had founded SPARCA in the 1920s and had led it most of his life. He also owned the largest number of racehorses at any given point in the racetrack’s history. Other notable SPARCA members and large owners included Moussa de Freige and Saudi Royal Prince Mansur ibn Saud. I only have faint memories of my earliest visits to the racing stables of Henri Pharaon and Moussa de Freige in the mid 1980s. These involve prancing horses, slender grooms, heaps of alfalfa, white plastic chairs, tea cups and endless conversations between adults, with their dose of foul language. They also involve sounds of neighing, horse farts, horses nervously pounding the metal doors of their boxes…
Just a note to say that the author of one of the obituaries of Henri Pharaon (1901-1993) in the Independent is wrong about him hailing from a Triestine family. The Pharaons are originally from Damascus, and one of their branches emigrated to Egypt then Trieste, which was then the only outlet of the Habsburg Empire on the Mediterranean Sea. Indeed a reader issued this correction: MAY I add to Professor John Carswell’s evocative memories of Henri Pharaon (10 August, further to the obituary by Robert Fisk, 7 August)? writes Rosemarie Said Zahan.Pharaon did not come from an old Triestine family which had emigrated to Egypt. The family came from the Bekaa in Lebanon, but one member, Antoun Kassis Pharaon, emigrated in the middle of the 18th century to Egypt, where he soon rose to become the substantial figure of Customs Master (Le Grand Douanier). He strongly advocated the Red Sea overland trade route from Europe to India via Suez (long before the canal was built), and in so doing, was helpful to many European traders. In 1784, he left Egypt and settled in Europe where he was given the title of Count of the Holy Roman Empire. His descendants are…
A previous entry by Kate McLachlan on the modern descendants of the Weil Stud foundation mare Murana I led me to the family of Cassis-Faraone of Trieste. Murana I was acquired in 1816 by Baron Fechtig for Weil by way of the port of Trieste. Some of Europe’s most illustrious foundation Arabian horses were associated with Fechtig: Tajar, Bairactar, Murana I, Warda, Koeyl, etc. But who was he? Lets pin down some places first: Weil was the royal stud of the King Wilhem I of Wurttemberg (1781-1854), whose capital was Stuttgart. Trieste, now in Italy, was at the time the main port of the Austro-Hungarian Empire on the Mediterranean sea. The trade of Austro-Hungarian Empire with the Orient, including Egypt and Syria, went through Trieste. Baron Ferdinand Fechtig Von Fechtenberg, the son of a senior magistrate in Vienna of same name, became a merchant when he married Teresa, daughter of a wealthy merchant from Trieste, Antonio Cassis-Faraone. This marriage marks the beginning of his trading association with the Orient. Antonio Cassis-Faraone was born in Damascus in 1745, the scion of a Greek-Catholic (ie, Melkite) family of traders. This is the same family as that of Henri Pharaon, who played such…
In 1955, the filly Nadja was imported to Weil-Marbach alongside Hadban Enzahi. Bred by the EAO, she was a daughter of Nazeer out of the mare Nefisa (pedigree here). The mares in this post all trace to her through her daughters Noha and Nabya, both sired by Hadban Enzahi. Photos shared here by kind permission of Oliver Seitz.
Daughter of the Pharaohs, aka “Pippa”, the 2015 Ma’anqiyah Sbayliyah filly I leased from DeWayne Brown, is confirmed in foal to Tamaam DE for March 2020. I am very much looking forward to this foal, whatever its gender. Terry and Lyman Doyle brought me the good news.
Excerpt from an Art Newspaper article: The Arab Image Foundation, Beirut’s pioneering non-profit archive of Middle Eastern photography, has launched an online platform that makes 22,000 images from the collection accessible and searchable for the first time. The foundation’s building, which has been closed to the public since 2016, will also reopen this summer, a spokesman says. I haven’t looked, but I hope there is something about Arabian horses there.
Photos shared here by kind permission of Oliver Seitz.
