akhal-teke

GOLDEN HORSE T H E L E G E N D A RY A K H A L-T E K E Photography by ARTUR BABOEV Text by Aleksandr Klimuk Abrams, New York in association with PQ Blackwell

“The Akhal-Teke is one of the oldest horse breeds in the world. It represents the purest version of the Turkmen horse and is a direct descendant of the famed Central Asian mounts of antiquity: the horses of the Massagetae, the Niseans, and the Parthians. ” The end of the twelfth century saw the rise of a new power: such a cross-breeding took place, but there are differences of The reputation of the Turkmen was inextricably linked to the the Khwarezmian Empire. According to the Hiva historian opinion about the extent to which it occurred.The new strain superior quality of their horses. No other type of horse that Abulgazi, Khwarezm wielded power over the Turkmen tribes, was known as the Muniqui Arabian: taller than the classic type the Turkmen came into contact with could compare with including the Teke, who were part of a larger tribal alliance and longer in the body, with a certain angularity of form and their own prized breed. This was probably the main reason headed by the Salyr people. But at the height of its influence, an impressive speed. why Turkmen horses were bred to stay pure: the quality of war the Khwarezmian Empire came up against Genghis Khan and horse guaranteed the owner not only his wealth but his life his Mongol army. Jalal ad-Din Mingburnu, the last ruler of the While Turkmen horses were less well known in Europe, they itself. Keeping such finely bred animals in Turkmen conditions Khwarezmian Empire, was defeated in battle on the banks of nevertheless left a significant trace. Horses from Central Asia was very expensive, but in the desert, any horse required the the river Indus; rather than allowing himself to be captured, he and the Near East that found their way to Europe were often owner to buy barley and lucerne, so there was no real rode his horse into the river, swam to the other side, and fled referred to as Arabian and exerted considerable influence on advantage in keeping the cheaper, more common steppe horse from his Mongol pursuers. European horse breeding, including in the creation of the (known as yabi in Turkmen language). English Thoroughbred. According to eminent Russian He continued to oppose Genghis Khan and fought for another hippologist Professor V. O. Vitt, the English Thoroughbred The Teke tribe, like all Turkmen tribes, was divided into ten years until his death.The Turkmen tribes who supported foundation stallion Darley Arabian, who was shipped to sedentary (chomur) and nomadic (chorva) people, and those Khwarezm (including the Teke) were eventually forced to England from Syria in 1704, was a Turkmen horse, or possibly who could afford to move around generally possessed greater accept Mongol rule, but they retained their customs, including a Turkmen-Arabian cross. Besides Darley Arabian, a host of material wealth. It is interesting to note that horse breeding their horse-breeding secrets.Those tribes who did not accept horses used to create the English Thoroughbred bear a striking was more the domain of the chomur, who were poorer but Mongol rule migrated west. Among these was the Osman resemblance to the Turkmen horse. Significantly, certain more militant. Unlike the diets of other peoples of Central tribe, who were to lay the foundations of the Ottoman Empire. aspects of the English race-training tradition—such as Asia, the Turkmen diet never included horse meat or mare’s exercising under blankets, early breaking, and training of milk (kumys), and killing a horse, no matter how old or sick, Evidence that Turkmen horses were being exported to nearby young stock—are remarkably similar to the old Turkmen was regarded as sinful. countries by the thirteenth century is clear from the writings traditions. It is therefore a safe assumption that the training of the Italian explorer Marco Polo, who noted their superior methods themselves may have been brought to England by When the Turkmen were not out on alamans (mounted raids quality. So, too, did many merchants, including the Russian the grooms and handlers who accompanied the horses on on the Silk Road caravans), or attacking rival tribesmen, they Afanasy Nikitin, who took a well-bred stallion to India to sell their journey to the British Isles.While the authentic type of raced their horses. Race trainers, known as seis, guarded their in the fourteenth century. Indeed, some well-known Asian Turkmen horse did not survive in Turkey, the Turks were training secrets and passed them down orally through the breeds can be considered direct descendants of the Turkmen always aware of their common Turkoman heritage and when generations. Preparation for a race was divided into two stages. horse: the Persian horse, the Karabakh horse of Azerbaijan, and the Turkmen horses found their way to the stables of the The first stage was “feeding up,” where the condition of the the Indian breeds Marwari and Kathiawari. sultan, they were valued more than another breed. horse was enhanced by feeding it the standard Akhal-Teke diet of barley and alfalfa, but with