The Majesty of the Horse: An Illustrated History

PREHISTORIC – MONGOLIA – RARE

HEIGHT

Up to 14 h.h.

APPEARANCE

A small, stocky horse of primitive appearance with a large, coarse head. Stocky, muscular neck, with a distinctive short, upright mane. Shoulders are straight, withers are flat, and chest is deep. Short, sloping croup and short legs with strong, dense bone. Hooves are narrow and oval, but very tough.

COLOR

Dun, often yellow, sometimes with dark markings such as a dorsal stripe and stripes on legs.

APTITUDE

Undomesticated

SOUTHWEST OF MONGOLIA’S CAPITAL, Ulaanbaatar, in the foothills of the southern Khenti mountain range, stretches the magnificent Hustai National Park. Here, amid the sublime steppe landscape of rugged hills, open river valleys, and dense forest, roams the Asiatic Wild Horse, Przewalski’s Horse, or the Taki as it is known to the local people. The herds of these small, primitive horses that live within the sanctity of the park represent a phenomenal international achievement in the reintroduction of these animals to their original wild habitat. Despite their unprepossessing looks, these horses are among the most important and are certainly the oldest living breed of horse that still exists in its original form. They also provide a link between modern horse breeds and the earliest horses that roamed the prehistoric landscape.

The breed hails from the vast steppes of Central Asia and in prehistoric times made its way into Europe, where its likeness was frequently recorded in cave paintings. From extraordinary images such as those at the Chauvet Cave in the Ardèche region in France, which date back approximately 30,000 years, we have a clear vision of just how little the breed’s appearance has changed in the intervening millennia.

The Taki is small, rarely more than 13 hands high, and typically has a coarse and heavy head. The coat is dun with dark legs (which can often exhibit zebra-type stripes), a dark mane and tail, and a pale underbelly. Unlike other horse breeds, the mane grows upright to a length of approximately 8 inches (20 cm), and the tail is more similar to that of a donkey, with short hairs on the upper part and long hairs at the bottom. Most significantly, these horses have sixty-six chromosomes as opposed to the sixty-four of the domestic horse. These differences from domestic horse breeds, combined with the intractable nature of the Taki, which is almost impossible to tame on any level, have led to some doubts that it is a direct ancestor to modern breeds. However, despite the difference in chromosomes, the Taki is able to reproduce with the domestic horse, and the resulting progeny are fertile, although they have only sixty-five chromosomes. When further crossed to a domestic horse, the progeny return to a sixty-four chromosome count. Given the extent and predominance of the Taki from prehistory and throughout the development of the horse, it seems likely that they have contributed at a founding level to some of the more primitive Eurasian horses such as the widespread Mongolian and the horses of Tibet.

Given the extent of its history, it is not surprising that there are many conflicting accounts of the Taki, whose past remains somewhat enigmatic. During pre- and ancient history, these horses were widespread through Central Asia and Europe, but as human cultures flourished and spread, the stout little horses found their natural environment shrinking. Because of their dominant wild nature, it is unlikely that they were favored for capture and domestication, though it is possible that foals might have been domesticated if caught at a young enough age. Far more significant was their value as a consumable, and as a consequence they were widely hunted, forcing them to retreat into increasingly remote areas.

It is unclear when the Taki first disappeared from central Europe, but the first documented mention of it was in the fifteenth century when it was described by Bavarian nobleman Johann Schiltberger (1381–c. 1440) in his unpublished memoirs. Schiltberger had been captured by the Turks in the Battle of Nicopolis in 1396 and passed to the great warlord Timur (1336–1405). After Timur’s death, Schiltberger was given to Chekre, a Tatar prince whom he accompanied on a number of missions across Central Asia. It was while he was with the prince in the Tien Shan mountains that he wrote about the Taki horses, providing the first known reference to them in literature.

The next mention of the horses occurs some three centuries later by John Bell (1691–1780), a Scottish adventurer and doctor. Bell was part of an embassy to China through Siberia and the Tatar deserts, and then attended Peter the Great (1672–1725) on his expedition to Derbend and the Caspian Gates; he recounted his experiences in 1763, providing a striking account of the Taki seen in southwestern Siberia: “There is, besides, a number of wild horses, of a chesnut color; which cannot be tamed, though they are catched when foals. These horses differ nothing from the common kind in shape, but are the most watchful creatures alive.”

It was, however, Nikolai Przewalski (1839–88), explorer and colonel of the Russian Imperial Army, who is most commonly cited as rediscovering the breed when he observed them on the edge of the Gobi Desert, picking their way through the Tachin Schah mountains in 1879. Przewalski was given a Taki skin by the local Kyrgyz people, and he in turn gave the skin to the zoologist J. S. Poliakov, who was the first to give the breed its scientific description and named it Equus ferus przewalski. As news of the existence of this wild breed spread, it became a sought-after specimen for collectors, which later proved to be of great significance for the breed’s survival.