Back in the 1990s, when Hansi Heck-Melnyk and I were trying to account for all Tunisian horses in Tunisia and Europe, there seemed to be an inexhaustible supply of these beautiful, dry Arabians with lines that traced exclusively to horses imported from the desert of North Arabia. Tunisia was indeed had the one of the largest pools of such Arabians, after Egypt but before Syria (pre-civil war) and Bahrain. The Tunisian state stud of Sidi-Thabet which I visited in 2004 (or was it 2005?), was filled with good broodmares. Today, almost thirty years later, one is hard-pressed to find a horse with a 100% Tunisian pedigree. Most everything at the state stud of Sidi Thabet seems to have been top crossed with doubtful French blood. There may be a few left at Gisela Bergmann’s near Jendouba, and a couple others in private hands, but that’s about it in Tunisia. Maybe a few more in Germany (thanks to the Bergmann’s influence), and one or two old mares in France, but there hasn’t been any Tunisian stallions there in a while, the last one being Jassem (Koraich x Nefissa by Madani). How can that be? Can someone undertake a survey of what…
Such reads the caption on the photo below, shared by Rehan Ud Din Baber on his wonderful Facebook page. Rehan tells us the photo is from the G. Eric and Edith Matson Photograph Collection, which I will certainly look up. Also sharing Severine Vesco’s beautiful comment on that photo, in French: C’est en regardant ces photos là qu’on comprend vite ce qu’est l’arabe… un cheval de guerre dans un des milieux les plus difficiles au monde, et dans une culture tribaleEt vu que le sport c’est quand même plus facile que la razzia ou la guerre, il devrait y exceller. Le cheval arabe est bien plus qu’un chanfrein concave ou une queue en panache. C’est un compagnon d’arme, garant et dernier rempart de son cavalier, un roc chargé de le protéger, de l’emmener en sécurité aussi bien qu’au combat, d’aller vite mais aussi loin, d’affronter tous les obstacles, avec Noblesse… Endurance, vitesse, polyvalence, volonté, proximité à l’homme, solidité, puissance, sécheresse des tissus, charisme, noblesse, Sang Voilà toutes les cases que doit cocher un cheval arabe pour survivre à ce mode de vie, et c’est tout ça qui l’a rendu si …. Parfait
Zalfa had to be put down yesterday, at the veterinary hospital. In many ways, she was just too good to be true. I just hate breeding when this happens. I just hate it. You buy a rare old mare in her twenties sight unseen from far, far away, you do export papers, you ask friends for help with shippers and vet papers, you have her hauled thousands of miles, you ask other friends to let you use their stallion a first time, she does not take the first year, you have her hauled to another friend, bred again, you give her to that friend, she offers you a future filly back, you wait, you hope, you wait again, eleven months, she is confirmed in foal, you’re elated when she delivers that big beautiful filly, you pick a name, you make plans to visit, then in a matter of seconds it all collapses, the dam, half blind, steps on the filly, displaces a hock, the filly can no longer stand, can’t nurse, your friend rushes to the vet hospital with her friend, you wait, you hope, then you get the bad news, you’re left with no other option, and you have…
It’s easy to get lost following any 200 year history and the Skowronek saga is no different. The storyline breaks into two periods of time: the history before his 1921 registration in Weatherby’s GSB and then the commentary post 1921. Each part will be examined sequentially. Each post will include links to English translations of the relevant documents along with links to the original sources in Russian, Polish, German and French. Each translation includes editor’s notes, footnotes clearly explaining any controversial translations and cross references to other documents. Articles will be available later this summer on www.skowronek.io, the FaceBook page Skowronek – A Partbred Arabian Horse, and this blog. List of Articles Cast of characters prior to 1921 Early primary sources (1799-1876)This includes a fully translated Slawuta Stud report from 1799, along with historical commentary on the Sanguszko family’s breeding operation from two brothers, Wladyslaw Sanguszko (1839 and 1850) and Roman Sanguszko Sr. (1876). These sources are often referenced by later authors. The Blunts, the Potockis and the Sanguszkos (1882-1895)The Blunt’s relationship with the Potockis began in 1882 with a meeting in Egypt. The story follows this relationship through Lady Anne’s journals and Wilfred’s letters from 1882 to 1895, including…
1908. A barber setting up shop by the train station of El Marg, North of Cairo. This is the closest train station to Lady Anne Blunt’s stud of Sheykh Obeyd. Her journals indicate she regularly used this station to go to Cairo and back to her stud, about the time that picture was taken. I wonder if she ever saw that barber.. (Photo from the magnificent Facebook Page: Ahl Masr Zaman.
