The Chevalier D’Arvieux’s TRAVELS IN Arabia the Desert
Originally published London, 1718
CHAPTER XI Of the Arab Horses
from the KHAMSAT Volume 2 Number 1 January 1985
The Khamsat introduction:
This is a most amusing reprint from a very long time ago (1718) in a form of English seldom seen or read in many years. We have reprinted it without modifying any of the phrases or spellings so it will read somewhat differently than we are used to but it provides some interesting insights into bedouin life with their horses as observed nearly 300 years ago. We thank Dr. Sherman Stinson for submitting it to us.
*****
There’s not the sorriest Arab but has his Horses. The Arabs had rather be without the most necessary Things in the World, than want a Nag to go about their Affairs, to seek their Fortunes upon the High-ways, and to make their Escape from their Enemies with.
They usually ride upon Mares, as properest for their Business; Experience has taught ‘em that they bear Fatigue, Hunger and Thirst better than Horses; they are gentler, less vicious, and bring ‘em every Year a Colt, which they presently sell, or keep it if it be a fine one and of a good Stock to make Money of it when ’tis fit for Backing: Their Mares never neigh; which is very convenient for ‘em in their Ambuscades to surprise Passengers; and they accustom ‘em so well to be together, that they will sometimes stand a whole Day, and in great Numbers, without incommoding one another.
The Turks on the contrary, don’t love Mares: The Arabs sell them their Horses which they won’t keep for Stallions, because of the Inconvenience to ‘em in their Troops. They are never fix’d in any one Place’ they are all People that go and come just where their Service calls ‘em: Their’s are Stone-horses, and it would be impossible to govern ‘em if they smelt any mares amongst ‘em. An Arab would not be reckon’d an honest Man if he had not a Mare to bestride. They call her Serras, which is a general Name for Horses; and they call a Horse Hhussan, which signifies only Curry’d or a Curriable Creature. The Turks, on the contrary, think it a Dishonour to mount a Mare, saying, that there is nothing so noble as a Horse; that a Cavalier, who is to make all the World his Country, ought not to embarrass himself with any sort of Female, nor any thing that may look like a kind of Family.
I told you, that the common Arabs ne’er mind their own Genealogy; if they do but know the fathers and Grandsires ’tis enough; They are usually unacquainted with the very Name of the Predecessors or their Families; but they are very curious about the Extraction of their Horses. There are some which they call Kehhilan, that are noble; others Aatiq, that are of ancient Race, but match’d below themselves; after those come the last Kind call’d Guidich, as much as to say, a Pack-horse, or by way of contempt, a Jade, these are very cheap’ the second are dearer, they are sold however at a venture, without proving their Descent. They that understand ‘em well, find as beautiful and good one’s among them, as among the first sort, and set no less Value on ‘em. They never let the Mares of the first Rank be Cover’d but by a Stallion of the same Quality. They know by long Custom the Race of all the Horses they or their Neighbours have; they knowe the Name, the Surname, the Coat, and Marks of every Horse and Mare in particular; and when they have no noble Horses of their own, they borrow some of their Neighbours, paying so much Money, to Cover their Mares, and that before Witness, who attest it under their Hand and Seal before the Emir’s Secretary, or some other public Person, where the whole Generation, together with the Names of the Creatures, is set down in Form. Witnesses are likewise call’d when the Mare has Foal’d; and another Certificate is made; where they put down the Sex, the Shape, the Coat, the Makes of the colt, and the time of its Birth, which they give to the Party that buys it. Those Tickets determine the Price of Horses; And they sell ‘em dear the least are worth Five hundred Crowns in ready Money, or in Exchange against other Cattle, according as they bargain. The Emir Turabeye had a Mare that he would not part with for Five thousand Crowns, because she had travell’d three Days and three Nights without drawing Bit, and by that means got him clear off from those that pursued him. Nothing indeed was handsomer than that Mare, as well for her Size, her sharp, her Coat, and her Marks, as for her Gentleness, her Strength, and her Swiftness. They never tied her up when she was not bridled and saddled: She went into all the Tents with a little colt of her’s, and so visited every body that us’d to kiss her, make much of her, and give her anything. She would often go over a heap of Children that were lying at the Bottom of the Tents, and would be a long time looking where to step, as she came in or out, not to hurt ‘em.
Dr. Amin Zaher, D.V.M., M.S.
