On November 7, 1998 the AHRA’s membership of WAHO was terminated, following a period of suspension from February 1 1997. The period prior to the suspension, from November 1996 to February 1997, and the period of the suspension itself, were intended as a time in which representatives from AHRA and WAHO could meet and resolve their differences. WAHO felt that it would be best for the Arabian horse, the breeders and the organizations, to attempt to discuss and negotiate quietly rather than take the issues public. Despite the best efforts of WAHO, this did not happen. Rather than negotiating, the AHRA chose to attack WAHO, its policies and horses registered by its membership, in various publications and on the internet. The WAHO Executive Committee and its Membership very much regret that it was necessary to terminate the membership of AHRA. Unfortunately, there was little opportunity to resolve even the simplest of differences between the two organizations.

The main item of dispute between WAHO and the AHRA is AHRA's arbitrary and restrictive importation policy. According to the AHRA, the issue is twofold: purity of blood, and national sovereignty. Its publicity, directed at an emotional response to those two issues, is best characterized as disinformation. American breeders are entitled to know the real facts that the AHRA is hiding.

According to the AHRA, a purebred Arabian is "An Arabian horse whose pedigree traces in all lines to the Arabian desert, " and an AHRA registration certificate "proves" to the owner that "their horse's pedigree can be traced in all lines back to the deserts of Arabia." [AHRA website, "Arabian Horse Dictionary"; "Mission and History, Our Product: The Certificate of Registration", 1997].

The AHRA claims to be acting "to protect the purity of the Arabian breed in America", from a WAHO decision to "sacrifice the purity of the breed" by forcing the AHRA to register "impure" horses as purebreds. The AHRA claims that the WAHO definition of a purebred is "less rigorous" than that of the AHRA, and was adopted as a "compromise" and "over the objections of the United States and other countries", and is one which the AHRA has maintained that "it will neither adopt nor accept" for 23 years. [AHRA Press Release 6/12/97; 11/96 ; 1/24/97]

Of course if all that were true, or even if any portion of that were true, there would be no dispute at all. Every other Arabian registry in the world would support the AHRA, and WAHO would cease to exist. The fact is that NONE of it is true.

1. The WAHO definition of a purebred Arabian, was adopted in 1974 at Malmo, Sweden by unanimous vote of all attending delegates, including those from the AHRA. It was not adopted over anyone's objections. It is absurd to suggest that it was. WAHO's function and mission is to facilitate cooperation among its member registries. It could hardly have done that had it begun by antagonizing a member registry which was then registering 3/4 of the world's purebred Arabians. [WAHO report, Malmo 1974 , p89]

2. The WAHO definition of a purebred Arabian was not a "compromise" at all. It was adopted as the only possible definition of a purebred Arabian which could ACCURATELY AND HONESTLY reflect the reality of existing breed purity in any of the voting member registries, including the AHRA.

Its adoption followed a 3-year investigation into existing Arabian studbooks, including those of the AHRA, and in which the AHRA participated. It established the fact that "every existing book appeared to have horses that did not fit the accepted phraseology that has historically been used to establish Arabian horse purity". ["Arabian Horse Definition", WAHO, 1982]

The problem with the question of definition was the discovery that a major discrepancy existed between what the member registries, including the AHRA, and/ or their members and owners wanted to believe about the pedigrees of the horses they had registered, and what was actually and factually true about them, when the existing studbooks and documents were studied. This discrepancy existed in the USA to an equal, and perhaps even greater extent than in most other countries, possibly because of the AHRA's previously published but non-factual statements supporting this discrepancy.

3. Despite its public statements, the AHRA delegates to WAHO have given repeated assurances to the WAHO Executive Committee since the 1980's that the AHRA would eventually adopt the WAHO definition as the basis of its importation policy, pleading only the need for time to educate its board members to accept the change.

4. Most important, the AHRA's claim that the horses it has registered can all be traced, in every line, to the Arabian desert is not even remotely true. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth.

Don't take our word for it. Try it yourself with the AHRA CD-ROM, which it claims is "as absolutely reliable as the Registry itself".

5. Nor is this an issue of varying definitions of "desertbred". Our investigation revealed that even the simple requirement of pedigrees which trace in EVERY line to "the Orient", could not be met by any of the 7 studbooks initially approved by WAHO, including that of the AHRA. Although the majority of original entries could legitimately be described as Oriental or Middle Eastern, if not always as desertbreds, these animals were no longer the only individuals in the pedigrees of most living horses.

Of the 8771 Arabians born in 1970 and registered by the AHRA, only 2% had pedigrees traceable in every line even to the "Orient". And that means giving the benefit of the doubt to all the "Arabians" imported since 1800 from the racetracks of India, Turkey, Lebanon, Egypt, and Iraq, from the cities and horse dealers of Alexandria and Algiers and Beirut, and Cairo and Damascus, and to those acquired in Europe during the 19th century with no more provenance than the claim that it was an Arab and "purchased from a Nubian in Berlin".

By 1970, 98% of AHRA horses could no longer be traced in every line to "desertbred", even with the most liberal possible interpretation of "desertbred", and one considerably more liberal than that applied by the AHRA in its database.

6. The WAHO representatives from the member registries, including those of the AHRA, therefore adopted the WAHO definition of a purebred Arabian horse as the only possible honest and accurate definition of breed purity, as it existed at that date in any of the member registries, including the AHRA. That definition is:

This is, in fact, the commonly accepted method of defining the purity of any breed.

By 1992 every member registry of WAHO except the AHRA, all 47 others, had agreed to accept the WAHO definition in practice as well as in principle. Each one had adopted it as the base of its own importation policy. Only the AHRA refused. [WAHO report #17, Cairo 1992, p127-128]

7. As of 1991, the AHRA was refusing even to consider for importation ANY horse registered in about 35% of the registries approved by WAHO, regardless of pedigree, even though the AHRA delegates to WAHO had voted to approve each and every one of those registries.

8. According to the AHRA: "The AHRA established its Approved Source policy in the 1960's to ensure the purity of horses being imported into the United States and Mexico." [AHRA Press Release 8/4/97]

However, since the 1960's the AHRA has continually registered imported animals whose pedigrees not only do not trace to the desert in all lines, which it now claims they must do to be pure, but which trace to animals not previously existing in AHRA pedigrees, and which were designated by the AHRA itself as "no recorded history".

These included two Shagya mares from Czechoslovakia registered in 1971, the previously rejected Veragua blood from Spain beginning in 1972, and a stallion of Polish ancestry which, according to the compiler of the PASB, traces to both Thoroughbred and Hungarian partbred ancestors. The AHRA refused to register descendants of the Egyptian stallion Sharkasi, whose purity of pedigree was certified both by his breeder and by the head of the EAO (his sire and grandsire from the RAS, his grand-dam a Bedouin mare), even though the AHRA delegate to WAHO had voted to approve him. Yet the AHRA chose in 1977 to register its first descendant of one of Egypt's Tahawi mares, a line which it had previously refused, despite the "NO RECORDED HISTORY" portion to her pedigree.

It refused to register descendants of Kurdo III from Argentina, even though it had already accepted and continued to accept animals of unknown pedigree descended from a herd which included multiple descendants of Kurdo III. As late as 1992, the AHRA registered its first descendant of certain French foundation horses whose ancestors were marked "NO RECORDED HISTORY" by the AHRA itself, one of which has no provenance other than "purchased in England" in 1825. [WAHO report #17, 1992, p. 126]

An examination of which horses were registered by the AHRA would indicate that the identity of the importer was often of greater consideration than the pedigree of the horse. It seems that the rules were frequently changed or ignored to accommodate the wishes of AHRA board members.

Moreover, under its "Approved Source" policy the AHRA continues to refuse even to consider registration of any imports from WAHO approved registries of the Arabian desert countries where, according to the AHRA's own database, the majority of the animals do trace entirely to "desertbred". For 15 years it refused to recognize the registry of Bahrain. It still refuses to recognize the registries of Saudi Arabia and Syria, though its WAHO delegates voted their approval in 1986 and 1990.

It would appear that if the purpose of the policy is to ensure the purity of importations, and if purity is to be defined, as the AHRA claims, in terms of a desertbred pedigree, then the policy has been a complete and total failure.