[My dashboard tells me this is blog post number 2000 on Daughters of the Wind, after more than eleven years of blogging] Marta Ulan has a page on Facebook where she shares photos of foundation horses. Not sure what the source is for this nice photo of the foundation stallion Kuhailan Zaid, the desert-bred import to Babolna. He was purchased by Carl Raswan and Bogdan Zientarski in 1931 from the Wuld Ali Bedouins. Kate McLachlan pointed me to this photo.
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.…
Severine Vesco and Amelie Blackwell, wearing their treasure hunter hats, found this gem of a mare somewhere in rural Southern France. Lannilis, the mare, is a 20 year old Kuhaylah Nawwaqiyah, of Tunisian, Algerian, and old, pure French bloodlines. She had a career as a trail riding horse, and is now being used to produce endurance Arabians and Araloosas. This mare traces to one of the lesser known Algerian (Tiaret) tail females, that of the mare Mzeirib, a 1891 desert-bred Kuhaylah Nawwaqiyah from the Shammar. The French imported Mzeirib to Algeria in 1898. The line went to the state stud of Tunisia at some point in the 1920s, then to private hands in France in the 1970s. In France it bred on with crosses to pure Arabian stallions of old Tunisian lines, including some of Robert Mauvy’s breeding. It is the same female line as that of the Tunisian stallion Omran that went to that zoo in Germany. The short back, the deep girth, the high withers, the long hip on this mare are somehow reminiscent of early Crabbet Blunt horses.
There are many ways to judge a horse. Some of the more common considerations include conformation, size, temperament, athletic ability and genetic “potency.” These are normal criteria for evaluating all breeds of horses. However, within the Arabian breed, another criterion takes precedence over all others: pure blood. A pure or asil Arabian horse is defined by its exclusive origin among the Bedouin tribes of Desert Arabia, the creators of the Arabian breed. Bedouins accepted a horse as pure if they had reliable information on its strain, sub-strain and Bedouin breeder. Conversely, Bedouins removed horses from the breed for two distinct reasons: mixed blood and unknown origin. Mixed blood. Bedouins used the term hajin to generally describe any horse that contained non-Arabian blood mixed with Arabian blood. Horses of mixed blood are by definition not pure. Any descendant of a mixed blood horse is also of mixed blood so the status of hajin is not reversible. A hajin horse does not have a strain connecting it to the community of Arabian horses. How do we know a horse has mixed blood? The most obvious way, but not the only way, is that the owner of a horse identifies non-Arabian blood…
The 1952 daughter of Amurath Sahib and 221-Kuhaylan Zaid (tail female to 60-Adjuze), 25-Amurath Sahib was a pretty grey mare (you can see a photo of her here), who produced a number of asil foals for Bábolna, including their chief sire Farag II, by Farag (Morafic x Bint Kateefa), the stallion Ghalion 6, by Ghalion (Morafic x Lubna), and the mare 3-Siglavy Bagdady VI, by Siglavy Bagdady VI (Siglavy Bagdady VI x 250-Kuhailan Haifi I). Some of the descendants of these horses can be found at Farag Arabians, Germany. Stephanie Weirich has very kindly consented to share photos of her 25-Amurath Sahib horses. The 1999 stallion Sheik Tahawi (Unkas x Tahia) has been brought in for the daughters of Farag II-3. The mare Shuweyma Sabbah (Moftha x Moona) is being bred this year to Sahil Ibn Farag II-3. Both Shuweyma Sabbah and Sheik Tahawi trace back to the mare Folla. It is good to see these unique bloodlines breeding on, as they preserve some of the old European lines, as well as Kuhailan Zaid and Kuhailan Haifi, in asil form.