In 1882, four Przewalski horses were captured by Russian naturalists in eastern Dzungaria close to the Gobi Desert, and in the following few years more horses were caught, including thirty-two for the Duke of Bedford. In 1902, the first pair of Przewalski horses were shipped to New York for the New York Zoological Society. The capture of these Przewalski horses and their subsequent arrival in zoos and private parks in Europe occurred at an opportune moment; the horses had been on the brink of extinction, and all living Przewalskis today are descended from approximately thirteen of those caught. The last Przewalski living in its natural habitat was seen in 1968 in western Mongolia—the small, prehistoric horses had been hunted into extinction in the wild.

Though Przewalski horses still existed in captivity, they were hard to breed in this environment, and by the 1970s the numbers of horses in captivity were dangerously low, prompting a move to reintroduce the Przewalski to its natural environment and return the horse to its roots. Several release programs were implemented, including one by the Przewalski Horse Reintroduction Project of China, who released a group into the Kalamely Mountains in the Xinjiang region of China in 1985.

Another process to save the Przewalski horse was begun in the late 1970s, with the formation of the Foundation for the Preservation and Protection of the Przewalski Horse (FPPPH) by Jan and Inge Bouman in Rotterdam, who organized a careful breeding plan of horses from different captive populations and developed a computerized studbook. Over time, the FPPPH established a number of semi-reserves in the Netherlands and Germany where the horses could be kept in large areas in semi-wild conditions while still being carefully monitored. In 1990, after several years of searching, deliberation, and international diplomacy, the Hustain Nuruu area of Mongolia was agreed upon as the right place for the Przewalski reintroduction project, and two years later, the FPPPH and a dedicated breeding program from Askania Nova, Ukraine, combined to release two groups of Przewalski horses back into the wild. The area was designated a national park in 1997. Thankfully the reintroduction of the important Przewalski has been successful, and in 2008 the breed was reclassified from being “extinct in the wild” to “critically endangered,” a significant achievement.

Although the Przewalski horse has suffered a tumultuous history and survives in small numbers, its relative the Mongolian horse thrives across the steppes of Central Asia and has played a key role in the development of many horse breeds through Asia and Europe. This small, tough horse may lack beauty and refinement, but it makes up for this with its striking constitution and the enormous influence it has had on other horse breeds by passing along its tremendous stamina and hardiness. Like the Przewalski, the Mongolian is primitive in appearance, often with a heavy, coarse head, and is notably stocky. The horses, which play a central role in nomadic life on the steppes, are bred and kept in large herds and are perhaps the ultimate of versatile breeds, used for draft purposes, riding, racing, meat, milking, and sports.

TARPAN

PREHISTORIC – POLAND, RUSSIA – EXTINCT IN TRUE FORM

HEIGHT

Up to 13.2 h.h.

APPEARANCE

A heavy head with a convex profile and long ears that angle slightly to the outside. Short neck, deep chest, flat withers, and a long back with a sloping croup. Shoulders are well conformed and sloping, and legs are long, fine, and notably strong.

COLOR

A primitive dun or grullo, with a dorsal stripe, black lower legs, and often zebra markings.

APTITUDE

Riding, light draft

THE PREHISTORIC CAVE PAINTINGS in Lascaux, France, depict, with astonishing detail, two very different types of horse. One type strongly reflects the characteristics of the Asiatic Wild Horse (Przewalski); the other type, seen in a striking procession of three fine-limbed, elegant horses, bears much in common with another of history’s important breeds, the Tarpan.

The Tarpan (Russian for “wild horse”) occupies a central role in the development of horse breeds and is widely considered to be a closer relative to the modern horse than the Przewalski. Despite their physical differences, the two breeds have occasionally been confused, primarily because both wild horses roamed across a slightly similar area. The Tarpan spread across western Russia and throughout Eastern Europe and formed the basis for the chariot-driving stock of ancient cultures, from the Greeks to the Egyptians, Assyrians, Scythians, and Hittites. The prepotency of its influence can be seen particularly in the light horse breeds of Eastern Europe and Eurasia, whereas the Przewalski’s influence spread through Central Asia, down into China, and east to Japan. In particular, the Tarpan can be connected to the magnificent but diminutive Caspian horse, though perhaps of greater significance is the link believed to exist at a founding level between the Tarpan and the desert breeds of Central Asia, and possibly even the Arabian. In Europe, the Tarpan’s influence can clearly be seen in the Portuguese Sorraia—which in turn formed the basis for the majestic Iberian breeds—and in the Romanian Hucul and Polish Konik.