9. Moreover, the AHRA had not only become openly vocal about the alleged "impurity" of some of the bloodlines it refused, causing considerable distress and damage to the breeders of those bloodlines throughout the world, but by 1987 it had also begun a massive advertising campaign claiming that its own horses were not only "pure", but could be "traced in all lines back to desert breeding", a claim which was utterly and completely false. [The Registry News, v19 #2, 1987; v21 #2, May 1989; AHRA Brochure]

10. The adoption of the definition by WAHO in 1974 did not require each member registry to accept and utilize that definition as the basis of its import policy. However, despite the AHRA's denial, that did become a requirement for new member registries, and one which was supported by the AHRA. Thus the AHRA has been instrumental in compelling new registries to accept its own non-desert bloodlines, while refusing theirs, under the guise of protecting a non-existent standard of breed purity.

11. According to the AHRA "The real issue remains national sovereignty; the right of any registry to determine its own policies." Of course, there is not and cannot be any issue of national sovereignty involved, for the simple reason that the AHRA is not a sovereign nation: it is not a nation at all. It has no sovereign powers at all. It is not the United States of America. It cannot claim the respect or loyalty Americans show their country. It is a private corporation under the complete control of a small and self-sustaining group of people. [AHRA Press Release 11/96]

Certainly any registry, or any other business, has the right to determine its own policies. But if the people with which it does business do not like those policies, they in turn have the right to cease to do business or to take their business elsewhere. If the AHRA wants to continue to deal with the rest of the Arabian horse world, it cannot expect to dictate terms which are offensive to the rest of the world.

It is true that the AHRA is the largest of the world's Arabian registries. But it no longer enjoys the commanding position it once held. According to the AHRA's own CD-ROM data 78% of the Arabians born in 1970 were registered by the AHRA. By 1990 that proportion had declined to 57%. And according to the AHRA's own statistics, its own annual registrations have fallen considerably from 1990 levels, while those of several of its leading competitors have continued to increase.

12. Participation in WAHO is voluntary. WAHO has no authority to compel any member registry to adopt or follow WAHO policies. It does, however, have the authority to suspend or terminate the membership of any registry which engages in "Any conduct of any kind whatsoever which in the opinion of the Executive Committee is detrimental to the character of, or prejudicial to the objects and interests of, the Organization and/or to the breed of Arabian horses generally." In effect, while WAHO cannot compel a registry to follow WAHO policy it can suspend one which refuses to comply. The authority to suspend or terminate an offending registry is vested in the Executive Committee of WAHO. [WAHO Constitution, Section 9].

Under that authority, the Executive Committee of WAHO voted in November 1996 at the WAHO meeting in Abu Dhabi to suspend the AHRA effective February 1, 1997. This was not done lightly, nor without opportunity for the AHRA to present its case. The Secretary of the AHRA, Walter Bagot, who had been a member of the WAHO Executive Committee since 1994, was present and addressed the issues at some length, as did Bart Brown, the AHRA Vice-President. And although the forthcoming suspension was announced to all member registries during the meeting of the WAHO General Assembly, neither the AHRA delegates present nor those of any other registry made any attempt to debate the issue in the assembly.

Subsequent to the meeting in Abu Dhabi, the AHRA was invited by the Executive Committee and the President of WAHO, not once but repeatedly, to meet with the Executive Committee and attempt to work out a solution. For most of 1997, the AHRA refused even to meet with WAHO, instead it engaged in a massive disinformation campaign, both at home and abroad, presenting utterly false information in an attempt to gain approval and support for its actions. They have continued to do this since the termination of their membership.

It is time to set the record straight. The breeders of America and the rest of the world are entitled to know the full truth of this issue. The AHRA's claim of purity of desert pedigree is a complete fabrication. WAHO believes the AHRA definition of a purebred Arabian is a myth. If that definition is valid, then at least 98% of the Arabian horses registered every year by the AHRA are impure, and it is in the business of registering impure horses, and of presenting them to the world as pure. We do not believe that is either honest or honorable.

The AHRA acknowledged in 1974 that, "It is the intention of WAHO to suggest and recommend registration practices that will be acceptable to WAHO and the balance of the registering nations." The AHRA's capricious and damaging importation policies, and its widely disseminated falsehoods in support of them, are no longer acceptable to WAHO or the balance of the registering nations. [The Registry News, v7 #2, June 1974]

The AHRA CD-ROM Arabian Horse Bookshelf was released in early 1997. According to the AHRA advertising, it contains "The complete records of the AHRA - and 67 other stud books from around the world." and "Everything is here - pedigrees for every purebred Arabian ever registered, all the way back to the desert." [AHRA website]

The claims made by the AHRA for this product do not match the statements made to WAHO by the AHRA regarding the database which it reflects, and neither the AHRA advertising propaganda nor its statements to WAHO accurately reflect what is actually in the CD-ROM database. We believe that the AHRA misrepresentations regarding its database and CD-ROM reflect the same fabrication and disregard of fact which resulted in their termination by WAHO, and which they have used in their attempt to combat that termination.

For instance, the AHRA ads say: "The Arabian horse Bookshelf is as absolutely reliable as the registry itself", and "Be 100% confident in the accuracy of the information." Yet in his 1988 comments to WAHO regarding the creation of the database from non-AHRA studbooks, AHRA Resident Officer Ralph Clark admitted: "We've had to make a lot of assumptions about words and definitions in those books." "When one starts to make assumptions one is treading on something other than the firmness that we try to apply in the business of pedigree authenticity of pure bred Arabian horses." [AHRA website, etc.; WAHO report # 15, London 1988, p42, p43]

It is a bit difficult to justify a claim of absolute reliability and 100% confidence in something admittedly founded on "a lot of assumptions". The fact is that we have found that the AHRA database is not reliable at all on older pedigrees.

The AHRA database attributes a number of horses to studbooks in which they do not appear at all, even as ancestors in extended pedigrees, thus misrepresenting both the credentials of the horse and the contents of the studbook in question. For instance, most of the pre-1945 horses attributed to ASBB- Babolna do not appear in the WAHO Babolna studbook at all, even in extended pedigree. Some may be ancestors of Babolna-registered horses, though many are ancestors of Babolna-bred horses registered elsewhere, but this is hardly the same thing, and it is not the policy followed in similar situations with Polish or Egyptian pedigrees. In at least one instance, that of Argentina's Kurdo III, a horse is attributed to the Babolna studbook, even though the AHRA has since 1988 possessed a letter from Babolna denying any knowledge or record of this horse. [Schimanski report, 1988]

A special situation exists with regard to those horses which were not themselves registered in a WAHO studbook, but appear in the extended pedigrees of the initial registered entries, either in places like Egypt and Poland where breeding preceded the formation of a studbook by a century, or in studbooks which registered horses from such places long before the creation of a studbook there. The AHRA database treatment of such horses and their pedigrees is capricious in the extreme, following no discernible pattern.

In the AHRA database "No recorded history" is applied to animals listed as imported from the desert in their studbook of origin, and also to horses with a long extended pedigree in the studbook of origin. "Desertbred" is applied to some animals with no recorded history at all, to animals bred in Egypt from unrecorded parents, and to horses with long extended pedigrees in Europe in the studbook of origin. In some cases even the names of the parents of registered animals have been deleted, and either "no recorded history" or "desertbred" substituted. The pattern, if there is one, is obscure: one might get more consistency using a dartboard. We have located one case where an actual pedigree was substituted, leaving a supposed ancestor younger than her descendant. The fictional EGYPT studbook contains a number of pedigrees not discoverable in any known studbook or importation document. Where the information in them came from is an interesting question. (According to an AHRA employee, it was supplied to the AHRA by the Pyramid Society.) Why some of it is used in preference to the official data from existing studbooks is an even more interesting question.

AHRA resident officer Ralph Clark addressed the case of unregistered ancestors when he said at the WAHO Conference in 1988, "in order to create a computer file we had to make some books up that no longer exist". In 1990 Ralph Clark said at the WAHO Conference: "Some of those animal’s identities have been ‘made up’ if you will, since currently there are no reference books in circulation." Yet in 1994 AHRA employee Becky Townsend explained, in a presentation at the WAHO Conference, the AHRA database entry of "original reference" as: "the stud book reference for the very first stud book which registered the horse. This is in most cases the birth country's stud book. However, historical reasons have, in some cases, caused the horse never to appear in its birth country stud book. In recognition of this we have assigned the first Stud Book that it does appear in as the original reference." [WAHO report #15, London 1988, p47; WAHO report #16, Scottsdale 1990 , p40; WAHO report #18, Rabat 1994, p43]

In fact, for a substantial number of horses the "original book" cited in the CD-ROM is the AHRA's fictitious studbooks, and certainly NOT the first real studbook in which the horse was registered. The original GSB registrations Ghazala, Mesaoud, Mahruss, Shahwan, Sobha of the late 19th and early 20th century, the original AHRA registrations *Fadl, *Nasr, *Zarife of the 1930's and *Adhem, *Hend, *Gamilaa of the 1960's and 70's are all assigned to "EGYPT" as an "original book", as are original RAS registrations like Radia and Jamila, even though no such book ever existed outside the AHRA database. These horses had already been assigned numbers in the fictional "Egypt" stud book in March of 1992, two years before Townsend made her statement to WAHO. However, PASB foundation horses were treated differently: their parents were not attributed to the fictional "POL" studbook, but were assigned PASB "registration" numbers. WHY? [AHRA computer printout, "Egypt Volume 0", 1992]

Likewise *Kaba and *Habanera, the 1945 US Army imports, are assigned to the equally fictitious INOC studbook for Yugoslavia. Ursus and Ornis, pre-studbook imports to Spain, are assigned to the fictitious POL (Early Polish Pedigrees) studbook. Skowronek, registered in the GSB and AHS only, has been given a PASB number, as has his unregistered dam, though the AHRA refuses to enter their pedigrees as given in the PASB.

