The elusive stallion Balabil: Lebanese, Saudi or even Tunisian?

I want to follow up on the previous blog entry about the 2010 magazine article about the horses of the USA expat families working for the oil company Aramco and living in the Abqaiq gated community, in the eastern province of Saudi Arabia. I am specifically interested in this reference from the article:

“More horses arrived when Ibrahim Abu Boutain, the agriculture minister, presented Abqaiq with seven of his fine Arabians. [Four of the seven] were sired by the famous Balalil, a foundation stallion for the Tunisian National Stud.”

I am not aware of a “famous Balalil, a foundation stallion for the Tunisian National Stud“, which would be Sidi Thabet. If this piece of information turned out to be correct, it could either mean the Saudis gave the Tunisians this stallion, or less likely at that time, that the Tunisians gave the Saudis one of their stallions. This is a matter for further investigation.

However, there was an Arabian stallion by the name of Balabil (with a “b” not an “l”) racing in Beirut in the late 1940s or early 1950s in the ownership of Prince Badr Aal Saud, a son of King Abd al-Aziz Aal Saud.

This Balabil is mentioned in the book of Syrian author ‘Ali al-Barazi, on page 133, in a discussion about large racehorse stables at the Beirut racetrack. The image below is a snapshot of that mention. I have circled the word “Balabil”.

The following translation of the Arabic passage is mine:

“Walking on the footsteps of H.R.H. Prince Mansour [son of King Abd al-Aziz ibn Saud, and the owner of a large stable at the Beirut racetrack – EAD] is his brother H.R.H. Prince Badr ibn Saud, who launched his own stables in Beirut, which brought together a nucleus of the best horses; [his stud] will grow and prosper because of his efforts, which we thank. Good results [i.e., in the races] have begun to show. The stars among his horses have begun to rise, and among these Namnum and Balabil and Sawlajan, and others. God willing, they will be followed by others among the best of his horses.”. 

It is my belief that this Balabil was very likely the sire of Sindidah (Balaybil x Saree’ah) who, according to her export documents, was bred by the Saud Royal family in 1954, and according to the same article, sold by King Saud to an Aramco family in 1957. So to recap:

1. Four of “seven fine horses” (“Ruks”, “Cinnamon, “Princess” and “Rafyk”) giften to Aramco families by government official Ibrahim Abu Butain in 1965 were sired by a “famous Balalil” (with an l). Two of the other seven horses incuding the dam of “Ruks” were race horses.
2. There was a Balabil (with a b) race horse in Beirut in the early 1950s, in the ownership of a brother of King Saud ibn Abd al-Aziz.
3. One of the 12 horses sold by King Saud to Aramco families in 1957 was Sindidah, sired by “Balaybil, a Hamdani of the Sa’ud family”.

Note: Of the two spellings, Balabil and Balalil, the latter looks like it could be a mistake: the word has no meaning in the Arabic language. Balabil, on the other hand, as the plural of Bulbul, is the Arabic word for the nightingale bird. In Lebanon but also in Egypt, the name is regularly give to race horses, such as these two different horses on the Egyptian racetrack, in 1988 and 2003, the horse running in 2003 being owned by a Saudi racehorse owner.