the addition of eggs and bread Although the Ottoman Turks had easy access to Arabian At the end of the Mongol invasions in the late 1200s, the smeared with mutton fat. During this period, horses were horses, they attached special value to the horses bred in their Turkmen tribes who had remained in their historic homeland worked only at a walking pace, usually by riding them to a historic homeland. According to the eighteenth-century found themselves under the rule of three contiguous political watering hole. The second stage was race training, which German-born explorer Carsten Niebuhr, the Turks did not entities: the Golden Horde, the Ilkhanate of Persia, and the included a gradual increase in canter work, while also value Arabian horses, but instead preferred their taller, slender, Chagatai Khanate.These states had nominal borders, and their continuing the walking regime. The horses were worked majestic-looking horses decorated with elaborate jewelry. In existence was punctuated by incessant wars and scuffles. By under felt blankets to encourage sweating, allowing them to Asia Minor and throughout the Near East, the Turkmen the fourteenth century, practically all of Central Asia and lose fat and build muscle. horses continued to be bred, and there is evidence that in Persia were amalgamated under the influence of Tamerlane. Syria this continued until the nineteenth century. In the Some Turkmen tribes supported Tamerlane and others Races were a favorite national pastime of the Turkmen people 1890s, well-known Arabian breed expert O. A. Balakshin opposed him in bitter armed struggle. After the fall of and were staged on auspicious occasions. Most races were run noted certain similarities in the conformation of the Syrian Tamerlane’s empire, the history of the Turkmen territory, up between just two horses and over a distance no longer than 5 Arab and the Akhal-Teke. to the time of its annexation to the Russian Empire, is an furlongs (0.63 mile); the winner usually took part in the next integral part of Persian history and that of two Uzbek race, running as many as four races in one day. Race winners Naturally, these Turkmen horses greatly influenced local principalities: the Emirate of Bukhara and the Khanate of were in great demand and were widely used in breeding. breeds. In Mesopotamia, a new strain emerged within the Khiva. Both of these states aspired to exert influence over the Races were a key factor in determining selection criteria for Arabian breed as a result of crossing Arabian and Turkmen Turkmen people, and the fortunes of each, to some extent, Turkmen horse breeding, as was the performance of horses in horses. Experts on Arabian horses, such as Carl Reinhard depended on whose side the famed Turkmen mounted military raids.This was not the case for the Turkmen’s Central Raswan, Johannes Erich Flade, and Erica Schille, agree that warriors were prepared to take. Asian neighbors, however, who saw horse racing as mere entertainment and usually gelded their winners.6

In Russia, too, Turkmen horses, known as argamaks, werehighly regarded.They were ridden by the gentry and used atimperial stud farms. Merchants and emissaries traveling toPersia, Khiva, and Bukhara invariably returned with argamaksto be presented as gifts to the tsar.The wars waged by Peter theGreat during the seventeenth century wiped out a hugeportion of the Russian equine population and decimated theimperial stud farms. When the time came to restore horsebreeding, industry breeders turned to the argamaks. By decreeof Peter the Great, new stud farms were built in Kazan andSimbirsk principalities, with instructions to use Persianstallions on Cherkassy mares. Although the project itself wasnever completed, it tells us that the “recipe” for producingquality saddle horses—using the argamak as an improver—waswell known to horse breeders at that time.Turkmen horses in general, and particularly those bred by the Akhal-Teke stallion Sardar, by B. P.Villevalde, oil on canvas, 1882. From the Museum of Horse Breeding at the Moscow Timiryazev Agricultural AcademyTeke tribe, played an important role in Russian selectivebreeding in the eighteenth and the first half of the nineteenth every ligament under his skin, like a taut steel string. His consignment was a stallion named Merv, who was shipped oncenturies. Professor V. O. Vitt describes this vividly in his whole body, covered in sweat from excessive energy, was to England and included in the Eastern section of thecollection of articles entitled “Horse Breeds of Central Asia.” literally swathed in gold.That is the only way to describe the Weatherbys Thoroughbred studbook.According to the data he collected across stud farms in Russia color of his coat in the sunlight.”in the 1840s, almost 40 percent of horses were Turkmen in By the eighteenth century, the Teke had emerged as the mostorigin. To source Turkmen horses, the Russian government One of the best-known breeding stallions in Germany at the powerful tribe in the region. Led by Keimir Ker, the Tekedispatched special expeditions to Central Asia, led by beginning of the nineteenth century was the golden bay conquered the Akhal oasis, and