Neither the creation of fictitious studbooks (EGYPT, POL, ARAD-Radowce, etc.), nor the inclusion of private, unofficial studbooks (Hamdan Stables, Al Badeia Stud) would be a problem, provided they were openly acknowledged for what they are. Yet there does not appear to be anything in either the AHRA advertising or its literature which acknowledges this. What is relevant here is not which convention the AHRA uses for it original reference, nor its inconsistency in using it, but the fact that it says it is doing one thing while it actually does another. The trust necessary among registries cannot exist under such circumstances. [WAHO report # 15, London 1988 , p47]

The real difficulty with the CD-ROM is the mis-attribution, misrepresentation, disregard, and invention of data which characterizes the AHRA database. The invention or corruption of data is a far more serious problem than misunderstandings created by ill-conceived entry methods. The latter can be identified and corrected. The former makes not only the entire enterprise suspect, but also calls into question the credibility of the AHRA itself. And this result is no longer confined to WAHO and its member registries: the term ROMGATE originated in discussions among American breeders published on the Internet.

The AHRA publicity says that with the CD-ROM: "You'll have comprehensive records of the bloodlines of over 780,000 purebred Arabian horses on one compact disc.", and can create "a complete pedigree for any purebred Arabian ever registered". They advertise: "Trace your horse's pedigree back to the desert." Yet you can trace less than 1% of the living horses back to "desertbred" in all lines with it, and could trace only about 2% to desertbred if all the necessary corrections were made. [Arabian Horse World, Jan 1997 p7; AHRA website]

Their own advertised example, *Sabellina AHRA #61145, has "NO RECORDED HISTORY" in the database in place of 8 of the 32 ancestors in the last generation of her CD-ROM pedigree. If the AHRA CD-ROM printed the 6-generation pedigrees produced at the AHRA itself directly from the database, instead of the more abbreviated 5-generation pedigrees, their published picture of *Sabellina's pedigree would have shown "NO RECORDED HISTORY" on a full quarter of her ancestors. Of course, the fact is that *Sabellina has a very well recorded history. The four parents of PASB foundation horses whose parents appear as "No Recorded History" have 5 and 6 generation pedigrees in the PASB itself. There are gaps shown in one of them, but the gaps are not where the AHRA says they are. [Arabian Horse World, Jan 1997, p7]

These claims appear in AHRA ads on the Internet and in a mailed flyer to breeders. It is our understanding that advertising items for sale through the mail or on the Internet using false claims is illegal, and considered a Federal crime, to be reported to the Postmaster General or to the FBI. Be that as it may, we do not consider it to be an acceptable practice.

Domow AHRA #267, born 1913, was originally registered as a bay, sired by the chestnut stallion *Abu Zeyd 82, and out of the chestnut mare *Wadduda 30. For two chestnut horses to produce a bay is an impossibility according to coat color genetics. This problem was published in 1961 in The Blue Arabian Horse Catalog, and Domow excluded from the Catalog because of it. Gladys Brown Edwards also published the problem in a 1966 article, stating that there were plenty of photos around to prove the color of both imported parents. Edwards raised the problem again in a 1968 letter to the AHRA, stating that Domow had been "positively identified as bay by people who knew her". Yet Domow, who by this time had thousands of descendants, remained a registered bay through the 1973 third printing of the AHRA Studbook Volume 5. However, by the 1983 microfiche, the AHRA database had been adjusted to show Domow as a chestnut. Of course, that change meant that her bay son Tabab, by the imported chestnut *Deyr, had now become a bay out of two chestnuts, passing the problem down a generation but "cleaning" the record of the controversial individual. If this is the AHRA's idea of 100% reliable records, it sure isn't ours. ["Is Abeyan Abbeian?", The International Arabian Horse, July 1966; Blue Arabian Horse Catalog; Letter from Edwards to Ward Howland AHRA, June 16, 1968]

In 1947 the AHRA registered an importation of horses for William Randolph Hearst's San Simeon stud on the strength of their Beirut racetrack certificates. While some of the horses were from the Jezira (the tribal territory between the Euphrates and Tigris) several were bred by the Khamis family in their stud at Rayak, Lebanon, as shown by their extended pedigrees in the Arabian Horse Trust San Simeon Scrapbook. You couldn't tell that from the AHRA import files, though, because none of the pedigrees are in those files, and no breeder is named for any of the horses. Parents were named on several of the racetrack certificates: two of the horses were by a horse called "Sergeant Major". The AHRA database ignored all this and gave all the imports "desertbred" for parents. WHY? [AHRA import files]

In 1963 the AHRA registered *El Thabi #26696, a stallion from Jordan presented to Douglas Marshall by Sherif Nasser Ben Jamil, uncle of King Hussein of Jordan. The signed and sealed Jordanian document presented with the horse gives an extended pedigree of several generations for the dam, but identifies the sire only as "ALWISHAH Saglawi MALE'". The AHRA registered him anyway, without data on the sire. *El Thabi appears in the Jordanian studbook as "Al Dhabi", the sole produce of his dam Alia, and is identified as exported to the USA in 1962. His sire is given as Ushaahe, an import from Spain (by a Skowronek grandson and out of a Veragua mare). In the database, *El Thabi's dam is correctly identified as the Jordanian Studbook mare, but his sire has NO name: he is just "desertbred". Apparently the AHRA now considers Spain part of "the desert". [RJSB v2, p118, v 1, p57 & 119; AHRA import file #26696]

Ishtar (GSB 16), an 1871 mare registered in the GSB, became heavily represented in WAHO pedigrees early in this century. Her prominent descendants include Shahzada, who went to Australia in the 1920's, his son Razada who went to Spain also in the 1920's, *Imamzada and *Nuri Pasha who came to the USA, and Dargee, who remained in England and is credited by the AHRA database with some 800 grandget. *Nuri Pasha and *Imamzada alone appear in about 80% of current AHRA pedigrees. The GSB registered Ishtar (Vol. 15, 1885 p591) with no mention whatsoever of importation, only the notation that she was "undoubtedly purebred", had been purchased "about the year 1876" and that "her pedigree has been lost". The AHS, in the extended pedigree of her descendant Ruth Kesia, refers to her as imported, but does not say whether she came from Arabia, Algeria, Turkey, France, or Poland or the moon. (Spencer Borden's claim in his 1909 book that she was imported by Wilfrid Blunt has been proven by British scholars of the Blunt stud history to be a total falsehood.) One would expect this to be the prime example of the AHRA notation of "No Recorded History". Yet the AHRA database says both Ishtar's parents were "Desertbred". WHY?

The AHRA pedigree of *Shabaka AHRA #237 shows her sire as Mameluke (GSB 2109), her dam as Kesia II (GSB 224), with the parents of both given as "No Recorded History". This is correct for her sire: he was registered in the GSB only as "A high-caste Arab imported from India", with no suggestion that he was desertbred (he may have been, but it doesn't say so). However, Kesia II has one of the best recorded desertbred histories in any studbook. She appears in the GSB (Vol. XIII p571) as an unnamed foal under her dam Kesia, and under her own name as a broodmare (Vol. XVII p810) with the name of her sire and dam and the Vol. XIII page 571 reference to her previous entry. The original entry states that Kesia II's dam, Kesia, was purchased "in the Arabian Desert" from the Sebaa-Anazeh in the summer of 1875, that she was "covered in the desert in 1875 by the Heddud Seglawee-el-Abd, bred by the Rualla tribe, Anezeh, but then in the possession of the Sebaa tribes; this mare had a bay filly by the Seglawee-el-Abd, foaled at Blankney, April, 1876". Kesia, the original import, appears to have been omitted from the database entirely. *Shabaka was imported to the USA in 1898 and now appears in some 75% of AHRA pedigrees. [GSB v17, p814, 1893]

Volume 1 of the PASB, published in 1932, not only registered the Polish horses which survived WWI, but also provided extended pedigrees back, in most cases, to the early 1800's. But, you can't find those pedigrees in the AHRA CD-ROM. For most of the initial registrations, nothing more is given than the names of their parents, with the names of the grandparents being replaced with "NO RECORDED HISTORY". WHY?