The Konik is the closest descendant of the Tarpan, to which it bears a strong physical resemblance. In fact, it is largely to the Konik that the modern-day Tarpan owes its existence. Like the Przewalski, the Tarpan in its pure form was hunted to extinction—the last wild Tarpan was accidentally killed in 1879 during a capture attempt, and the last Tarpan in captivity died in a Russian zoo in 1909. Several attempts have been made to breed a reconstituted Tarpan, including one by the Polish government, which established breeding herds from stock that most closely resembled the Tarpan. These herds were primarily made up of Konik ponies, and in 1936 Polish professor Tadeusz Vetulani used these Koniks to establish a program to try to re-create the Tarpan. Around the same time, Berlin Zoo director Lutz Heck and Heinz Heck of the Munich Zoo also began a breeding regimen using Konik, Icelandic, and Gotland mares with a Przewalski stallion. Eventually a fixed type of Tarpan physicality was established, with the horses referred to as Heck horses. A Heck stallion and two mares were imported to the United States in the 1950s, where they now have a dedicated following. A further horse of Tarpan characteristics, the Hegardt, was developed in the United States by Harry Hegardt (and previously Gordon Stroebel) based on crossing Mustangs with Tarpan-like ponies, also probably of Konik descent.

Despite the Tarpan’s importance, it was not actually recorded and described until around 1768, when German naturalist Samuel Gottlieb Gmelin (1744–74) captured four of the wild horses in Russia. He provided a detailed account of its appearance, which was further recorded in a drawing of a Tarpan colt in 1841. In 1912, Helmut Otto Antonius, director of the Scholbrunn Zoological Gardens in Vienna and one of the first scientists to recognize the importance of the Tarpan in the development of modern domestic horse breeds, named the Tarpan Equus caballus gmelini in recognition of Gmelin’s description; now the breed’s correct scientific name is accepted as Equus ferus ferus.

HUCUL

ANCIENT – POLAND, ROMANIA, CZECH REPUBLIC, SLOVAK REPUBLIC – COMMON

HEIGHT

Up to 14 h.h.

APPEARANCE

Robust in build with a rectangular body frame; short, strong, clean limbs; and an attractive head with large, kind eyes. Strong back, with a well-formed, muscular croup. Heavy through the neck and front end, with a broad, deep chest.

COLOR

Chestnut, bay, black, or grullo, often with a dorsal stripe and zebra markings on the legs.

APTITUDE

Riding, light draft

STRETCHING IN A STEADY ARC across central and eastern Europe are the Carpathian Mountains, Europe’s largest mountain range and home of the highly prized Hucul, or Carpathian Pony. It was here among the rugged peaks and diving valleys that the Hucul, a direct descendant of the wild Tarpan, developed. It is also a meeting point of several countries, as the borders of Romania, the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Ukraine, Serbia, and Slovakia come together, and many of these countries either claim the origin of the Hucul or raise and breed the hardy pony. The breed’s name derives from the Hutsuls, a Ukrainian culture of highlanders who rely heavily on their horses and whose history goes back many centuries. Despite being their namesake, however, the Hucul pony existed long before and was bred by the mountain tribes of Dacians, for whom the tough and enduring ponies were essential in everyday life, for transport, packing goods, and in warfare. Though they were and are ridden, the Hucul was most widely used in a draft capacity early in its history and was able to negotiate the forbidding, mountainous terrain where other horses failed. Bas-reliefs of Hucul-like ponies—showing little difference in physicality from their present form—appear on Roman monuments depicting battles between the Romans and Dacians. Even when the Dacians fell to the Romans in the battle of Sarmizegetusa in 106 C.E. they continued to breed their indomitable Hucul ponies.

Once the breed was established, the inhospitable and inaccessible mountain habitat of the Hucul contributed to maintaining its purity. The Hucul, which is noted for its quality, is thought to have developed directly from the Tarpan (it is described in early accounts as the “mountain Tarpan”), as well as through breeding with Oriental horses, Mongolian stock introduced to the area by nomadic tribes from Central Asia, and quite possibly even the Asiatic Wild Horse. Other than these relatively infrequent outside influences, the Hucul remained largely untouched until several attempts to improve the breed were made in the late nineteenth century through the introduction of other blood. Despite this, the innate Hucul characteristics—its extreme and virtually unequaled hardiness, its strength in relation to its size, and a certain air of quality not always seen in native mountain breeds—have perpetuated.

The Hucul is particularly prized in Poland and Romania, and it was in Romania that the first specialized stud farm was established at Rădăuţi in 1856, the primary aim of which was to produce Huculs for use in the Austro-Hungarian army. After some years, the stud activities floundered, but they were reactivated in 1876, and the program expanded to establish Pietrosul, Hroby, Ghoral, Gurgul, and Oushor bloodlines, with Ghoral being one of the most important and prodigious.

In 1922, thirty-three Huculs were sent to Czechoslovakia, where a new line of Gurgul horses was established, with the breeding still focused on producing horses for use in the military. The breed suffered enormous losses during both world wars, and after World War II, in light of increasing mechanization, Hucul numbers dwindled rapidly. In the 1950s, the State Forest Directorate at Murán Plain National Park in Slovakia made efforts to increase breed numbers, and then in 1972 the Czech Republic’s Association for Protection of Nature and Landscape founded the Hucul Club to implement a more effective preservation program. The initiative has been a great success, and Poland, Romania, Ukraine, Hungary, and Austria have all joined in, while the Hucul continues to be bred in Russia.

AKHAL TEKE

ANCIENT – TURKMENISTAN – RARE