EDITOR'S NOTE: Interest of Western breeders, particularly Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse raisers, in some Thoroughbred blood lines, prompted us to ask Mr. Raswan for a story on Turk horses. The relationship of the Arabian, Barb and Turk horses to the Thoroughbred is not clearly understood by most horsemen nor is it realized what Barbs and Turks are offshoots of the Arabian. In our opinion Mr. Raswan is the only man qualified by contact with all three horses in their native habitat to give a modern explanation. His remarks on Palomino come as quite a surprise.

THE VARIOUS TYPES of Arabians, from race horses to cavalry and show types, were recognized in Europe centuries ago in spite of the fact that any Arabian is and always has been easily distinguished as belonging to the breed regardless of which strain he followed. Certain European stud farms, however, bred certain types exclusively, depending on the utility they expected to exact from them. Continental Europe specialized on the cavalry type, which was in great demand. This was a medium sized horse, fifteen hands, a great weight carrier, gentle, of remarkable endurance and courage and handsome enough to match a good-looking man in a splendid uniform riding in a military parade or review.

NEEDLESS TO say, the Arabians selected for cavalry development were the KUHAYLAT and SAQLAWIYAT, able to improve ordinary native breeds. These horses appeared on the continent during the eighteenth century. Later, 1860 onward, the Thoroughbred type began to be used because of the influence of the English Thoroughbred.

MANY EUROPEANS, studying the development of the racing horses, went in the eighteenth and nineteenth century into Asiatic Russia, Turkey and Persia to investigate horse breeding, well knowing the Turk horse took a prominent part in the development of racing in England. They found outstanding types among the Turcomans, central Asiatic Tartar tribes migrating between the Caspian and Aral Sea, across desert and prairie-like plains. Turcoman horses were handsome, of unbelievable endurance, much taller than the Arabian and in great demand among neighboring people. Horse breeding was an important source of income to the Turcomans, as Russians, Turks, Afghans and Persians came to purchase horses from them.

GENERAL BENNINGSEN, an Austrian authority on cavalry horses who traveled extensively in Persia and adjoining countries, wrote in 1809 that Turcoman and Kurdish horses as well as those of Karabagh, Persia and Chorosan, an ancient Parthian province whose horsemen were famous warriors, were rich in Arabian blood.

THE ARABS, invading Persia 636 A.D. and remaining there 585 years, rode their desert steeds from Arabia, as they did to other parts of Asia, Africa and Europe which they conquered. Native horses in these dominated countries were not particularly well bred, enduring or beautiful before the Arabians came, but continuous breeding of the desert blood to the conquered horses produced outstanding types notably the Turcoman of the plains beside the Caspian Sea.

SHAYKH Muhammad' Abd Ar-Rahman At-Tay, whom I visited last in 1928 in northern Mesopotamia told me that his MUNIQI HADRUJ, racing type Arabians, came from a cross with a stallion that one of his forefathers brought from Asterabad by way of Bushire, Persian Gulf, Basra. A Turcoman on his pilgrimage to the Holy City had visited his tribe and became an inseparable friend of the old Sheykh. Returning to the Caspian Sea the Turcoman persuaded his Bedouin friend to join him and they left with a number of slaves, gazelle hounds, falcons and Arabian horses. Two years later the Tayi chieftain returned with his entourage and brought a number of Turcoman horses, among them a splendid sire that was bred to a MUNIQIYAH mare.

IT MUST be remembered that the Tayi remained in the middle of the Arabian desert until the 17th century when they moved north to Iraq, on the border of southeastern Turkey. At that time thy were famous for their pure-in-the-strain horses but not any more today.

I WOULD advise to read the descriptions by old travelers Ker-Porter, Frazer, kinneir, Generals Malcolm and Bennigsen, Muravive, Jourdain, Morier, Elphinstone who I remember gave much information on horse breeding in Persia, Turkey and Asiatic Russia. Malcolm and Elphinstone say (I have not their books but I quote from notes I took twenty-five years ago [This would be about 1917] that Turcoman horses more than any other oriental or eastern horses, resemble the English race horse for size, 15 to 16 hands, long bodied, strong limbed, with excellent temperament, very courageous and of unbelievable endurance. They often covered 80 miles every day for two weeks or more on their raiding expeditions. Without dismounting, Turcomans ride their horses 40 miles at a canter, Frazer says, and they cover the distance form Bukhara to Teheran, almost five hundred miles, in six days period.

I CAN testify to a similar feat of endurance. When I went from Arabia to Persia in 1936 I stayed in Teheran where I met a Turcoman chief who had arrived from Samarkand on horseback n eleven days, a distance equal to that from New York to Miami or San Diego to Seattle. The horse which I saw in a blacksmith shop of the Bazaar was lean as a greyhound, about 15.2, a dark chestnut mare with a blaze and two white hind feet. Head rather long, eyes big but set high, jowls large and wide, profile line of face straight but the forehead was wide. Her neck was long, shoulder, hind quarters, forearm, cannon bone were models of perfection but the back was somewhat long, hind legs straight and perfect, good hocks and knees, pasterns long but strong, good tall withers with croup slanting, tail set high and carried high. This Turcoman mare showed the strain of her long hard journey but she was ridden every day while in Teheran until her master left for his tribe a thousand miles away.