At least two of the imported "original Arab" sires of PASB foundation entries received "Desert Bred" after their names. Both were imported from India in 1910 with, apparently, no further recorded details on their history:-

Kohejlan PASB 417, sire of Gazella II and Zulejma 1914

Hermit PASB 401, sire of Durbar, Dzingshan III and Dabrowka, all born 1912

Yet most of the imported "Original Arab" sires were downgraded to "No Recorded History" instead of "Desertbred". No such distinctions appear in the PASB: all are listed only as "or.ar". Why were they not treated in the same way? They are:-

Ibrahim PASB 407, sire of Skowronek, Posejdon 1916, Elstera 1913, Kalina 1909

Ilderim PASB 446 , sire of Bakszysz 1901 and Sultanka 1912

Sourour PASB 427, sire of Koncha 1918 & Lutecja 1917

Arslan PASB 462 , sire of Linkoln 1911

Kubiszan PASB 467, sire of Narzan 1913

Ibrahim, sire of Skowronek, is very well documented, even in the existing studbooks and registries. The PASB (chart 81) says "Ibrahim or.ar.". The import document of his son Ornis, exported to Spain in 1912, says Ibrahim was "Etalon pur sang importé de l'Arabie". The Spanish Studbook (Vol. 15 p 123) says Ibrahim's parents were "nacidos en oriente", the same designation it gave the other imported sires. Yet Ibrahim was the only imported sire of all the Spanish acquisitions from Poland that was denied the "desertbred" label by the AHRA. WHY?

Kubiszan where he appears as the sire of Europa, a 1905 mare exported from Slawuta to Spain, was identified by the AHRA as the produce of "Desert Breds"(Kubiszan in the original export document, Kubichan POL 104 in the AHRA database, "Kubikan" in the SSB Vol. 14 p128). Yet where he appears in the PASB as Kubiszan PASB 467, sire of the PASB stallion Narzan 1913 from Slawuta, he was downgraded to "No Recorded History", despite being identified as "Kubiszan or. ar." in Narzan's entry in the PASB. WHY?

Sultan, (POL 107 in the AHRA Database) as sire of Nowik, a 1904 stallion exported to Spain from Antoniny, was identified by the AHRA as "desertbred", but as Sultan PASB 429, sire of the 1906 Najada PASB 489 from Antoniny in the Polish Studbook, he rated only "No Recorded History", despite the "or.ar." appended to the strains of his parents in the PASB (PASB v1, chart 82). WHY?

Primorosa (SSB 252), a foal imported to Spain in-utero from Slawuta, is recorded in the SSB (Vol. 15, p 140-1, & 155) as sired by "Lenkoran" or "Linkoran". The SSB says that Lenkoran's parents were "nacidos en oriente", i.e., born in the Orient. The PASB (chart 93 page 257) says Lenkoran was an 1891 stallion by Handzar out of Ekspedycia. The AHRA database doesn't follow either version. Lenkoran's name does not appear at all as the sire of Primorosa: it has been replaced with "desertbred". WHY?

Jaskolka, grandam of the 1909 stallion Ornis (SSB 250) exported to Spain from Antoniny, is the same 1891 Jaskolka (PASB 3601) who produced Skowronek at Antoniny. Yet the AHRA database says Ornis' grand-dam was Jaskolka PASB 157, a 1918 mare. Apparently it had not occurred to them that a 1918 mare could not be the grand-dam of a foal born in 1909. WHY?

Malta (ARAD 12), an 1892 mare imported to Radautz is clearly identified in the PASB (under the entries of her daughter Siglavi-Bagdady (PASB 363) and her granddaughter Koalicja (PASB 186) an ancestress of *Witez II) as an 1892 mare bred at Slawuta/Chrestowka, sire Handzar, dam Republika, both of which have long extended pedigrees in PASB charts 46 and 67. Yet the AHRA database replaced the names of both her parents with "Desert Bred". At least one other Polish import to Radautz was altered in the same way. WHY?

Van-Dick (SSB 122), also known as Wan-Dick and Van Dyck, was an 1898 stallion used at stud in Poland before his export to Spain. His CD-ROM pedigree follows that of the SSB rather than that found in the PASB or his import document. Yet in 1985 Ralph Clark of the AHRA was informed that the Spanish Stud Book data on Polish imports to Spain was not entirely accurate: in some cases the SSB did not accurately reflect the information, or pedigrees, found on the original import documents from the Spanish registry files, due probably to clerical or translation errors but possibly to wishful thinking (as in the listing of some animals as "nacido in oriente" when no such notation appeared in the original). The information came from two Al Khamsa researchers, who subsequently shared that information, and copies of the import documents, with several others. Yet today, 12 years later, most of the SSB errors remain a part of the official AHRA database. WHY? (PASB v1, p168, chart 86).

In Egypt, the 1948 RAS studbook also included some extended pedigrees of its initial registrations which began in 1914. However, the treatment given by the AHRA to the pre-studbook pedigrees in Egypt is quite different from that given by them to Polish pre-studbook pedigrees. WHY?

The RAS foundation mares Radia (RAS 56) and Jamila (RAS 58) are identified in the RAS studbook as daughters of "Ghazala El Beida". (This mare Ghazala El Beida was eventually exported to the USA as *Ghazala, and appears in at least 80% of AHRA pedigrees). The AHRA database does not use the name Ghazala el Beida, but calls her Ghazala EGYPT 121, listing Radia and Jamila as her only offspring in Egypt. The RAS (p45) says Ghazala's sire was Ibn Sharara, out of "Sharara Koheila Jellabia"; the GSB and AHRA spell the name "Sherara". The AHRA database calls this mare "Sherara II", a name which does not appear in any of the official studbooks or documents. No extension of Sherara/Sharara's pedigree appears in any of the official studbooks. Yet the AHRA database extends this pedigree through several more generations, apparently more or less following the Raswan Index.

Zobeyni (EGYPT 233) appears in the extended pedigrees published by the AHS in 1922 (AHS v2 p22-3) for Mesaoud, Feysul, and Makbula, (all imported from Egypt and registered by the GSB). According to the AHS, he was a desertbred from the Fedaan Anazeh. Yet the database does not show him as a desertbred. It names his supposed parents (courtesy of the Raswan Index, apparently), gives them Egyptian "registration numbers", and gives their parents as "no recorded history". He appears in over 90% of AHRA pedigrees.

Mahruss (GSB 235) an 1893 stallion imported to England from the stud of Ali Pasha Sherif, is registered in the GSB (Vol. 19, p907) with the names and strains of both parents: sire: "Mahrus, a Wadnan Hursan", dam: Bint Nura, a Dahmeh Nejib", both "of strains from the stud collected by Abbas Pasha I", but no further extension of their pedigrees. The AHS (Vol. 2 p29) extends the pedigree of the sire Mahrus. Yet the AHRA database does not mention the sire Mahrus at all, replacing his name with "Desert Bred". It gives an extension to Bint Nura's pedigree that does not appear in either studbook, and which disagrees with the commonly accepted version. Mahruss founded the sire line of *Nureddin II and *Nasik, among others, and through them alone appears in some 75% of AHRA pedigrees today.

*Shahwan AHRA #241 was an 1887 stallion bred by Ali Pasha Sherif, used in Egypt by the Blunts, imported to England and registered there in the GSB, and then imported to the USA. He appears in over half the AHRA pedigrees today, through his American-born progeny alone. All his registrations, including that in the AHRA studbooks, agree that his sire was WAZIR (a stallion bred in Egypt). The AHRA database gives WAZIR as the sire for Shahwan (EGYPT 132 and GSB 2978) in the foreign registrations. But in his AHRA registration, the name of WAZIR has been deleted, and "desert bred" substituted. WHY? In the GSB, Shahwan's dam is not named: it simply says "dam's grand-dam, the mare of Ibn Khalifeh" (Vol. 17 p814), thus identifying Shahwan's great-grand-dam as the original import to Egypt. Yet the AHRA database gives Shahwan's dam herself as "desertbred". WHY?