I am happy to report that Monologue CF (Riposte CF x Soliloquy CF by Regency CF), now 18 years old, has been busy pasture breeding two precious mares at Laura Fitz’s, her HH Karisma Krush and her Mi Blue Angel. Monologue has been doing so much better since going to Michigan with Laura on lease from Darlene Summers and I. As a youngster he was just gorgeous, below at Jackson Hensley’s in New Mexico.
Does it still exist in asil tail female? or did Sadana and her daughter Souha die without asil female progeny?
This photo is from the World Digital Library “from a collection of 65 projectable lantern slides relating to the Arab Revolt of 1916?18.” DOW readers and lovers of the true Arabian horse, click on the image to enlarge it, and please spend time gazing and squinting at each horse, and look at the chest, the eye sockets, the facial bones, the knees, the fine muzzle, and try to breed for similar traits to the extent possible.
This spring my 24 year old mare Nuri Al Krush will be bred to Jamr Al Arab for a linebred foal to the great Hanad. Nuri brings the lines of the Hanad sons Tripoli and Mainad, and Jamr adds Sanad, Ibn Hanad and Ameer Ali. The photo was taken at her breeder and owner Trish Stockhecke in Ontario, Canada.
Mystic UF (Janan Abinoam x Astranah by Astrologer), 1987 Kuhaylan Hayfi of Davenport lines, was a powerhouse. Owner Aida Schreiber riding.
The strain of the Frayjan is one of the oldest Arabian horse strains. It gets an early mention by K. Niebuhr in 1772 as of the five strains of Al Khamsa, with the spelling fradsje — see the beautifully researched article of Kate McLachlan on the five Al Khamsa strains. The strain is not a Kuhaylan strain, but is self standing. It takes it names from the Frijah section of the Ruwalah tribe, to which it originally belonged. The Frijah were one of the first sections of the Ruwalah to migrate from West Central Arabia to North Arabia. In the 1970s, two stallions from this strain were listed in the first Lebanese Arabian Horse Studbook submitted to WAHO. In the early 2000s, Hazaim mentioned to me a non-Asil mare from this strain in Homs. She traced in female line to an Asil Frayjah mare. She was the daughter of the Iraqi part-bred Arabian stallion al-Zir. It would be interesting to get some DNA from this line. The strain is now extinct in asil form. Incidentally, the Frijah is the section of the Ruwalah which owned the Saqlawi strain. The Qidran (or Gidran, hence Jidran and Jadran) are one of the…
These posts weere initially published on the AKHorsemen Yahoo discussion group, over several days in August 2001. There is no evidence whatsoever that Bedouins ever bred according to strain theory. This is a myth. They most certainly never did it intentionally during the 20th century and the Abbas Pasha Manuscript is here at last to tell us it did not happen in the 19th century. There are definitely many different types [of Arabian horses], distinctive and special. The greatest contribution of North American breeders of Arabians to the breed (a contribution at least equal that of the Bedouins in preserving the purity of the blood from immemorial times) is that they have emphasized and developed these types. However it is my opinion that the mistake of these breeders was to confuse strains and types. They are not to be associated. Strains are just equivalents of family names for humans. Humans transmitfamily names from father to son, in horses family names (strains) aretransmitted from mother to daughter, simply because Bedouins thought it was more convenient, for several reasons (I’ll expand on this later). You have tall humans and short humans; and you have humans from the Smith family and other from…
The information on this rare strain found only in the Kingdom of Bahrain, primarily comes from the seminal 1971 article of Judi Forbis in Arabian Horse World, later republished in her book Authentic Arabian Bloodstock. Judi visited Bahrain in March 1970, and recorded the following information about the strain, in three different parts of that article. The first reference provides background on the strain: Kuhaylah Al Adiati is another strain rarely heard of before, but deriving from the Kuhaylah family. She came from Saudi Arabia and was presented to Sheikh Hamad when he was a prince, together with a letter of presentation from the offering Sheikh of Al Ajman: “I send to you this mare which fulfills Al Adiat”. That is, to him she embodied all the swift and desirable attributes understood in the beautiful El Adiat, Sura 100 of the Koran [A translation of Verse 100 of the Qur’an follows]. What greater or more meaningful gift could he possibly have bestowed? When Sheikh Hamad saw her race and found her to be exceedingly swift, he happily declared: “Truly She is of Al Adiat.” The second reference occurs during a visit to the stud of Sakhir: “Sakhir, the abandoned palace…
The ‘Ubayyan colt Kasim was a gift from King ‘Abd al-Aziz Aal Saud to the Earl and Countess of Athlone (Queen Victoria’s granddaughter) during their visit to Arabian in 1938. I donated this photo and that of *Turfa and Faras which you saw on this blog earlier, the Arabian Horse Archives. They were a gift from Kees Mol, who had received them from someone who had received them from the Dutch Consul in Jeddah who took the pictures, as indicated on the archives’ website.