THERE WERE many Turcoman horses in Persia. The mounted police and cavalry rode them as did the wealthy village chiefs owning horses that could be taken for tall but purebred Arabians of the JILFAN, ABU URQUB and MUNIQI strains.

THE FINEST of these animals were not less than $750.00, some as much as $2000 while ordinary Turcomans sold for $150. These figures are Frazer's which correspond with horse prices in Arabia, Syria and Iraq.

BEFORE I close my remarks about Turcoman horses I want to draw attention to some of the ancient writers who mentioned the horses of old Media, the land which bordered on the Southern Caspian Sea from Persia to Turkmenia. Aelian, living two thousand years ago, describes the horses of Media as tall and beautiful, of proud bearing and graceful. I refer also to Diodor, Strabo and Arrian, who should be read by horse lovers. Alexander the Great on his second journey through Media found sixty-thousand horses there, according to Arrian and Diodor.

THE HORSES of Nisaea are described by Oppian in the second century; "excelling in beauty all other horses is the horse of Nisaea," and then he goes on to say they are gentle and obedient to the rein, have small heads and FLAXEN MANES (honey-yellow). Favorinus mentioned the Gilvus (golden-yellow) color of their manes. In fact his descriptions of the Nisaean horse fits the Isabelle horse of Spain, the light-golden-reddish horse with flaxen mane and tail. Philostratus and Herdot speak also of these Palominos of Persia and Palemon whom General Bennigsen two thousand years later (1909) quotes on the honey yellow color of the Nisaean horses and later calls "The Isabellen horses of Nisaea as Palemon's steeds."

IT IS VERY possible the Spaniard took this word Palomino from Palemon's book when he described the honey golden colored horse of Persia. Most travelers in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries who left records of their journeys mentioned Palomino type horses in Persia and Turkmenia. The horse called the Yellow Turk which was so famous in the founding of the Thoroughbred breed in England also suggests the Palomino color. He was probably a Turcoman.

MANY TURCOMAN horses are reported in early Thoroughbred registrations, also in the Arab stud book in England. Merv, for example, not an Arabian but as stated, a Turcoman horse brought to England by General Baker. Also Nubian horses and others from the Sahara were registered, some even brought in as Arabs by the Blunts before they went to Arabia and recognized the true strains.

I WILL FINISH this article with a few notes and corrections which should be checked by all Arabian breeders in America and England.

MESHURA, MUNIQUIYAH mare imported in 1881 was not purchased from the famous Ali Pasha Sherif of Egypt, but from a Turkish official called Ali Pasha at Deyr on the Euphrates River.

ARABIANS WHICH the Blunts themselves or their friends imported were mostly of the classic type. I have checked and analyzed many thousands of Arabian pedigrees and among them also the Blunt horses. Here is what I found out and it should prove a most important discovery.

OF THIRTY-NINE imported Arabian stallions and brood mares twenty-four were pure-in-the-strain: Jerboa, Pharoa's(sic) dam, Saoud, Dajania, Hagar, Abeyan, Furshan's dam (imp. 1911), Kuhilet El Krush (imp. 1927), Perghi's mare, Saadun, Sahub (sic), Saade, Horra, Bozra, Meshura's dam, Dafina, Kars, Damask Rose, Burning Bush, Purple Stock, Darley, Azz, Wazir, Bint Nura.

FRIENDS OF the Blunts imported the following seven which were all pure-in-the-strain: Yataghan, Haidee, Zulielika, Joktan, Ishmael, Kesia, Nimr (1914), and eleven other of the Blunt horses were pure-in-the-strain too: Mabrouka, Feyda, Aida (I), Ghalaya, Bint Roda, Ibn Nura, Gahrran, Ibn Mesaoud, Jemla, Meroe, Bushra. This covers practically the greatest part of the Blunt foundation stock. To these we may add seven more pure-in-the-strain horses in Ali Pasha Sherif and Blunt pedigrees: Hamasa, Aziza (I), Jamilel Ahmar, Mahrousa, Bint Durra, Jemla, Nasr (I), Ibn Bint Izz.

THE REST of the Ali Pasha Sherif horses, including those which Blunts acquired at the famous auction sale March 26, 1897 in Cairo were every one of the KUHAYLAN-SAQLAWI and related strains not a single one being of MUNIQI or their related strains.

IT SEEMS unbelievable but it is true and here are the names: Abu Khasheb, Mahruss, Bint Helwa, Fulana, Jellabieh (1897 sale), Johara, Kasida, Makbula, Feysul, Badia, Shahwan, Sobha, Merzuk, Mesaoud, Azz (Izz). Forty-nine pure-in-the-strain horses and fifteen of the related strains. Even the few imported MUNIQIYAT were of pure strain.

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