Neither the RAS studbook nor any other studbook or authoritative document we know of says that such horses as El Dahma (RAS 22), Muniet el Nefous (EGYPT 244), or Nader el Kebir (EGYPT 222) were desertbreds or even imports to Egypt. All were identified only as animals from the studs or collections of Ali Pasha Sherif and Abbas Pasha, without pedigree. All of these appear in the pedigrees of such AHRA imports as *Morafic and *Ansata Ibn Halima and *Fadl. In fact, through their descendant Ibn Rabdan, they appear in nearly ALL Egyptian imports. The AHRA CD-ROM gives all of them as the offspring of "Desert Breds".

Where did the weird and wonderful pedigrees for the Egyptian foundation stock come from, if not from the studbooks? Well, according to a 1992 statement made by an AHRA employee, they got it from the Pyramid Society in 1991.

Numerous other examples are available.

At least 90% of AHRA registrations today trace to stock bred during the first half of the 19th century in the Slawuta/Chrestowka studs of the Sanguszko family in the Ukraine, in an area which had previously been part of Poland but was then under Russian rule. In 1900 Prince Roman V. Sanguszko (1837-1917), who had acquired the stud from his uncle in 1860, wrote that all his remaining stock had some amount of non-Arab blood. In a letter published in 1900 he wrote, "At present I have no more pure-blood Arabians (i.e. born of imported parents); the last of these was the stallion "Attyk", which was sold in 1899." (Attyk's pedigree, found in the PASB in Chart 25, shows his great-grand-dam as the imported mare, with his sire, grandsire, and great-grandsire also imported.)

Referring to a proposal to create a Russian studbook with a separate division for "those animals that have even the slightest drop of non-Arabian blood", he stated categorically: "This would apply to all my horses, since I have at present none born from original desert sires and dams." He asserted that his remaining horses had "some amount of local non-Arabian blood or blood the Arabian origin of which cannot be proven (from one-fifth to one-third)", and that they were "without any infusion of alien blood (excepting local mares)." He advised that the proposed stud book "should include all genuine Arabian horses (whether pure- blood or thoroughbred), i.e. all animals descended exclusively from imported desert brood-stock without a drop of alien blood, but also the horses of the more reputed Russian studs having a minimum of 66% Arabian blood, this being duly proven." [Sherbatov & Stroganov, The Arabian Horse, A Survey, 1900, translated by G.I. Vassiltchikov, 1989 p131-134]

Horses found in current AHRA pedigrees which were present at Slawuta in 1900, and thus acknowledged by its owner as containing some amount of "non-Arabian blood", include the following, all bred at Slawuta. AHRA database identification numbers are in brackets. (Although Omega and Oferta do appear in PASB Volume I as the dams of Alaska and Algebra, their names have been replaced in the AHRA CD-ROM with "NO RECORDED HISTORY".):

Parada 1895 mare (PASB 458), dam of Bakszysz 1901 (PASB 31)

Unia 1899 (PASB 474), dam of Linkoln 1911 (PASB 227)

Omega 1894, dam of Alaska 1901 (PASB 484), she dam of Narzan (PASB 296)

Oferta 1894, dam of Algebra 1901 (PASB 422), she dam of Granica 1907 (PASB 120)

Mazepa 1892 (PASB 476 & POL 109), sire of several, including:-

          Belgja 1902 (ARAD 2), exported to Radautz, dam of Anielka 1909 (PASB 18)

          Dardziling 1903 (WEIL 15), exported to Weil

          Mazepa I 1910 (PASB 263), bred at Jezupol

          Mazepa II 1910 (PASB 264), bred at Jezupol

The PASB pedigree for Oferta [PASB Vol. 1, Chart 3 p85, 1932], shows her as the descendant of an 1846 Slawuta mare Pruszyna. Since Oferta's sire, grandsire, and great-grandsire are all clearly identified in the PASB as original Arabs (all three are identified by Kwiatkowski as bred "in the desert", with importation dates of 1865, 1870 & 1879), it is obvious that her "non-Arab" ancestry must come through Pruszyna. Pruszyna's great-granddaughter Republika 1876 was dam of:-

Orjent 1894 (PASB 399), sire of Bialogrodka 1910 (PASB 37)

Malta 1892 (ARAD 12), grand-dam of Koalicja 1918 (PASB 186)

Neither of these connections appears in the AHRA CD-ROM, which gives Orjent's parents as "NO RECORDED HISTORY", and Malta's, for some unfathomable reason, as "DESERT BRED". However, they are clearly identified in PASB Volume 1 on pages 5 and 29 and Chart 67. The PASB (Volume 1, Chart 55, p 137, 1932) identifies Pruszyna's grandparents and great- grandsires, but does not name her great-grand-dams, though they are identified in the pedigree tables published by Dr. Skorkowski, the first Secretary of the Arab Horse Society of Poland, and compiler of Volume 1 of the PASB. Pruszyna's pedigree according to those sources is given below.

The Polish exports, descended from these specific non-Arab lines of the Slawuta stud, which appear most frequently in AHRA pedigrees are:-

*Kasztelanka, grand-dam of Fadjur (855 get), in 20% of AHRA pedigrees, traces to Pruszyna

*Bask, in 25% of AHRA pedigrees (1126 get), traces to Bakszysz & Granica

*Czubuthan, in 25% of AHRA pedigrees (110 get, 585 grandget), traces to Mazepa I.

*Witez II, in 33% of AHRA pedigrees, (219 get, 3880 grandget), traces to Pruszyna

Skowronek, in 90% of AHRA pedigrees through *Raffles and *Raseyn, traces to all 8 great-grandparents of Pruszyna.

The presence of "local mares" in the pedigrees of the Sanguszko "pure-bred" Arabs was reported by Lukomski in his 1906 study of the Sanguszko and Potocki studs. He also noted that "even if the progeny of the Slawuta stud is not of so pure an origin as e.g. the Arabs of Count Dzieduszycki ... whose whole stud descents from three imported desert bred mares and desert bred stallions only, yet they are rightly regarded as pure bred Arabs ....". [Das Arabische Pferd in Slawuta und anderen Gestuten des sudwestlichen Russlands, 1906. Olms Press reprint 1979. Skorkowski translation]

Borowiack's 1914 study of the Branicki studs stated "The foundation stock of "Polish horses" as the base of the breeding must be estimated as successful" and that "the admixture of the Polish blood' of tap-root mares decreased with time to such a degree that it was difficult to see it in the exterior. In fact we may speak of an Arab breeding in every sense of the word".. (Die Arabische und Anglo-Arabische Pferdezucht der Grafen Branicki in Bialocerkiew, 1914. Olms Press reprint 1979. Skorkowski translation in Arab Breeding in Poland, 1969.)

According to the PASB, its "purebreds" were derived from the studs of the Branicki, Dzieduszycki, Potocki, and Sanguszko families. (The Potocki Arab stud at Antoniny was considered a derivative and branch of the Sanguszko stud, after the mid-19th century marriage of Count Potocki to a Sanguszko daughter whose dowry included a large portion of the Sanguszko horses.) Here again we see a definition of purity based on the derivation of stock from acceptable western sources rather than an insistence upon an entirely desert pedigree. (PASB 1932, p. iv, ix).

By the 1960's the actual origin of the Polish Arabians was a matter of published records in America. An 1876 history of the Sanguszko stud written by Prince Roman Sanguszko the Elder (owner of the Slawuta branch of the stud 1845-1860 and of other branches of the family stud until his death in 1881) revealed that the actual Sanguszko importations consisted of stallions only until 1818-19 when the first Arabian mare was imported. ["The Story of the Princes Sanguszko Stud", Prince Roman Sanguszko, 1876. Originally published in Jedziec i Hodowca (Horseman and Breeder), official publication of the PASB, Nov 1933. Translated by Count Joseph Potocki, and reprinted in Arabian Horse News, February 1965].

Dr. Edward Skorkowski (Secretary of the Arab Horse Breeding Society of Poland and compiler of the pedigree data for the PASB), considered the foremost authority on Polish pedigrees, wrote that "A continuous admixture of the blood of desert bred Arabs caused the distinctly Arab type of the Slawuta horses." He also described the Sanguszko and Branicki Arabs as "Horses developed by continuous improvement by desert bred Arabs", thus differing "with regard to descent" from the Dzieduszycki Arabs whose descent was based on the families of imported Arab MARES. ["Studs Before World War I", originally published circa 1965 in Your Pony magazine. Reprinted 1969 by Your Pony in Arab Breeding in Poland.]