Damascus SF (Memoir UF x Neroli CF by Regency CF) is a very smooth stallion of Davenport lines, bred and owned by Aida Schreiber in New Hamsphire. Through a close cross to Bint Ralf, he has a rare line to the Davenport desert-bred import *Farha, and most probably, the last line to *Haleb in Davenports, too. I loved that crested, muscular neck.
My friend and mentor Chuck Humphreys sent me this poem by Latin American poem Pablo Neruda: HORSES From the window I saw the horses. I was in Berlin, in winter, The light was without light, the sky skyless. The air was white like a moistened leaf. From my window, I could see a deserted arena, a circle bitten out by the teeth of winter. All at once, led out by a single man, ten horses were stepping, stepping into the snow. Scarcely had they rippled into existence like flame, than they filled the whole world of my eyes, empty till now. Faultless, flaming, they stepped like ten gods on broad, clean hoofs, their manes recalling a dream of salt spray. Their rumps were globes, were oranges. Their color was amber and honey, was on fire. Their necks were towers carved from the stone of pride, and in their furious eyes, sheer energy showed itself, a prisoner inside them. And there, in the silence, at the mid-point of the day, in a dirty, disgruntled winter, the horses’ intense presence was blood, was rhythm, was the beckoning light of all being. I saw, I…
Severine Vesco took this beautiful photo of my friend Jean-Claude Rajot and his Syrian stallion Mahboub Halep, bred by Radwane Shabareq near Aleppo in 2007.
Le débat que Louis a enclenché est le bienvenu, il est important. Essayons de le continuer en mettant tous les griefs de coté, dans l’intérêt du cheval. Nous sommes évidemment en présence d’acceptions différentes de ce qu’est un cheval arabe aujourd’hui. Celles-ci proviennent de la manière que chaque civilisation a eu d’appréhender la relation de l’homme au cheval au fil du temps, de l’évolution du rôle du cheval dans chaque civilisation, mais aussi et surtout de perceptions par les hommes d’hommes de civilisations différentes, donc de leurs chevaux. Je demeure cependant persuadé que ces acceptions peuvent se recouper. (La suite est à venir)
Bonjour Cher Edouard, très touché par ta marque de sympathie et sentiments à mon égard. Cela faisait bien longtemps et l’on aurait pu croire que le contact était rompu, faute je suppose à ma franchise ?! Mais si tu le permets, puisse un ami te crier gare !!! Ton auditoire t’emporte dans des sphères viciées et ineptes car, constitué pour une grande partie de beaux parleurs versatiles et sans expérience notoire. Entre ceux qui traitent Nimr de « Chèvre Syrienne » et qui ensuite le comparent au superbe Dahman de 1909, d’autres qui affirment que Mokhtar aurait du barbe, celui qui choisit d’acheter un cheval en fonction de sa selle, il en est de même un parmi ces illuminés qui m’a réclamé un produit, va comprendre ? J’en passe et des meilleures et à présent voici la chasse à l’«Asil » accompagnée de toutes ses critiques malveillantes envers ceux qui pourraient leur faire de l’ombre, parlant même au nom d’autres personnes, ceci afin de se hisser sur le pavois et écouler je suppose leurs produits, peut-être même par vice… C’est lamentable ! Quel piège que cet outil trop souvent mal employé où suspicions, commérages, babinages et niaiseries font loi. Toutes…
This was, until recently, the most beautiful city in the world, in my eyes. Paris, Rome, Chicago, Vienna, Budapest? No.