From “This Issue and Next” (Western Horseman Mar/Apr’48)
Dr. Amin Zaher, D.V.M., M.S., has recently come to the United States from Egypt to obtain a Ph.D. in genetics and animal breeding. His thesis title is “The Genetic History of the Arab in Ämerica.” Prior to his arrival in the states he occupied the position of Arabian horse breeder in the stud of the Royal Agricultural Society of Egypt for twelve years. The Egyptian ministry of agriculture has requested that he visit the various Arabian Stud farms while he is in America. Already he has visited many of the most prominent, such as Kellog, (sic) Dickinson, Babson, Van Vleet, Raswan, Tormohlen, Draper, Bazy Miller and many others. Just so that he would have plenty to occupy his time he has been judging Arabian horse shows and has kindly consented to write three articles for The Western Horseman. The first, which appears in this issue, is on the background. This will be followed by articles on the Arab in Egypt and America today.
Amir Abdelkader Algazairy, a nineteenth century Morroccan nobleman, tells us that some Arabs of the Azed tribe went to Jerusalem to congratulate Solomon on his marriage to the Queen of Sheba. Having completed their mission, they asked him to give them food to take on their long journey. He gave them a stallion descended from the Ismail stock and said to them:
“When you are hungry, place your best rider on this horse and arm him with a stout lance; by the time you have collected your wood and kindled a flame you will see him returning with the fruit of a successful chase.”
The Azed did this and never failed to obtain a gazelle or an ostrich. Therefore they called this horse “Zad Elrakeb,” meaning “provision for the rider.” Unfortunately Amir Abdelkader did not give any description of the stallion. Later when bred he produced some mighty sons and daughters.
The first Egyptian records of the horse are very ancient. A wall painting shows an Egyptian hunter, and it was drawn about 1400 B.C. The horse has a good many of the original, desirable characteristics of the Arabian such as the dished face, the large eye, the sensitive muzzle, the long swan neck, the well rounded rump, and the cocked tail, all of which are still highly esteemed in the Arabian horse. Whether this kind of horse existed in Egypt at that time, or whether the horse originated in the mind of the artist, nobody can tell, but the latter seems improbable.
Before the rise of Mohammedanism the famous Arabian poets, Imro-olkais, Amr Ibn Abi Rabeah, and Antara wrote their masterpieces of Arabic verse. In these they described many of the characteristics, colors, and habits of the Arabian horse. From their description one can tell that they were talking of the horse of the desert.
The Bedouins of Arabia had the Arabian horse, loved it, and in their life it played an extremely important role. The sayings of the prophet Mohammed reveal the significance of the Arabian to them. The following are good examples:
1. Bounty and happiness are ever on horseback; horses are gold that one may hold.
2. Every Moslem must have as many horses as he can afford.
Illiad: 1975 – 1991
By Amber Finnigan
El Khala Arabians
Knoxville, Maryland
Arabian Visions May 1991
Although he was only with us for a very short time, none of us at El Khala Arabians will ever forget Illiad (Ibn Alamein x Oriole). He came here on lease from Jim Gribben in May, 1990. His reputatiion for being in Jim’s words, a “Breeder’s Dream Stallion,” preceded him and he certainly lived up to his reputation. In fact Lad, as he was affectionately called, would have been anyone’s “Dream Horse.”
Neither my husband Dave nor I had met Lad before he came to live with us. We had seen pictures of him and thought he was very handsome. However, the muscular, glistening bay Davenport stallion that pranced off the trailer trumpeting his arrival to our other horses that day in May, was even more spectacular than we had imagined. Lad was a very dominant stallion, in that his very presence said to everyone here (Horse and human), “I’m special. I’m ‘King’, I’m your protector.”
Illiad was all stallion but never mean, or aggresssive. He got along fine with our other two stallions. There was of course, the usual snorting and trumpeting on both sides, but it was obvious that both Sheikh and Watir accepted Lad and had no need to challenge him.
By Sidney Couch
White Horse Artworks
RD 1 Box 179
Millerton NY 12546
Arabian Visions May 1988
all rights reserved
Call me fatalistic, but I knew early on that when it came to Arabians, I wanted a Davenport. My friend Peggy had loaned me every book in her library, and Homer Davenport’s My Quest of the Arabian Horse compelled an immediate and visceral response. Yes, the Egyptians were exquisite. The Crabbet Arabians were lovely. The old California and American lines were classic. But the Davenport — well, a common man with a dream up and went to Araby, and he trafficked with the common man of the black tents, and brought home the common desert-bred horse, undiluted and un-Anglicized, shaped only by the desert and the hand of the ragged bedu. This tough, wiry, scrubby bit of flint and silk was exactly what I wanted.
In addition to loaning me books, Peggy lured me with “Geym,” (as in gem), her old Arab gelding, whom I rode for a summer. At 25, he was as game as any horse I’ld ridden, a grand old gentleman. Geym was Peggy’s Special One. ”There’ll never be another Geym,” she says.