It might be appropriate to point out that the development of the Polish Arabian from Polish "native mares" crossed with Arabian and other oriental stallions was exactly similar in pattern to the development at the same time of the English Thoroughbred from a foundation of native English mares crossed with Arabian and other oriental stallions, the major difference being the documented presence of quite a number of Arab mares in 18th century Thoroughbred pedigrees. It is therefore difficult to justify a claim that the admitted non-Arabian elements in early 19th century Polish Arabian pedigrees are somehow different in kind, or "less impure" from those derived from a Thoroughbred mare introduced into early 19th century Hungarian Arabian breeding.

A 1968 book, in German and English by Ursula Guttman, documented all the existing PASB pedigrees back, in most cases to pre-1818, to either the original imports or the animals of unrecorded ancestry. (Apparently, a copy of Guttman's book on microfiche was included by the AHRA in its initial mailing of the AHRA microfiche studbook circa 1981.)

In 1969, a year after its publication, a member of the AHRA board commissioned a study of it and of Polish pedigrees from Gladys Brown Edwards. Edwards’ report confirmed that "certain foundation mares are unknown". The instructions given to Edwards are revealing of the AHRA attitude toward the need for secrecy: "If you decide there is reason to tabulate or refer to specific horses which have been imported, please do not refer to them by name, but use a code system of your own device." The instructions also reveal that, rather than asking that purebred Polish pedigrees be traceable in every line to the desert, Edwards was specifically instructed to ignore any "unknown" blood in determining whether they were pure-bred or part-bred. (This is rather like saying that the offspring of an Arabian and a grade mare could produce a purebred Arabian, but the offspring of an Arabian and any recognized breed could not.)

"We in America do not subscribe to a notion that one can breed up a group of grade horses to become purebred Arabians, even if purebred sires are constantly employed. However, if any impure horses were used but were all back in the early 1800's and purebred sires have been used since that time, the project may be terminated. A statement that there is no practical problem worthy of consideration will suffice. I hope that will be the result. If part-bred sires were used originally and linebreeding has occurred so part-bred sires have been used on part-bred mares, it would be helpful to know the magnitude or degree. Unknowns' may be disregarded for the purpose." [Letter, D Marshall to Edwards, Dec 9, 1969; Edwards to Marshall, Dec 29, 1969]

*Habanera AHRA #6779: This mare was imported by the US Army in 1945-6, but was not registered until 1951. Her pedigree reveals Thoroughbred and Hungarian part-bred ancestors. Her 5-generation pedigree from Europe in the AHRA import file gives one of her ancestors as Porta 1895, a mare from the Slawuta Stud in Poland. The charts in the part-bred section of the 1932 PASB at the AHRA identify Porta as a daughter of Jussuf 1885, a Hungarian partbred stallion imported to Poland from Babolna. The PASB pedigrees for Jussuf 1885 include in his ancestors several "Gidran" Arabs from Mezohegyes, and a daughter of "Young Muley", an 1830 Thoroughbred stallion purchased for Babolna in 1835 and sent to Mezohegyes in 1837.

The "Gidran" stallions shown in Porta's pedigree include the Mezohegyes stallions Gidran XXVIII, Gidran XXIV 1851, and Gidran XVI. One of the handwritten pedigrees from Radautz, for an 1863 stallion, extends the pedigree of Gidran XXVIII still further, to include another Thoroughbred, the 1829 stallion Trevilliam. And, the pedigree given there for the Mezohegyes Gidran XXVIII shows him to have several crosses to "Nonius" blood as well. [PASB V 1 1932, Chart 97, 103; Das k.k. Staatsgestut Radautz und seine Pferde, Hans Brabenetz, 1987 p165; Ungarns Pferdezucht in Wort und Bild, Graf C.G. Wrangel, 1893, Vol. 1 p251]

The Gidran breed is described thus: "The Gidran is the Arab-based half-bred. It was again developed in the 19th century from the Arab stallion Gidran Senior which was imported into the country in 1816. Local mares were used, then Thoroughbreds and some more Arab. The Gidran is the Hungarian Anglo-Arab. It is stockier and more robust than an Arab." The same book described the Nonius breed as a Hungarian sport horse, originating with a Norman stallion Nonius, imported from France in 1815, and local mares, and "possibly" some Lipizzaner, Arab and Turkish blood. [Jane Kidd, International Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds, 1985, p109 & 122]

Ornis 1909: Purchased from Poland's Antoniny stud, this stallion was one of the foundation horses of the PASB. According to Dr. Skorkowski, the Antoniny records revealed his grandsire as an imported "partbred" from Hungary, descended from the same Hungarian partbred bloodlines as the Shagyas. His descendants were accepted by the AHRA in 1972. Ornis' importation document from Antoniny in 1912, written in French, identifies his dam as Sikora 177, a daughter of Tybet. The 1932 PASB identifies the Antoniny Tybet as an 1892 stallion, by Zarif I imported from Babolna. The same Tybet, by Zarif, is cited in Lukomski's 1906 study of Antoniny, page 24, 4 years after the birth of Tybet's daughter Sikora in 1902. It would be stretching credibility just a bit to believe that Antoniny had ANOTHER Tybet (See NOTE), imported, at stud at the same time as their home-bred Tybet (his foals in the PASB & in Spain born 1899-1906), and that somehow this imported stallion escaped the notice of Lukomski. This would be improbable under any circumstances, but in a stud the size of Antoniny (2 stallions and 35 mares in 1914 according to Dr. Skorkowski) it is incredible.

Moreover, in two separate letters (1978 & 1981), Dr. Skorkowski, the original compiler of the PASB (who researched the Antoniny records for that publication in the 1920's) insisted that there was only the one Tybet, saying "in Poland was one TYBET only, bred in Antoniny 1892 by Zarif/Babolna", and "TYBET in the pedigree of ORNIS is the same TYBET in the PASB Vol. I, partbred section". Tybet 1892 is a descendant of the 1847 Thoroughbred stallion Chief Justice. NOTE: The import document refers to Tybet as "etalon p.s. importee", an obvious error since, in the French language, "importee" can apply only to females (importe would be the masculine form). This term could not have been applied either to the stallion Tybet or to his imported sire, though it might have been applied to Tybet's dam, who was "imported" to Antoniny from Satanow, not "nee ici" (born here) as the document says of his daughter. Since Ibrahim, Ornis' sire, is described in the same document as "Etalon pur sang importe de l'Arabie", the differences between the two references, both as to gender and source of import, are obvious.)

The first descendant of the 1847 Thoroughbred stallion Chief Justice registered by the AHRA was AHRA #86605, in 1972.

Kurdo III: The AHRA has recently made a big issue of its refusal to register Argentinean and Brazilian descendants of Kurdo III, allegedly because of the presumed presence in his pedigree of a single cross to an 1842 English Thoroughbred mare, 30-Maria. One may note, of course, that the AHRA database pedigree for Kurdo III does not show this mare, since it stops short at "NO RECORDED HISTORY" many generations later. We may also note that the approval of Kurdo III by WAHO was proposed by AHRA Vice-President Don Ford, then a member of the WAHO Executive Committee. [WAHO report # 17, Cairo 1992, p126]

In fact, the AHRA approved the blood of Kurdo III by implication in June of 1972, when they voted to approve the Veragua horses from Spain. The Veragua horses were animals of unknown pedigree from a stud which contained several mares descended from Kurdo III. This approval was a complete reversal of previous AHRA policy. [News from the Arabian Horse Registry of America, August 1973, page 1].