Kate McLachlan and I were recently exchanging about the treasure trove of Arabian horse related documents stored at the Qatar Digital Library. She has located, among other findings, a translation of the hujjah of the Bahrain import to Poland Kuhailan Afas, in the hand of Carl Raswan, as well as a translation of his full pedigree. Kuhailan Afas was a major stallion in twentieth century Arabian horse breeding. Click to read they are easily legible. There is also a typewritten Arabic hujjah, which Kate also found, and an extended typewritten pedigree in Arabic, both obviously based on a handwritten Arabic hujjah. These Arabic typewritten versions of the hujjah and pedigree are a bit odd, because they give the horse the strain of its sire (Kuhailan Wathnan) in addition to other glaring inconsistencies. Probably typos. “I declare I, o ‘Abd al-‘Aziz al-Abd al-Razzaq al-Sani’, the servant of Shaykh Hamad ibn ‘Isa Aal Khalifa, that I sold the horse known as Kuhaylan al-Wathnan to His Excellency the Mister Bogdan Zietarski and I produced this [piece of] paper for him, about the lineage of the horse to clarify its origin; he is of a young age; born on the 25th of Sha’ban the…
Kees Mol offered me this photo of the mare Faras (‘mare’ in Arabic), and in turn I donated it to the Arabian Horse Archives, on the website of which a copy can now be found. Faras was a 1927 desert bred Kuhaylat al-Krush, gifted by Abd al-Aziz ibn Saud, King of Saudi Arabia to her HRH Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone and the Earl of Athlone during their visit to Arabia and Bahrain in 1938. She was from the most precious and sougth after strain of Central Arabia. Peter Upton’s book “the Arab Horse” has a copy of her hujjah, written in Ibn Saud’s hand. She also appears to have been a producer of horses famed for their speed and endurance. Despite all these credentials, I am not sure she would be accepted in a halter show for Arabians today (or even thirty years ago). Most people familiar with Arabian horses in the West, and increasingly, in the East too, would not believe her to be an Arabian: where is the dish, the two-level profile? Where is the bird-like eye, popping out of its socket? the croup flatter than a counter top? the swan-like arched neck? the meaty face? the…
I just fell upon the photo of this superb younger mare of the Jilfan Dhawi strain from the breeding of Fabienne Vesco. Fedaia Beni Sakr is a blend of mostly Egyptian, Tunisian and Algerian bloodlines, with a hint of old French blood. Such a deep girth and nice hindquarter on this mare, on top of pointy ears and the black skin around the eyes.
In an earlier thread on Dwarka, Astrid Moegling shared the following photo print of a horse that was captioned as being of Dwarka, located on the Meisterdrucke Fine Art Prints website: Astrid asked the additional question of: “And is it really Dwarka? I thought only one of his hind feet was white? On the other hand, the head seems to be the same (including the makeshift halter etc) as in the headshot above. Probably taken at the same shooting.“ I think it is him! The rope halter is definitely similar, and the star matches other headshots of Dwarka where his marking is visible. There are precious few photos of Dwarka in full, and some of them are very poor in quality, but we can compare with a few of them to determine that, yes, Dwarka does, in fact, have two white hind socks, both visible from the near side, but with the partial sock on the off-side hind only extending slightly around the front to to be visible from the off side.
** Note: this post contains a picture of a dead horse’s partially dissected skull. ** Ginnie Pope sent me this scan of an article related to Dwarka, published May 16th, 1923 — two years after Dwarka had passed away — within The Illustrated London News. The article, “A Problem For Horsemen: The “Blind” Nostril” was by W. P. Pycraft, Author of “The Infancy of Animals,” “The Courtship of Aimals,” etc. etc. This was in fact William Plane Pycraft, an Englishman and a zoologist that wrote extensively on natural history while involved with the British Natural History Museum. The article includes a photo of Dwarka from his very last days, as well as a postmortem shot of his skull which is used to compare against reconstructions of earlier protohorses. It also discusses the evolution of the horse and its functional anatomy. Gruesome as it might be, it’s cool to find out that another of our desert horses played a role in the advancement of scientific education. Photo under cut, but if it’s too small for you to read the font, you can access it via dropbox by clicking this link.