in the nineteenth century theyveterinarians Kersting and Nanni, who between them Turkmen-Atti. He was used at the Neustadt stud, where he annexed Merv,with Kaushut Khan as their leader.Traditionally,purchased thirty horses.Teke stallions commanded the highest sired a line of horses subsequently used in the creation of the the Teke were considered to be under control of the Khan ofprice and the most expensive of all was the future stud stallion famous Trakehner breed. It is quite possible that other Eastern Khiva, but over time they had effectively become independent.of the Streletsk stud farm, Yalantush-Khan, who played a imports used at European stud farms were Turkmen, but Attempts to subordinate the Teke, first by Khiva in 1858 andcentral part in the creation of the Streletsk breed. referred to as Arabian, Persian, or Turkish. For example, stallion then by Persia in 1861, resulted in outright failure, with severe Gomoush-Bornu at the German stud farm Weil (now known military losses. By now, the Teke tradition of selective horseAccording to Professor Vitt, the foundation sire of the Orloff as Weil-Marbach) was likely to have been of Turkmen origin. breeding had become highly sophisticated. Many visitors toSaddlebred, the dark-brown Sultan the First, was most likely a the region noted that theTeke tribe had the best horses amongTurkmen horse, too. In the Don stud farm in 1839, there were European explorers and military men who traveled through the Turkmen. Those who encountered a Teke horse for theover eight hundred Turkmen stallions (though they were Central Asia and Persia often gave pithy descriptions of first time were struck by its resemblance to the Englishsometimes referred to as Persian). Turkmen horses and clearly recognized their superior caliber. Thoroughbred.They noted its exceptional speed and stamina; When in 1884 a consignment of six Turkmen horses arrived its dry, long limbs; and an almost complete lack of mane.Turkmen horses were also used by breeders of the Bashkir in France from Merv, the famous French hippologist Eugèneregion and by the Ural Cossacks. Nineteenth-century Russian Gayot wrote about them with great excitement and proclaimedhistorian and ethnographer Pavel Ivanovich Nebolsin them to be “the new blood horse.” One of the horses in thedescribed a Turkmen stud stallion he saw in a breeding stablein Bashkiria:“I couldn’t take my eyes away from a gray Teke, atall, beautiful animal, five vershoks tall [the writer means twoarshins and five vershoks, which is equal to 16.2 hands], with along, straight neck and wondrously fine skin. He had virtuallyno mane. His muzzle, legs, and chest were a pleasure to behold.. . . He was being led by two stocky Bashkir men; he barelytouched the ground as he danced along, and one could see 7

“It was crucial for a Turkmen warrior to have a good war horse to ensure his and his family’s safety, so well-bred horses were highly prized.” extinguish Kuropatkin’s zeal to support horse breeding in Considering the limited overall number of mares within the Breeding, visited Transcaspia in 1914, new measures were put Transcaspia. In 1897, he allocated funds from the regional breed (recorded as 551 heads in 1896), this one export forward that were designed to support Akhal-Teke breeding: budget to enable Colonel Kovalev to purchase three purebred constituted a loss of nearly half of the Akhal-Teke mare The number of stallions at Transcaspian Stables was to be stallions: Abbas-Shah, Abrek, and Alaman-Bay. The following population. One hundred hectares were allotted near the increased to sixty; stipends were to be awarded to private year, he appointed Grigory Andreevich Mazan, a cavalry village of Makhtum-Kala near Ashgabat, and Mazan began to stallion owners; and Transcaspian Stables’ mare herd officer of the Caucasian division, and originally a Cossack acquire mares for the stud at every opportunity. (numbering forty to fifty at that time) was to receive from the Korennovsky settlement of the Kuban region, as government support. The proposed measures were presented manager of Transcaspian Stables. Twelve loose boxes were Over time, what had started off as a modest undertaking by to Tsar Nicholas II, who, upon consideration, gave them his erected as stables in the village of Keshi, where the Turkmen General Kuropatkin became a site of keen interest for Ashgabat royal stamp of approval. cavalry division was stationed at that time. and the whole Transcaspian region.Visitors to the area, even those who were not necessarily horse breeders or enthusiasts, Sadly, with the onset of World War I, the new measures did not A landmark in the history of Transcaspian Stables was the gave interesting accounts of their excursions to the Stables. A have a chance to be implemented. During the ensuing military purchase of Boinou, the greatest purebred Akhal-Teke sire Russian composer of Swedish descent,V. N. Garteveld, wrote: campaign, the Turkmen cavalry regiment, consisting of (the term used in those days was “Akhal-Teke bloodhorse”). “I have never been ‘horsey’ and have never been particularly Turkmen volunteers mostly riding Akhal-Teke stallions, He was acquired