A blog on desert arabian horses, past, present and future
For much of the 2000s, the chestnut Saqlawi Sh’aifi stallion Mash-hur Shammar was herd sire in the desert stud of the paramount Shaykh of the Northern Shammar, Dham Ahmad al-Dham al-Jarba. I never saw him in real life but the three photos below provide a good idea of what a desert-bred stallion looks like well … Read more
My research project about Syrian horse-racer Ahmad Ibish is progressing well, but I am not ready to share the results on this blog yet. Ibish, of Damascus, Syria, was on the top of my list of influential urban Middle Eastern horsemen of the twentieth century, along with Henri Pharaon of Beirut, Lebanon, Iskandar Qassis of … Read more
A previous entry had discussed how the young children of Shammar Shaykh (and prominent Syrian politician) Mayzar Abd al-Muhsin al-Jarba lost the ownership of their father’s prestigious marbat of Kuhaylan Krush al-Baida strain upon the latter’s death (late 1960s? early 1970s?), and how the man Mayzar had entrusted with his assets took the horses for himself. … Read more