This morning, Lyman Doyle sent me several videos of Pippa, which he had taken in the summer of 2018. Pippa (her registered name Daughter of the Pharaohs) is a three year old Ma’naqiyah Sbayliyah, by Lyman’s stallion Chatham DE out of SS Lady Guenevere, by SS Dark Prince), who belongs to DeWayne Brown. I leased her from DeWayne last year, boarded her at Lyman’s in Alfafla, OR, and attempted several breedings to Lyman’s stallions Kashgar, Tamaam, and Buckner. We will be trying again this year. The lineage traces to the Sba’ah Bedouins of North Arabia, as it should for this precious and highly prized strain.
This is yet another photo from the same collection at the Arabian Horse Archives, showing the mares of King A. A. Aal-Saud at his stud of al-Kharj. Notice the pretty head of the bay mare on the left, and the plain head of the chestnut one near, and the convex profile of the bay one in the center. Clearly, all desert mares, all royal mares, and all different. There was not one single type.
From the website of the Arabian Horse Archives comes this photos of a handsome desert bred stallion at the stud of King Abd al-‘Aziz Aal Saud of Saudi Arabian, in 1946 or 1949. Notice the very dark skin around the eye and the muzzle, a distinctive trait of authenticity (asalah). This photo is “part of a series of 120 primarily glass slides taken by Joe Buchanan’s father, Robert Earle Buchanan, a professor of Agriculture at Iowa State University, on trips to the Middle East in 1946 and 1949. In the Comar Arabians collection of Garth and Joe Buchanan. Now held by Carolyn and Dick Hasbrook, Twinbrook Arabians, Ames, Iowa.”
This precious image of a Bedouin in Saudi Arabia, recently uploaded on the website of the Arabian Horse Archives is “part of a series of 120 primarily glass slides taken by Joe Buchanan’s father, Robert Earle Buchanan, a professor of Agriculture at Iowa State University, on trips to the Middle East in 1946 and 1949. In the Comar Arabians collection of Garth and Joe Buchanan. Now held by Carolyn and Dick Hasbrook, Twinbrook Arabians, Ames, Iowa.”
Photographer Kevin Bubriski in a new book: “Legacy in Stone: Syria Before War”, which the blog “Roads and Kingdoms features here.
Saraly El Shahin (Ansata Aly Jamil x Saree by Salaa El Dine out of Selmah by Shakhs out of Sappho by Bleinheim) is, at 24 years old, one of the most precious asil mares in Europe. She is with Laszlo Kiraly in Hungary. One of the very last asil mares of the precious strain of Hamdani Simiri, tracing to the mare Selma of Abbas Pasha, she has a predominantly Egyptian pedigree, with the addition of two of the desert bred stallions of the Courthouse Stud, in England, Nimr and Fedaan. She has a three year old daughter, which is not currently in a preservation program.
The following article on the life of the mare *Naomi was tracked down by Kate McLachlan and dug up by myself, and can be read online through the Hathi Trust website courtesy of the New York Public Library [click here.] Written by the Rev. F. Furse Vidal, it was published August 16, 1900 in The Country Gentleman – an American agricultural magazine founded in the 1830s. He writes about his acquisition of the mare, her disposition with children, and of several of the foals that he bred out of her. I am struck by his pointed description of her attitude toward children, and it only further confirms for me what I’ve long thought: Arabian mares and children go together like the moon and the stars.
Laszlo Kiraly sent me this head shot of the Babolna mare 25 Amurath Sahib, from the last asil female line from Babolna. The photo was never published before Laszlo’s recent article in the Khamsat magazine about the asil lines of Babolna.