In 1964 the AHRA had refused to register Veragua descendants for the Steen Ranch importation. The AHRA at that time said that Spanish pedigrees would not be accepted unless they could "trace in unbroken line to source (the British, Polish and Egyptian Stud Books and the desert being construed as sources)". The first Arabian of "Veragua" blood registered by the AHRA was AHRA #86605. ["The Veragua Stud", Larry Black, Arabian Horse World, Nov 1964; "Arabian Horse Club Registry Report - 1964", Arabian Horse News, Nov 1964]

The Duke of Veragua had imported 6 mares descended from Kurdo III in 1927. Nine years later, in 1936, the Duke was killed and his stud records destroyed in the Spanish Civil War. When his broodmare band was taken over by the Yeguada Militar (the Spanish military stud which also maintains the Spanish registry), the identity of 17 of the older mares and the parentage of the 21 1935-1937 fillies could not be determined. Since they were unwilling to delete these animals from purebred breeding, they registered and/or re-registered them in the SSB as "Veragua" horses, with no details of parentage or pedigree. The last SSB records prior to the Duke's death showed 3 of the imported mares and 2 of their daughters still among the Veragua herd in 1934:-

Radjef 1922 chestnut, imported, dam by Kurdo III

Hayadjan 1923 chestnut, imported, dam by Kurdo III

Rafa 1924 chestnut, imported, dam by Kurdo III

Radoura 1930 bay, (Marouf x Khotbat, a Kurdo III daughter)

Galaad 1934 chestnut, (Almudafar x Radjef)

Any of the 21 1935-1937 "Veragua" fillies could have been daughters of these mares. [Schimanski report, 1988; SSB vols. 24, 25, 26; WAHO General Information and Handbook including the Veragua Report, 1972]

Kurdo III was born in 1902, the same decade as Skowronek. 30-Maria appears in the 6th generation of Kurdo III's pedigree. In that same generation, 9 of the 64 ancestors in Skowronek's pedigree have non-Arab blood (6 mares: Kokietka 1853, Metka 1831, Woloszka 1834, Medina 1844, Armida 1843, Matka; and 3 stallions: Szumka III 1836, Witold 1838 and Krolik). In the same generation in Kurdo III's pedigree there are only 2 (30-Maria and Heroldja 1856, a mare from the same stud that produced Skowronek, and daughter of his ancestress Medina). In the next generation Kurdo III has 3 animals with non-Arab blood, while Skowronek has 16. Obviously the concentration of Arab blood in Kurdo III is higher than that in Skowronek. In fact, if we count every recorded Arab ancestor in both pedigrees, Kurdo III had more documented Arab blood (98% compared to 93%) even without counting the Arab ancestors of 30-Maria.

The presence of the 1830 Thoroughbred stallion Young Muley, and the "Gidran" part-breds in *Habanera's pedigree was brought to the attention of the AHRA Board in the late summer of 1988, in a report presented to the Board on behalf of the South American registries by Walter Schimanski. The same report detailed the presence of Kurdo III in the Veragua horses, and thus approved as a possible ancestor of existing AHRA pedigrees. With the exception of the Brabenetz book pedigree, copies of all the above-mentioned documents were included in the report. It is consequently just a bit disingenuous for the AHRA to continue to insist publicly that it has none of this type of breeding.

The AHRA has always claimed that it registers only "purebred" Arabians. It has publicly defined a purebred as "An Arabian horse whose pedigree traces in all lines to the Arabian desert". However, it has NEVER, in practice, limited its registration of either imports or American-bred Arabians to animals which actually trace to the "Arabian desert" in all lines, nor even to animals which its directors believed had that sort of pedigree. From its very first studbook in 1909 to date, AHRA registrations include horses which were admitted by the original foreign breeders of the stock themselves to trace in one or more lines to non-Arabian and certainly to non-desert ancestors. ["Arabian Horse Dictionary", AHRA website, Oct 1997]

Even if we consider the cities and racetracks of Turkey, Egypt, Algeria and India along with the horse-markets of Jerusalem, Beirut, and Damascus as "the Arabian desert," and accept all the "original oriental" imports acquired from 19th century dealers with no more pedigree or provenance than "purchased from a Nubian in Berlin" as "desertbreds", we still find that only a very small fraction of AHRA horses can claim a "desertbred" pedigree. The proportion of AHRA registrations born in 1970 with such oriental pedigrees was 2%. AHRA registrations for that year whose pedigrees trace entirely to "DESERT BRED" on the AHRA CD-ROM numbered only 16 (that's right, 16 (Sixteen).

So if we accept the AHRA's public position that only horses which trace in every line to the Arabian desert are purebred, we must admit that more than 90% of the AHRA registrations are NOT purebred. Since NONE of the more than 4000 imported horses registered by the AHRA in the last 25 years trace entirely to horses marked "desert bred" in the AHRA CD-ROM, it would appear that none of them are purebred under the AHRA definition.

The fact is that the AHRA has always defined purebred Arabians, in practice (as contrasted to their propaganda statements), in terms of registration or documentation from an acceptable source, exactly as WAHO does now. Until recent years those sources have included the Arabian desert, but they have never been limited to horses originating there.

The first importation rules, published in 1909, required the registration of "All horses of pure Arab blood furnished with certificate of registration in any recognized European stud book". This was quickly amended to limit acceptance only to the Jockey Club studbooks of Britain, France, the US, and Australia. [Stud Book of the Arabian Horse Club of America, 1909 p 26, Arabian Horse Trust Library; The Arabian National Stud Book, Volume 1, Arabian Horse Club of America, 1913 p27].

Although the rules specified that registered horses were to be "of pure Arab blood," it is obvious that either the directors regarded that to mean "pure" in the sense of being registered in an accepted stud book (exactly as the WAHO definition functions today, in every registry but the AHRA), or as promotional window-dressing to be disregarded in practice (exactly as the AHRA does today).

One of the very first registrations, in 1908, was Gouneiad, AHRA #21, a stallion bred by the Imperial Streletsky Stud in Russia, imported for exhibition at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. Far from being of "pure Arab blood" in anything approximating the "desert" sense, the 1898 American Jockey Club stud book had openly identified one of his ancestors as "Takhteiwan Trukhmianski", and the World's Fair booklet produced by the Russians, in English, was even more explicit, showing "imp. Turcoman bred Takhtaravan'" as an ancestor. Incidentally, this horse of "pure Arab blood" with the Turkoman ancestry was owned by the original secretary- treasurer of the registry. [ASB v7 1898 p1128]. [Russian Horses, Ismailoff, 1893 p28; The Arabian National Stud Book, Volume 1, Arabian Horse Club of America, 1913 p43].

By 1918 the rules had been amended again to allow complete discretion to the Board of Directors. The amended rules required the registry to accept "Any horse of pure Arabian blood" registered in those four Thoroughbred studbooks, and allowed it to accept such horses registered "in such other authenticated Stud Books of foreign countries as may be accepted by the Board of Directors". The registry could also accept unregistered horses "furnished with such authoritative and authentive (sic) papers and records as may fully establish his pure breeding to the satisfaction of the Board of Directors." [The Arabian Stud Book, Arabian Horse Club of America, 1918, p19]

In other words, the directors had to accept some horses but could accept anything else they wanted. They took full advantage of that discretion. During the next 20 years, in addition to 40- odd mandated imports from the French and British studbooks, the registry accepted forty more under that discretionary clause, from Argentina, Spain, Egypt and the "Arab countries". Few of these, even from the "Arab countries" came with pedigrees allowing them to be traced to "the desert" in every line, unless of course one considers Cairo and Alexandria (Egypt), Constantinople (Turkey), and the horse markets of Beirut and Damascus as "the desert". More than half the "discretionary" horses were imported by registry directors (Babson, Brown, Dickinson, Harris , Selby).

In 1937-1938 two more foreign studbooks, the British and Polish Arabian studbooks, were added to the non-discretionary sources of importations. In 1937 the registry completed a reciprocity agreement for "the mutual recognition of registration between the Arab Horse Breeding Society of Poland and the Arabian Horse Club of America", and in 1938 a similar "reciprocity registration arrangement" with the Arab Horse Society of England. [The History of The Arabian Horse Club Registry of America, Inc., 1908-1950, Albert W. Harris, 1950, p29, 33]

The 1937 acceptance of the Polish stud book covered the importation of 8 horses from Poland that same year by one of the registry directors (Dickinson), and 14 more horses the following year, also by registry directors (Dickinson and Babson).

That none of these Polish Arabians were traceable entirely to "Arabia" or "the desert," or even to the "orient" or "Arab world", and that this was known to at least some of the registry's directors is amply demonstrated by the published pedigrees in the 1932 Polish stud book and by the pedigrees and statements in registry director J.M. Dickinson's 1937-1947 catalogs. By Dickinson's own admission in 1947, Skowronek's ancestress Matka "is simply known as an Arab mare of the Slawuta stud, her actual sire not being identified by name" (in point of fact he is not identified in any way at all; in any known record he is simply a blank), and "Matka's dam, Iliniecka, was an Arab mare known to have been at Slawuta Stud in the eighteen twenties." In his words, with respect to Iliniecka and other "taproot" mares from the old historical studs of Poland "something has to be taken on faith". [A Catalog of Traveler's Rest Arabian Horses, J.M. Dickinson, 1947, reprinted 1988 by Arabian Horse Trust, pages 29 & 31]

Two other registry directors at the time of the Polish reciprocity agreement were also on record as being aware of the problems. The registry's president from 1918-1939, W.R. Brown, was aware of them as early as 1926. In April of that year he wrote to W.K. Kellogg, who had just that month imported the first Polish blood to America, through 3 Skowronek offspring from England. Brown transmitted to Kellogg a quotation from a Dutch friend that Skowronek had "a lot of doubtful ancestors (which may be seen from the books of Lukomski, Verlag Schikhartt)".

