3 ms·

> Lusitanian and hispanic horsemanship owes a lot to the moorish influence..., and therefore they do a lot more to put a handle on a horse This is arguable, as

> Lusitanian and hispanic horsemanship owes a lot to the moorish influence..., and therefore they do a lot more to put a handle on a horse This is arguable, as one of the earliest surviving records of horsemanship in Portugal was by Dom Duarte, a king who reigned briefly around 1280. His influeces are directly from Xenophon ("nothing forced is beautiful," etc). For the prior millennia, horsemanship had spread westward and then southward from the mongols. Islam had fantastic influence on architecture, math, language, music, and all aspects of culture, but horses were something more received for them. It has also not persisted, as outside buzkashi played by arabs and throughout central asia, their horse culture has not evolved. Especially not since the renaissance when the italian, and then french, and spanish high schools developed. If horsemanship were indeed their advantage, the kingdom of Jerusalem could not have been established either. It's fashionable to say europe was uncivilized but for its invaders, but its horsemanship predates islamic invasions.

082349872349872 3y ago
I'll have to get a hold of a copy of Bennett, Conquerors: Roots of New World Horsemanship by Dr. Deb Bennett to check her arguments that Persian horsemanship[0] went both north around the Med (via Xenophon) and south (via the north Africans). Certainly the Byerley Turk (1680s), the Darley Arabian (1704), and the Godolphin Arabian (1729) are some post-renaissance contributions to one[1] of my favourite breeds. Lagniappe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darius_the_Great#Accession https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darius_the_Great#Accession Top dressing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfiTTyi2He8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfiTTyi2He8 (if my indoor were this small, I guess my stock would have to learn how to back out of the corners too?) [0] steppe riding yields the jineta seat, but not the brida seat (which would have been useful for cataphracts?) [1] pedantically: three, as I prefer racing quarters, etc.
- motohagiography 3y ago
  Whether the moors included pre-Hellenistic Persians would be the crux of this statement, as typically that refers specifically to Islamic invaders almost a thousand years later whose architecture and culture influenced Iberian penninsula, and not to the whole African continent. Breeding and horsemanship were also separate, as the modern school that survives today came via Grisone, Pignatelli, de Pluvinel, and eventually l'Hotte & Baucher, with not a lot of written innovation since. These are all european. However, to dresser means to be arranged and fit for a purpose, and arabian stock are used for arabian purposes. (https://youtu.be/D89RO-5oSeM?feature=shared https://youtu.be/D89RO-5oSeM?feature=shared) Personally, I prefer to ride.
  - 082349872349872 3y ago
    True, but it's evening here so I'm done riding for the day. What sort of riding do you do? My three main interests are (a) will the horse crowd other stock under pressure, (b) how quickly can it roll back*, and only then (c) top speed. I am not saying moors included persians; I am saying Bennett's hypothesis was that the vaquero style of riding in california came via spain, the moors, and the arabs, from persia (and maybe they got it from Kikkuli?). Naturally anything that passed along the south of the Med would also have travelled along the north as well. What you are calling arabian purposes in that video is called a "halter class" for any breed; you can even find halter QHs which bear the same resemblance to working cow horses that show dogs have to working dogs. Romans typically used mercenary cavalry, of which some were north african: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_cavalry#Allied_cavalry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_cavalry#Allied_cavalry see also https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_parure_des_cavaliers_et_l%27insigne_des_preux https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_parure_des_cavaliers_et_l%2... ; I don't read arabic so I'm much more familiar with the authors you mentioned (in particular Pluvinel, de La Guérinière, and some englishman in exile whose name I forget; Baucher I find worthless: he himself was obviously talented, but he never developed a method, as none of his students reproduced his results) than with any of the arabic literature, eg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furusiyya https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furusiyya . Consider that if the iberian cavalry had been superior to moorish cavalry, the Reconquista would not have taken ~750 years. If you want I'll try to dig up the reference, but one of Napoleon's cavalry generals during the Egypt campaign said something like "3 of them can take 10 of us, but 100 vs 100 is an even match, and 300 of us can take 1'000 of them", so I think he admired their individual horsemanship, while acknowledging the advantage of european unit discipline in larger formations. The french would later get outdone at this by the prussians, who took minimal trooper skill, maximal unit effectiveness to its logical conclusion in the Franco-Prussian War. Maybe something we can agree upon is that lusitanian/iberian riding has some unique features (from wherever they arose) because of the nature of extensive, pastoral, cattle herding? Lagniappe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_sOWLl6kVw&t=250s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_sOWLl6kVw&t=250s (note his reins) * > "By the Blue Gums of the Back Blocks," snorted the troop-horse, "do you mean to say that you aren't taught to be bridle-wise in your business? How can you do anything, unless you can spin round at once when the rein is pressed on your neck? It means life or death to your man, and of course that's life and death to you. Get round with your hind legs under you the instant you feel the rein on your neck. If you haven't room to swing round, rear up a little and come round on your hind legs. That's being bridle-wise."