Over time I looked at many horses. I corresponded with folks and made friends. And when I made the trip to Upland Farm in Massachusetts, I was convinced that I would purchase a horse from Joyce Gregorian Hampshire. Here were Davenports in the flesh. Now these bits of flint and silk were a far cry from what I was used to looking at in the big magazines. Definitely not Anglicized. There were not Disney horses.
by Claire Garceau of
El Janan Arabians, Blackstone, Mass.
Arabian Horse News August 1972
Davenports “happened” to me many year ago when I bought my first half-Arabian mare, sired by the Davenport stallion KOKHLESON (Ashmar x Kokhle). I found this mare to be very different from any horse I had ever known. Besides being versatility itself, she had a special “human” quality I now know to be particular to Davenport Arabians.
Later on, we acquired a nice-looking purebred stallion and were having a fine time riding and showing him. One day I was browsing through the NEWS and saw an advertisement for Craver Farms and their Davenports. I wrote to Charles and, after several friendly and informative letters, we sold our stallion and were picking an unborn foal from Charles’ list of expecting mares. I chose DHAREBAH (Dhareb x Antarah), who was in foal to TRIPOLI (Hanad x Poka), hoping for a colt. Well, “he,” JANAN ABINOAM 11433 was born, and Charles kindly kept him a year until we could go to Illinois to bring him home. We brought him home in late June and showed him at the New England Arabian Show in July, where, to our delight, he took second in his class.
He was not shown again until he was old enough to be under saddle. We showed mostly at open shows; there weren’t many with Arabian classes then. He was shown both English and western in a variety of classes that ran from pleasure to road hack to costume and everything between! When permitted, he went in lead line, walk-trot, and regular equitation classes. During all this he continued to be everyone’s favorite trail-riding horse too!
In May 1968, he was in a terrible trailer accident and there were doubts that he would come through it. But he did, and the vet said it was his intelligence that did it. No matter how he hurt him, “Binnie” seemed to know that Dr. Maury was trying to help him. He made a remarkably fast recovery and soon was being ridden bareback by one of his little friends, still with an open hole in his side. It has left scars that he will always carry; it took over one hundred stitches to put him together inside before the vet began on the skin outside. Other than the scars, it has not bothered him, and we are very thankful.
copyright 1988 by JOYCE GREGORIAN HAMPSHIRE
Upland Farm
Holliaron, Maine
all right reserved
Arabian Visions May1972
Of course I am prejudiced. The first of my Davenport horses was — and is — the third TRIPOLI/DHAREBAH foal, JANAN ABINOAM. Better known as “Binni,” a.k.a. “The King of Upland Farm,” he is a 1960 grey stallion. In the last few years, more than 20 other Davenport horses have joined him and the other Arabians at my farm, including Binni’s full siblings PRINCE HAL (a 1959 grey stallion), PERICLES (a 1965 grey stallion) and LADY FAIR (a 1966 grey mare). The head of the family, SIR (a 1958 grey stallion) is in charge of Alice Martin Kuhn’s Star West stables, and the other full sibling LADY GREY (a 1961 grey mare) is now deceased. What makes these horses so special?
First, there is the simple fact that a successful nick was recognized and repeated often enough to create a family of siblings, a rarity in the horse-breeding world. Mares that produce will tend to be put to many different sires. When a mare has most or all of her foals by one sire and they are all identifiably worthy individuals, that fact alone is noteworthy. For example FADJUR has many famous offspring, but the family he produced from SAKI is particularly well-known. DHAREBAH’s foals by ARAMIS, MONSOON and TYBALT were also exceptional but their fame is a little overwhelmed by the size and vigor of her family by TRIPOLI.
Harara x Moliah (foaled 1921)
Author not given
from “The Horse Lover” Apr/May ‘51
A brief history of the progenitor of the Antez line; his sons and daughters are carrying on their great sire’s reputation in the show ring, on the track.
Antez was foaled in California in 1921 from stock tracing entirely to the horses brought from the Arabian desert by Homer Davenport in 1906. His sire HARARA and his dam Moliah had been bred at the Hingham Stock Farm in Massachusetts by Mr. Peter B. Bradley.
Later Antez was acquired by Mr. W. K. Kellogg [1925 -- Antez was 4] at whose Pomona California Ranch the horse was featured as one of the “tops” of that famous “Romance of Pomona” ranch and for several years he was many times a champion at shows on the West coast in halter classes as well as being first on several occasions at five gaits under saddle.
In 1933 at age of 12 years, he was purchased by General J. M. Dickinson of Tenn.