Three years later in 1929, Brown included Lukomski's work, and that of Dunkelberg, another German who had studied the pre-WWI Polish studs and mentioned the native Polish elements in their pedigrees, in the bibliography of his own book. Kellogg joined the registry board not long after, and both men were still on the Board when the registry concluded its reciprocal registration agreement with the Polish Stud Book. [Private letter, W.R. Brown to W. K. Kellogg, April 24, 1926, File #00150, W. R. Brown Library, Arab Horse Owners Foundation]

However the registry directors might have misconstrued or overlooked statements in the Polish language in the Polish stud book, or in the German language in Lukomski et al., it would have been difficult to overlook or misconstrue the published statement in English by the president of the Polish registry, which appeared in the British Arab Horse Society magazine in 1935, two years before the AHRA board concluded its reciprocal arrangement with the Polish registry. According to Count Alexander Dzieduszycki, President of the Arab Horse Breeding Society of Poland from 1925 to 1945, "The basis of the Polish breed of full-bloods was therefore an Oriental material, attained by the crossing of imported Arab stallions with Polish mares, the breed of which had also been improved by centuries of intermixture of Arab blood". ["The Breeding of Arab Horses in Poland", The Arab Horse, An Annual Journal, Arab Horse Society, England, 1935, reprinted in The Journal of the Arab Horse Society 1935-1938, Alexander Heriot & Co, Ltd., 1979, p 32.]

In other words, the Polish concept of "full-blood Arab" admittedly applied to horses descended from native Polish mares, provided they had been repeatedly crossed to imported Arab stallions, and not just to the exclusive produce of imported Arab mares.

Was this known to the AHRA at the time? Well, considering that the same issue of the British magazine which contained Dzieduszycki's article and statement also contained a feature on movie horses of the Kellogg Institute, an account of the 1934 "National Arabian Show" in which Dickinson's farm was described as "the leading exhibitor", and an article by AHRA President W.R. Brown describing American breeding operations including those of all five AHRA directors, it is hard to accept the premise that any of them, let alone all of them, did not see it. (See also, Non-Arab blood in AHRA pedigrees - the evidence.)

In 1945 the US Army imported a considerable group of Arabians (and other breeds) from Europe as spoils of war. The AHRA registered most of the Arabians, from Poland, Yugoslavia, and Hungary, as well as their offspring bred by the Germans, the last one in 1951. Neither the AHRA import files nor its database contain pedigrees back to original oriental imports for any of them, though some of the Hungarian mares and one from Yugoslavia do possess them. One of the mares, *Habanera, bred by the Germans from a Yugoslav mare and Polish stallion, has a pedigree which traces to Thoroughbred and Hungarian part-bred breeding. (See Non-Arab blood in AHRA pedigrees - the evidence). She was finally registered by the AHRA in 1951.

Other importations registered in the 15 years immediately following the war included a stallion from Morocco and a mare from Tunisia, both with long pedigrees from the Stud Book Francais, a large importation for William Randolph Hearst of horses with papers from the Beirut racetrack, another from a private breeder with a stud owned for several generations in Lebanon, a group from the Netherlands (with English papers), several from Saudi Arabia, one from Bahrain, several from Egypt, and of course many from England. Two horses from studs in Turkey were registered in 1959: their pedigrees in the AHRA import file go back several generations.

The 1947 stallion *Ibn Farhan AHRA #11234 was imported in 1952 but not registered immediately. According to a letter in the AHRA import file "there was a lot of controversy over his papers". These included an Egyptian Jockey Club certificate, a letter from the Jockey Club stating that their information "is only what was given us by the person presenting the horse for Classification, and we have no means of checking this" and that "horses are classified on their looks and actions, as you will note and not on statements as to breeding", and a sworn statement from a person claiming to be his breeder (not the same person named as breeder in the Jockey Club letter). The "breeder's" statement claimed his sire as an RAS stallion, Dahman, which had been exported to Iraq in 1939, according to an RAS letter in the file. It also named his dam and maternal grandparents but said nothing about their origins. An AHRA letter of 1984 refers to the Jockey Club letter as "quite amusing". The horse was registered by the AHRA in 1956. [AHRA import file #11234].

In the 1960's the AHRA registered a large number of horses from Poland, two from Russia (while refusing others which they finally registered in 1978), an importation from Spain (refusing those of Veragua ancestry in 1964 but accepting them in 1972), two from Germany, one from Jordan (with, according to the Jordanian Studbook, a European sire), several from Saudi Arabia, and of course numerous imports from England and Egypt. An importation of two Shagya mares from Czechoslovakia (mother and daughter) in 1965 was finally registered in 1971, and de-registered shortly afterwards at the insistence of WAHO.

Several of the importations of the 1960's and later are of particular interest. The AHRA import policy announced in 1964 permitted importations from only 6 sources, one of them being "Egypt, and registered in the Egyptian Agricultural Organization Stud Book." The same wording appears in both a 1964 AHRA ad and its 1966 importation brochure. One might therefore expect all the Egyptian imports imported between these dates to be registered in the EAO studbook. They weren't. A 1964 mare bred in one of Egypt's private studs and unlisted in the EAO studbook, was imported on April 4, 1965 (and registered as AHRA #32267). Her importer had joined the AHRA Governing Board the previous year.

Two additional mares bred in Egypt's private studs were imported and registered in 1968 & 1969 (AHRA #50731 & 55969). In February-March 1970 a large importation arrived from Egypt, including no less than 15 horses not bred by the EAO and thus not in the EAO Studbook, 4 of them (AHRA #69601, 69602, 69604, & 69607) by that same AHRA board member. Were they also exceptions to the existing rule? That's a good question. How soon this rule was changed after the issuance of the brochure is unknown. By 1972 the AHRA was talking about accepting "EAO owned and pedigree horses" instead of only those "registered in the EAO Stud Book".

The imported mare *Bint Shaams AHRA #69605 was a grey, from two non-grey parents. Her sire El Sareei was bay, and there are many photos to prove it. Her dam Shams was registered as bay as a mature mare, and there are photos of both of her non-grey parents. *Bint Shaams was registered by the AHRA in 1970 for an AHRA board member.

In 1971 the AHRA registered 2 Shagyas imported from Czechoslovakia in 1965: *Slovenka #70140 and her daughter Nitra #70743. They were discovered by WAHO in their investigation of the AHRA studbooks and the AHRA had to de-register them. Why were they registered in the first place, when the AHRA proclaimed to one and all that only horses from "approved sources" would be registered? Did they have pedigrees tracing entirely to "the desert"?

*RH Desert Fox AHRA #168143 was a 1977 imported in-utero foal, the first AHRA descendant of the Hungarian mare 25-Amurath-Sahib-2 (ASBB 82), a 1952 mare which was one of the founding mares of the WAHO Babolna studbook. The AHRA pedigree for that mare gives the parents of her grand-dam, 11 Siglavy Bagdady II ASBB 61 as "No Recorded History". If the AHRA had no recorded history for this mare, why did they register her imported descendant in 1977?

*Akid Danzarra AHRA #146375 was imported in-utero from Austria in 1971 but not registered by the AHRA until 1977. Both her parents had been born in Egypt, but her sire was the son of a Tahawi mare, Folla (HSB 43), whose pedigree is untraceable to Arabia in several lines. In fact, the AHRA database gives only the names of Folla's parents; her grandparents appear only as "NO RECORDED HISTORY". Previously the AHRA had resolutely refused to register Tahawi descendants. Could their change of policy have been related to pressure from the Pyramid Society? Obviously they had not been presented with evidence of desert descent.

The imported mare *Gannat AHRA #177242, registered 1978, apparently has an EAO private breeders registration number of 188, but, she does NOT appear at all in the private breeders section of the EAO studbook. The only place she can be found is the private Al Badeia studbooks, with the EAO PB number and the claim that she appears in EAO Vol. V. In fact, she doesn't appear in EAO V or VI. You would never know this by checking the AHRA CD-ROM: it references only the EAO PB 188 number. The AHRA registered her anyway.

Although the AHRA database identifies most of the French foundation horses as "desertbred", it identifies the parents of two French foundation stallions as "No Recorded History". This concurs with the entries for these two horses in the Studbook Francais. Hussein SBFAR 127, an 1829 stallion, appears (Vol. IV, 1846, p342) as "Pere et mere de race orientale", though 3 of the other five stallions in that section say "pere et mere arabes". Emmon (SBFAR 427), an 1819 stallion, appears (SBF Vol. I, 1838, p265) only a