On the strain of Saqlawi al-‘Abd and its relationship with Saqlawi Nijm al-Subh (Marzaqani)
The Saqlawi al-‘Abd strain is relevant to Arabians in the USA because two main foundation mares, the desert-bred Davenport imports *Urfah and *Wadduda are from it.
I am now realizing that it may be related to the strain of Saqlawi Nijm al-Subh, which is present in Syria among the Shammar’s Marazeeq clan under the name of Saqlawi Marzaqani. This is at least according to the testimony of Saddah Ibn Jadran in the Abbas Pasha Manuscript (APM). He should know.
As a first step, I broke the account of the history of Saqlawi al-‘Abd in the Abbas Pasha Manuscript (APM) into the following simplified sequence of ownership (additional information in between brackets are mine):
Saddah ibn Jedran (of the Ruwalah) was asked about the Saqlawiya from the strain of al ‘Abd, and said:
1/ One of Shammar had in his possession a Saqlawiya Jedraniya, but we do not know how she passed to Shammar originally.
2/ The Shammari was taken captive by Funaykh of al-Sha’lan (of the Ruwalah), who took the mare as ransom.
3/ Funaykh gave the mare to the family of a man of al Mani’ (also of the Ruwalah) as blood money for having killed him.
4/ The dead man had left his black slave [al-‘Abd] in charge of the very young children, the slave rode the mare as his mount.
5/ the slave was unhorsed during a raid by the Bani Sakhr, who took the mare. The owner of the stud/marbat of Saqlawiyat al-‘Abd among the Beni Sakhr is Ibn Bakr.
Also, in a different section of the APM’s Saqlawi chapter:
Saddah ibn Jedran was asked about the mare Saqlawiya Najmat al Subh, the mare of Hussein al-Awadi of al-Ghabin (of the Fad’aan), he said:
6/ She passed from Ibn Bakr of Beni Sakhr to Ibn Ramlah of al-Sirhan, and Ibn Ramlah is the owner of the stud/marbat of Saqlawi Najm al-Subh;
7/ She passed from Ibn Ramlah to Ahl al-Jabal (a coalition of small Bedouin tribes who lived in the Jabal Hauran of southern Syria before the Druze moved there)
8/ Her daughter passed from Ahl al-Jabal to the Ruwalah; she belonged to one man of al-Ruwala who stayed for some time with
Farhan al Jarbah (of the Shammar) at al Jezirah.
9/ One day Hussein al Awadi of al Ghabin (of the Fad’aan) unhorsed him and seized her.
Putting these two accounts together, it would seem that Saqlawi Nijm al-Subh is an offshoot of Saqlawi al-‘Abd itself said to be a branch of the Saqlawi Jadran.
From the histories of the Shammar, we know that the Ruwalah man who was staying with Farhan al-Jarbah of the Shammar had two relinquish one of his Saqlawi Najm al-Subh mares (perhaps a daughter or a sister of the mare of Hussain al-Awadi above) to the Marazeeq clan of the Shammar for having harassed one of their women. The story is well known among the Shammar. The Marazeeq gave their name to this line of Saqlawi Najm al-Subh who became known as Saqlawi Marzaqani after them.
Oh, that is a neat untangling of the chain of ownership. Logically, it does follow from the testimony in the APM that the Saqlawi Marzaqani is an offshoot of Saqlawi al-‘Abd. Don’t think any of the Nijm al-Subh or Marzaqani horses have published mtDNA results yet, so that would be an interesting comparison.
Qualities of the saklawi marzakani, which our imported MAHBOOB, HUSSAM, DAHESS, DAHJANI and NIMR have in their origins, is probably not without good reason!