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The Magic and Mystique of the Black Arabian Horse

"Through the mists of time, nothing has fired the imagination as much as the beautiful black horse, proud and majestic, running with the wind and as black as the desert night from which he came"

"The black Arabian Horse has generated so much interest in both art and literature like no other breed or colour"

Article

The True Black
The true black Arabian horse should not have any brown in the ears, muzzle or flanks. Until more recently the black colour was very rare, but with the influence of Egyptian and Polish bloodlines, the black colour is being produced more often in the Arabian breed today.

Black can vary from Jet-black, Raven-black, Blue-black and Summer-black. The primary colours in horses are black, or brown, and chestnut and the coat colour is the result of 11 independent processes with the interaction of the 11 processes causing the end shades and types.

Basic coat colour is due to the presence of two types of pigment in the hair, "eumelanin", causing the black or dark brown colour, and "phenomelanin", which causes red, tan or yellow. The phenotype is the external colour of the horse and the genotype refers to what is hidden.

The genetic control of the hard colours lies at two loci, the "Agouti" and the "Extension", the locus being at the point at which the colour starts. The "Agouti" determines the colour of the horses with black points and blacks, and the "Extension" the basis for chestnut. The dominant or homozygous black horse will receive a black gene from the sire and dam and will be uniformly black, or in some cases brown.

To prove a black horse is homozygous, it has to be bred to a chestnut horse and if there are no chestnuts born in at least 20 black to chestnut breedings, and that horse's sire and dam also had no chestnuts, the horse can be considered to be homozygous black. The homozygous black will often produce a bay, but it will be a very dark bay, or nearly black, without the red tint often associated with bays and, despite its bay appearance, can also be a carrier of the black gene. The heterozygous black horse will also be black, but will carry the recesseive chestnut gene that will be masked by the black gene.The heterozygous horse can produce a chestnut at any time, even if mated to another heterozygous black horse. If a horse is homozygous, then the dominant "allele" will be present at the extension locus. This "allele", known as ED, will attempt to turn the horse black, irrespective of the base colour occurring at this locus.

"The Treasure of the earth lie between thy eyes"

    -Bedouin proverb

Article

Breeding for Black
Until recently, the black colour in the Arabian horse was very rare, but with the influence of the Egyptian and Polish bloodlines, the black Arabian is being bred in greater numbers throughout the world.

The United States of America is the leading black Arabian producing country with over 12,000 blacks registered. Within the United States, California is the largest black producing State with an excess of 1,000 blacks registered, with Canada having a similar number registered and the second largest producer of blacks.

Egyptian bloodlines have been the most influential, particularly through the Babson Egyptian, notably the first Babson black stallion, Fa-Serr, born in 1947, sired 20 black foals and no chestnuts from, very likely, non black mares. Fa-Serr's influence was continued through his sons Fa-Rousse, Khemahr, Ozem and Negem. Negem was the only one of Fa-Serr's sons who did not sire any chestnuts from almost 100 offsprings.

Within the Egyptian pedigrees leading to black, there are two connections between the old and new Egyptian bloodlines, notably the mare Venus of the Hadban Enzahi strain and the stallion Dahman. Dahman is the sire of Rabdan, who appears three times in the fifth generation of Nazeer's pedigree and is the grandsire of Fadl. Malabar Farms in the United States linebred the great-grandson of Fadl, Sa Zarka, to produce Malabar King-Prince Ebony, Malabar Duke and Malabar Sheik. Of these three, only Malabar King-Prince Ebony did not sire any chestnuts from 134 foals. Sa Zarka also did not sire any chestnut foals.

Through his son Ofir, the desert bred Kuhailan Haifi is believed to be responsible for breeding black. The Ofir line produced Witez II, Bask, Aladdinn and Fortel. In particular, the lines of Witez II, Bask and Aladdinn also contained the blood of the black mare Czbessie II, born in 1814, and Kabron I, born in 1813. The line of Kabron is passed on through the bay stallion Tajar and crosses the Czbessie II line in Amurath. Both of these mare lines are found in the Polish pedigrees of Amurath, Hamdany and Seglavi. These bloodlines in turn appear in the pedigrees of the black producing mares Balalajka, the dam of Bask, Federacja, the dam of Witez II and Lalage, dam of Aladdinn.

In 1932, the grey stallion Zarife and the grey mare Roda were imported by the Maynesboro Stud in the United States and produced the black stallion Hallany Mistanny, sire of 16 black foals, he proved to be a sire of significance.

In more recent times, some well-known progenitors of the black colour have included Bey Shah, who sired in excess of 20 black offspring, Ansata Ibn Halima sired at least 6 black offspring, while Morafic sired no black offspring in the first generation, but did in the second and third generation. Adhem by Alaa el Din (by Nazeer) sired 32 black offspring. Adhem's son, Saud el Ameer, sired over 70 blacks and no chestnuts from over 130 breedings. The influential bay stallions Ali Jamaal, The Minstril, Theee Desperado and Desperado V have also consistently sired black offspring.

The future of the black breeding programme today is secured with the presence of some strikingly beautiful black Arabian mares and stallions. The Black Arabian is here to stay!!!