He was used at Dickinson’s Travelers Rest Arabian Stud Farm for breeding purposes and in the 1933 National Arabian show he stood 3rd in the Mature Stallion championships and his daughter Fayadan won the championship over about a dozen other fine weanlings. Since then his sons and daughters have gone on to win many honors in the show rings of America.
Antez today stands undisputed as one of best sires in America as to passing on his strong breed character to his get and they in turn are passing it on to their produce.
by Jerry J. Embry, M.D.
The Arabian Horse Journal, April 1982
An old adage goes “There is nothing better for the inside of a man than the outside of a horse.” In this age of pressures and uncertainties, even fears, for some of us there is something fundamentally restorative to the human spirit in our association with horses. This is true whether one is in the barn with a foaling mare or in the saddle attempting to master the classic rules of the past which are forever necessary to good riding.
My association with horses began in 1966 when I decided to buy a first riding horse. I was engaged in my psychiatric training at the University of Colorado Medical Center in Denver and thought the Colorado countryside would be a fine place to ride. I mentioned this in passing to one of my supervisors, Dr. Fred Mimmack, who was, unbeknownst to me, a very knowledgeable horseman, and he suggested that instead of buying I take riding lessons from a European dressage master who had located in the area. That was only the first of many pieces of good advice from Fred as I entered the world of horses. Fred subsequently introduced me to the Arabian horse and particularly to the Davenport lines. During my stay in Colorado he obtained the Davenport stallion KAMIL-IBN-SALAN and explained the significance of his Bedouin origins. He also sold me DAHN, a Half-Arab mare, which I bred to KAMIL-IBN-SALAN in 1968 before moving to Knoxville, Tennessee. At that time my interest was in riding rather than in any particular breed of horse, but Fred’s Davenports, and especially KAMIL-IBN-SALAN, made impressions that would greatly influence my later direction.
(foaled 1924)
by Grace Dashiell
Arabian Horse News(?) 1950
The J.G. MacConnells have a pleasant ranch home near the foothills not far from Chatswarth, Calif. Close by there is a stable, corrals, and a pasture where they keep a small band of Arabian horses, headed by the white classic Arabian stallion, Dhareb (AHC-537), which they purchased from the W. K. Kellogg Institute in 1932. Dhareb, now 26 years old, is one of the few old classic stallions of “all-Davenport” bloodlines still living.
Dhareb’s sire was the famous Letan who was a favorite of Will Rogers since he was an excellent stock horse. His dam was Moliah who was bred by the Hingham Stock Farm.
Dhareb’s four grandparents, *Muson, *Jedah, *Hamrah, and *Wadduda, were all imported by Davenport in 1906. Davenport’s 1908 catalog states that *Muson was a horse of spectacular beauty. He descends from the famous “Listening-mare” which warned her Bedouin master of the approach of raiders which struck that night and only the mare and a few escaped. Thus the name was given Kehilet Muson, or “listening horses”. *Muson created a sensation in Madison Square Garden in 1907 when ridden by Buffalo Bill the first two evenings of his Wild West Show. He was much admired in the exhibit made before President Theodore Roosevelt and his guests. *Jedah was a brown mare of Sheykh Aba Hassan. She was taken from the tribe of Jedah who got her from the Shammar. She was a remarkable walker, according to Davenport. *Hamrah was considered one of the best of the importation by Davenport. He was a beautiful golden bay of immense power and fine action. Without any preparation and never before having run at top speed, when only three in an impromptu mile-race, he ran the last quarter in 29 seconds. Many who saw him preferred him to any of the importations. His dam was the beautiful *Urfah.
By Aaron Dudley
Photos from Spide Rathbun Collection
from The Western Horseman Mar ’52
Probably no horse of modern time — including the favorite mounts of our current TV and movie cowboys — has enjoyed greater popularity or been viewed by more people than a proud little grey Arab named Jadaan.
That name probably means little to the average horseman, and certainly nothing to the millions of curious who have seen him, but when you say he’s “the horse that Rudolph Valentino rode” there’s an immediate reaction.
Millions trekked to the famous W. K. Kellogg Arabian Horse ranch at Pomona, Calif., upon the matinee idol’s death to see this horse and view trappings the dashing Latin used in his popular desert pictures of the 1920s. And although the ranch had many fine horses, fully 90 percent of the visitors who came wanted to see “the Valentino horse.” Women crowded around his box stall, wore the stable door smooth pressing for a better look at the sleek stallion. And they stood to silent near-reverence when Jadaan was led riderless into the arena carrying his former master’s colorful desert regalia.
This idolizing of a movie hero’s horse continued almost unabated for 19 years until the little horse died in 1945. And then avid Valentino zealots had his skeleton preserved and enshrined in the University of California’s School of Animal Husbandry.
