often hear Western horsemen talk about the Russian horse. It behaves differently, they
say, it moves differently, it is... well, just different. And even if its ancestors came
from Europe, like those of Russian Trakehners, or from the East, like those of Russian
Arabians, in a couple of generations they begin to refer to it as Russian.
But is there such a thing as the Russian horse, or can there be
such at all? One seemingly obvious answer is no. No single breed would be ideal in the
unfathomably huge space where Asia meets Europe; a space with more steppes and mountains
than in the States, more forests than in Brazil; more tundra, taiga and permafrost areas
than in Canada and Alaska; more deserts and arid wastelands than in Australia? What a
horse can just survive in the utmost extremes of Russia's climates, where, like the
Yakutian horse, it may be subject to —50°C; and, like the AkhalTeke, to +50°C.
Also, Russia is a melting pot of Slavic, Turkic, Mongol, FinnoUgric,
Romance, Eskimo, and many other cultures and subcultures. Of Russians alone ethnographists
identify around 70 types.
The dozens of Russia's peoples are represented by their equine and
equestrian cultures. Russia is a kaleidoscope of breeds, horsemanships, breeding &
riding manners, testing rules, equestrian sports & games, horse trappings, saddlery,
and what not. It is the land of Cossacks. It is home of the Troika.
still, one can talk of the Russian horse!
Whatever the breed (and there are many of them in Russia), it is a
nononsense animal, undemanding and hard working, manageable, and friendly.
"In the haywain and under the sovereign"
These words Russians use
to describe an ideal Russian horse, an allrounder. Life in Russia demanded a universal
horse, and the Russian horse was universal. One example is the Don. Superb under
the Cossack saddle, it makes a good carriage horse as well.
The Russian horse has never been meant solely for the racetrack, but
rather for hard practical work. And Russia has never been a country of equestrian
sportsmen and gentleman riders, like England. It has rather been a land of heavy users of
horses, on the road and on the battlefield.
I am a very
of your wonderful
I just wish that
we had more
of them over here
in the U.S.A.
A horse is good for
nothing in Russia if it cannot survive in harsh Russian climates, with the meagerest of
foods, having to cover vast distances sometimes unshod, or even when attacked by wolves.
Some breeds spend most of the time in the steppe or forest fending for
themselves and getting feed from under one meter of snow.
Many were the times that
Russians were saved by their dear troika hacks or their brave mounts. A Don or another
Russian steppe horse brings its master to safety through a snow blizzard or the densest of
fogs. Many Caucasian mountaineers owe their lives to surefooted and intrepid Kabardins.
Many Russian horsemen have been saved in battle by their loyal chargers.
Some Russian breeds are known as onemaster horses, and they may be
difficult sometimes when ridden by strangers.
Most Russians have never
understood the use of some Western breeds produced only for speed on the racetrack, often
at the sacrifice of endurance, presence, and other qualities.
Even Thoroughbreds were assessed differently in Russia, as potential
improvers of local breeds for cavalry. And a Thoroughbred Derby winner with conformational
defects would not necessarily become a sire.
The amazing stamina of the Russian horses, such as Dons, Budennys,
Kabardins, Russian Arabians, Tersks, etc., makes them extremely good for endurance races.
There are some breeds in Russia that could be referred to as
"extreme". These are horses of mountains, desert, and taiga. All of them are
products of the extremes of temperature, aridness, altitudes, etc. It took centuries,
sometimes millennia, for those horses to adapt to their respective conditions. The extreme
Russian breeds are a good example of Darwin's theory in action. They are products of a
combination of two selections: natural selection, as a result of which thousands of
animals died from the elements, and primitive selective breeding by humans.
Nature and breeders sort of joined forces to breed for survival
and endurance, with speed and conformation often being of secondary importance. The end
result is stunning.