This morning I woke up to a message from Jeanne Craver to the Davenport Owners list serve on Google Groups that Triermain CF had died the night before. Her message, titled “Another end to another era”, was: I went to feed about 30 minutes ago, and Triermain was gone. It looks like he strolled out to the water tank and was heading back to the shed and just dropped. No sign of struggle. He ate his breakfast with his usual gusto, and had seemed well. I am glad he went so quickly. Jeanne The passing of the last senior stallion at Craver Farms indeed marks the end of an era. Triermain was my personal favorite, after his sire Thadrian. He will forever have a special place in my heart. He was just perfect. First photo by Anita Westfall. Second photo from the Craver Farms collection. Of his several sons and successors, Aurene CF (below, photo by owner Hannah Logan) is, in my opinion, the new king. Long live the king! In homage to Triermain, a quote from the poem of Walter Scott “the Bridal of Triermain” after which Charles Craver named him, because only him was worthy of Plantagenet daughters:…
Quite by accident yesterday, I came across the following photograph in the Getty Museum’s collection, of an Arab stallion presented to Napoléon III by the Sultan of Turkey in 1867: The caption reads “Aladin, étalon de pur sang arabe offert par le Sultan Abd-ul-azis à l’empereur Napoleon en 1867”. The occasion of the gift was Abdulaziz’s visit to Europe; Paris was the host city of the World’s Fair that year, and there was a significant Ottoman presence at the fair. Aladin was not the only Arab horse presented by the Sultan to European heads of state in 1867 – he also gave horses to the British royal family, among them Kouch, sire of Gomussa, who was given to the future Edward VII. The Illustrated London News from 16 November that year mentions four of the horses by name and provides an engraving of them to boot: The gift of the Sultan of Turkey, our late guest in London, to his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, consisting of four noble horses of the purest Arabian breed, has been mentioned in this Journal. The Engraving on the preceding page represents these superb animals, which have been placed in the stables of…
Happy New Year everyone. May it be a year of peace, and peace of mind, for all of you. For me, it will be the year when I will launch this blog in Arabic. I am in my hometown, and I miss speaking and writing my language.
This is a photo of Dwarka, published on page 55 in the book Hooves in the Heather by Virginia Pope, granddaughter of Arthur Hurn, who managed the Tor Royal Stud during the time that Dwarka stood at stud. This image was apparently taken after he landed in from Arabia in 1897, meaning it very well could have been taken whilst he was in India! I think this is my favorite photograph of his profile that I’ve seen thus far. You can see the slight bulge of the forehead, the slight dip in the nasal plane, and what is clearly a wedged shape of a head attached to an arching throat. The photo presented is a direct scan from her book, which the author has granted me permission to share until she can find her original digital file to share.
Bev Davison tells me my beautiful Ginger, 20 years old, is confirmed in foal. I am over the moon with this news. I had been trying since 2015 and the aborted pregnancy from the Bahraini stallion Mlolshaan Hager Solomon, which was a big blow. I am so hoping for a filly. The outcome of this breeding will be high percentage Abbas Pasha and old Crabbet blood up close, which I find miraculous. Kualoha (Ghadaf x Rabanna) and Jady (Jadib x Im Gulnar) are four generations away on Ginger’s side, and Parnell (Ibn Gulida x Bint Ghadaf) and Subani (Ghadaf x Im Gulnar by Nusi) three generations on the sire’s side. The lucky future dad, if all goes well, is one of Bev’s stallions, Subanet Jabbar SDA. Jabbar means mighty in Arabic. He sure looks so in this photo.
I keep marveling at this horse, and how close to the desert bred Arabians the Hadban Enzahi stallion Wahid CW (Wahid CW x RL Zahra Assahara) looks like, 112 years after the importation of his ancestors from North Arabia to the USA. Photo by Hannah Logan
I love these photos of my friend Yasser Ghanim, riding the Shuwaymah mare Challawieh of Jean-Claude Rajot who appears in the other photo on her dam, Naalah. Here he is on the Syrian asil stallion, Mahboub Halep, while JC is on Dahess Hassaka, the other Syrian stallion.