082349872349872 3y ago

I'll have to get a hold of a copy of Bennett, Conquerors: Roots of New World Horsemanship by Dr. Deb Bennett to check her arguments that Persian horsemanship[0] went both north around the Med (via Xenophon) and south (via the north Africans). Certainly the Byerley Turk (1680s), the Darley Arabian (1704), and the Godolphin Arabian (1729) are some post-renaissance contributions to one[1] of my favourite breeds. Lagniappe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darius_the_Great#Accession https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darius_the_Great#Accession Top dressing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfiTTyi2He8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfiTTyi2He8 (if my indoor were this small, I guess my stock would have to learn how to back out of the corners too?) [0] steppe riding yields the jineta seat, but not the brida seat (which would have been useful for cataphracts?) [1] pedantically: three, as I prefer racing quarters, etc.

motohagiography 3y ago
Whether the moors included pre-Hellenistic Persians would be the crux of this statement, as typically that refers specifically to Islamic invaders almost a thousand years later whose architecture and culture influenced Iberian penninsula, and not to the whole African continent. Breeding and horsemanship were also separate, as the modern school that survives today came via Grisone, Pignatelli, de Pluvinel, and eventually l'Hotte & Baucher, with not a lot of written innovation since. These are all european. However, to dresser means to be arranged and fit for a purpose, and arabian stock are used for arabian purposes. (https://youtu.be/D89RO-5oSeM?feature=shared https://youtu.be/D89RO-5oSeM?feature=shared) Personally, I prefer to ride.
- 082349872349872 3y ago
  True, but it's evening here so I'm done riding for the day. What sort of riding do you do? My three main interests are (a) will the horse crowd other stock under pressure, (b) how quickly can it roll back*, and only then (c) top speed. I am not saying moors included persians; I am saying Bennett's hypothesis was that the vaquero style of riding in california came via spain, the moors, and the arabs, from persia (and maybe they got it from Kikkuli?). Naturally anything that passed along the south of the Med would also have travelled along the north as well. What you are calling arabian purposes in that video is called a "halter class" for any breed; you can even find halter QHs which bear the same resemblance to working cow horses that show dogs have to working dogs. Romans typically used mercenary cavalry, of which some were north african: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_cavalry#Allied_cavalry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_cavalry#Allied_cavalry see also https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_parure_des_cavaliers_et_l%27insigne_des_preux https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_parure_des_cavaliers_et_l%2... ; I don't read arabic so I'm much more familiar with the authors you mentioned (in particular Pluvinel, de La Guérinière, and some englishman in exile whose name I forget; Baucher I find worthless: he himself was obviously talented, but he never developed a method, as none of his students reproduced his results) than with any of the arabic literature, eg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furusiyya https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furusiyya . Consider that if the iberian cavalry had been superior to moorish cavalry, the Reconquista would not have taken ~750 years. If you want I'll try to dig up the reference, but one of Napoleon's cavalry generals during the Egypt campaign said something like "3 of them can take 10 of us, but 100 vs 100 is an even match, and 300 of us can take 1'000 of them", so I think he admired their individual horsemanship, while acknowledging the advantage of european unit discipline in larger formations. The french would later get outdone at this by the prussians, who took minimal trooper skill, maximal unit effectiveness to its logical conclusion in the Franco-Prussian War. Maybe something we can agree upon is that lusitanian/iberian riding has some unique features (from wherever they arose) because of the nature of extensive, pastoral, cattle herding? Lagniappe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_sOWLl6kVw&t=250s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_sOWLl6kVw&t=250s (note his reins) * > "By the Blue Gums of the Back Blocks," snorted the troop-horse, "do you mean to say that you aren't taught to be bridle-wise in your business? How can you do anything, unless you can spin round at once when the rein is pressed on your neck? It means life or death to your man, and of course that's life and death to you. Get round with your hind legs under you the instant you feel the rein on your neck. If you haven't room to swing round, rear up a little and come round on your hind legs. That's being bridle-wise."