For more details see Russian "extreme" breeds.
horses outside of Russia
Most of Russian horses are
easier and cheaper to breed than other horses. They are especially good as work horses in
the field, where they have to defend themselves from the elements and cope with hardship
and discomfort. They thrive on rough pasture and often need little or no extra feeding.
Overall, they require little attention and are very reliable. They make good cowboy,
trekking and military horses, etc. Russian steppe horses are second to none in cold
Russian horses bred outside of Russia respond positively to
improvements in their care, of course. But quite often they suffer from overfeeding and
lack of exercise. Used to meager diets, they become fat fairly quickly, which is not good
for their shape. Even Russian Arabians, which are normally rangy and athletic in Russia,
when met in foreign stables are uncharacteristically rotund, with their movement impaired,
and eyes dulled.
One should be a bit more careful with Russian "extreme"
horses and not to breed, say, Russian desert horses in wet climates, Yakutian horses in
hot climates, and mountain horses on the plain. Ironically, nobody would think of growing
grapes or camels in Scandinavia, or Siberian pines or raindeer in Italy, but some European
breeders may think nothing of producing Russian extreme horses in conditions that are
exactly the opposite of what a breed is used to at the most profound level, including its
blood composition, skin structure, subcutaneous fat accumulation, heat transfer
characteristics, and so forth.
We suppose that you, if you are a true lover of horses, will
think twice before breeding a horse that comes from a different environment. At first, you
will learn everything about that environment from books, Internet, consultants, etc.
For more details see Breeding Russian horses ourside of Russia.
Most of the credit for the
fact that the Russian horse is still with us goes to thousands of obscure Russian
horsemen: herdsmen, stable lads, grooms, and others. In the last war they had sometimes to
fight desperately and pay with their lives to buy some time to enable their comrades to
drive huge manybreed herds away from advancing Nazis.
And it was not only at wars that Russian horsemen had to prove their
mettle. When Khrushchov made a peremptory decision to get rid of all the horseflesh in the
USSR, the Russian horse was saved by the harassed underpaid stalwarts at studs and farms.
Russia has a rich equine
and equestrian history, perhaps the richest in the world. The horse has been with the
peoples that inhabit the huge spaces of what is now known as Russia for millennia. It is
to the horse that goes much of the credit for the colonization of the wild Russian steppes
A wealth of archaeological evidence tells us an exciting story of
the early Russian horse. For instance, excavations at the Altai Mountains revealed remains
of noble Oriental horses that date back to the 4th or 3rd millennium B.C.
The horse was domesticated in Central Asia, and also in Siberian and
Russian steppes, about 6 thousand years ago. It is believed that domesticated more or less
simultaneously were the smaller steppe horses and the larger forest horses. Both of them
belonged to the same biological species and their differences were only caused by the
ecological conditions of their respective habitats.
The last "real" wild horse, called tarpan (E. caballus Gmelini),
was killed in the late 19th century in Ukraine. In the 1930s Russian and Polish biologists
began to "reconstruct" it on the basis of the Polish konik. Experimental crossing of
the konik with the Prjewalski horse produced an animal looking like the tarpan: a dun or
mousecolored 133cm pony with a dark mane and tail, often with an eelbelt along its
spine and zebroid legs. Hordes of restored tarpans now roam the forest of western
Bielorussia and Poland.
a drawing by
(E. Caballus Gmelini)
In the forests of Eastern
Europe early in the first millennium B.C. horses were used largely for meat. In the early
centuries A.D. horses began to be used for military purposes and as draft animals for
tilling the soil. More attention began to be paid to their height and bulk. Archeological
excavations at Novgorod (NorthWestern Russia) revealed that 97% of horses in the 10th and
11th centuries were about 140 cm high.
In medieval Rus horseflesh was valued very high. According to the laws
of Yaroslav the Wise (11th century) the punishment for the killing of a stranger's horse
was 12 grivnas to the Crown and one grivna to the owner, as compared with only 3 grivnas
for the killing of a free peasant. The Russian Code ruled that horsethieves should be
turned out to the Prince to be stripped of all civil rights.
In the late 15th century the office of the Master of the Horse
was established at the courts of Russian princes and tsars. The Master of the Horse was in
charge of the horse studs that produced horses for the court. Aristocrats and monasteries
had their own studs. Sires at studs were mostly of Russian and Tartar origin. Beginning in
the days of Ivan the Terrible sires of European and Arabian breeds began to be used at
many Russian studs.
Up to the middle of the 17th century horse trade in Russia was
dominated by the Tartars who brought each year 3050 thousand horses to Moscow, Tver, and
Rostov. There were also a sea of homebred horsed in Ukraine, Don, Kuban, Urals, and
Siberia. Ukraine alone produced 60,000 horses suitable for military uses. Their type was
heavily influenced by Oriental horses captured by Ukrainian Cossacks in their raids. Those
horses were forerunners of the famous Don breed.
The Don emerges
By the end of the 18th
century the Don breed became well established. It was improved not only by selection in
harsh breeding conditions and raids, but also by uses of stallions that proved to be the
best in wars.
In the early 19th century Europe admired Cossacks on their intrepid
Dons who came to Paris in pursuit of Napoleon. In 1945 Europeans saw new generations of
Cossacks cantering on their hardy steppe steeds.
Early Horse Studs
Before Peter the Great the
Crown studs had about 50,000 horses. Under Peter the Great several new stateowned studs
were organized to produce horses for the army, and the many Peter's construction
projects. In 1740 the Royal stables had 1685 horses, and their stock was mostly European.
Much experimenting was going on through the 18th century, with studs
organized, merged, reorganized, and disbanded. The same concerned crosses with various
breeds, and breeding practices. Most studs produced mounts for cavalry, and through the
century much attention was paid to height, type, and suitability to dressage.
First Russian stud breeds
The first Russian breeds
produced at studs with system and method were Orlov trotters and Orlov mounts, better
known as OrlovRostopchins.
They took their names from Count
Alexey OrlovChesmensky (17371807), a brilliant courtier at the court of Katherine II
and the defeater of the Turkish fleet at Chesme.
Orlov began his early breeding experiments in the 1760s at Ostrov near
Moscow, then he moved to Khrenovoye near Voronezh, a place
better suited for breeding.
Because of his prominent position at the court Orlov had a nearly
unlimited access to the stock brought to Russia, especially to Arabians and Thoroughbreds.
Orlov tried ten crossing types. AngloAsian crossings appeared
unsatisfactory. ArabianAsian crosses yielded Sultan II, a prominent producer of good
mounts. Among other combinations the most productive was AngloArabian. Outstanding
products of those crossings were Yashma I and Yashma II.
Another famous production of Orlov's was Orlov trotters. All
pedigrees of modern Orlovs have at the core Polkan I, a son of the Arabian Smetanka and a dun Danish
mare. Later some Friesian and Barb blood was added to improve the trotting action. But the
true founder of the trotting breed was undoubtedly Bars I, an elegant powerful trotter —
exactly what Orlov longed for.
The reasons behind the successes of Orlov breeds were
perseverance and skills of the breeders, very careful selections, and extremely rigorous
culling system. Orlov's success would have been impossible without his fantastic stock of
The wealth or experience gleaned by Count Orlov has been well
documented and used by later Russian breeders to produce other stud breeds, such as
Budenny, Tersk, and many others. His ideas on the importance of Arabians for Russia were
appreciated by Count Stroganov, the
father of the Russian Arabian.
Early Stud Books
In 1836 the first volume
of Stud Book of PureBlood and Racing Horses was published in Russia. It included
287 stallions and 222 broodmares. The book was badly needed at the time because there were
already many studs producing racing horses. There followed many other stud books.
A History of the Russian Arabian
A History of the AkhalTeke
A History of the OrlovRostopchin
Histories of other Russian
breeds are to follow.