at the age of sixteen, by which time he was interested in equestrianism. However, I must admit that I have became known as the Teke Legion and earned a reputation for well known for the quality of his offspring, who demonstrated never seen, and could not even imagine, horses of such striking carrying out swashbuckling attacks. The officers of other both strong type and superlative speed. Later stallions, beauty as those I saw in Ashgabat. Every horse is a piece of cavalry regiments who had been stationed in Central Asia including Voron, Agar, Gecheli, Baba-Akhun, Dovlet-Ishan, poetry.” Another visitor, gendarme officer A. M. Poliakov, during peacetime also often chose to ride Akhal-Teke stallions. Sapar-Khan, and Mele-Kush, also became famous for the high could not contain his excitement at the sight of the Akhal- Many of these horses died at the front, creating an caliber of their progeny and eventually became line founders Teke horses: “I remember when the head of the stables, unprecedented demand for replacements. The situation soon in the breed. Every mare was issued a covering certificate, and Captain Mazan, showed me their stallions. It should be noted reached critical proportions, prompting Mazan to initiate a Mazan accurately recorded the pedigree of the foals and that Teke people only ride stallions; to even sit on a mare is petition from the State Horse Breeding Regulatory Authority assessed the quality of the offspring from each breeding pair. considered shameful. Mazan showed me the difference to the Ministry of Military Affairs to exempt Akhal-Teke between a purebred Akhal-Teke horse and an English horses from being sent to the front.The petition was honored, Breeding season lasted from March to June, and two additional Thoroughbred. I have to say that comparing them does not do and the remaining horses were re-registered and some of them breeding stations were set up in Merv (now Mary) and Fort the latter any favors. An English horse stood next to a Teke returned by the military to the stud farm. Nevertheless, the Alexander (now Aktau, in Kazakhstan), where local Turkmen looks rather like a commoner before a nobleman.” breed was now close to extinction, with the total number of breeders could bring their mares for in-hand cover. From the horses exempted from the military campaign (not including time whenTranscaspian Stables first opened until 1909,breeding The work of Transcaspian Stables came to the attention of the those kept at Transcaspian Stables) amounting to 643—of for the mares belonging to local Turkmen breeders was free. general public during the exhibitions in Tashkent, Piatigorsk, which 405 were mares, 25 were stallions over four years of age, After 1909, they were charged half the cost established for other, and Kiev between 1909 and 1913.The breed, which was once and the rest youngstock. non-Turkmen breeders residing in the Transcaspian region. well known in Russia but then forgotten, had been rediscovered. Enthusiastic responses abounded in the press, During the Russian Civil War, which followed the Russian In 1901, regular exhibitions started to be organized to show and the government was called upon to encourage the Revolution of 1917, the crisis worsened. In an attempt to save the Stables’ yearlings, with the best ones being awarded breeding of Akhal-Teke horses by state-owned stud farms Transcaspian Stables from the advancing Bolshevik Red Army, monetary prizes and trophies.The activities of the Stables met outside Transcaspia. The exhibitions changed the economic the officers of the anticommunist White Army evacuated the with approval from traditional Turkmen breeders, especially fortune of the breed in a seminal way. While Mazan had horses to Tersk in the North Caucasus, to a place known today those residing in the vicinity of Ashgabat, the nation’s capital. previously written about the difficulties of finding commercial as the Malkin stud farm. However, the revolution soon arrived The stallions of Transcaspian Stables were in great demand, outlets for the horses, after the exhibitions he received so there also, and some of the stallions were requisitioned into exceeding supply. In his reports to the governor of the many inquiries for mares from prospective buyers that “if I was the Red Cavalry, while others found their way into the hands Transcaspian region, Mazan regularly highlighted the need to to satisfy every interested party, there [wouldn’t] be any decent of local residents. Untold damage was also done to the breed acquire new “Akhal bloodhorse” sires. In order to retain the mares left in the whole of Akhal.” in Transcaspia, where British troops who had fought alongside best stallions as well as the best mares, Transcaspian Stables the White Army took sixty Akhal-Teke stallions away with undertook an expansion that allowed it to maintain a herd of The combination of Mazan’s efforts at Transcaspian Stables them as booty. Having thus witnessed the destruction of his its own mares, gradually transforming it into a proper and the activities of individual traditional Turkmen breeders lifelong project, Mazan was forced to depart for Ekaterinodar, Transcaspian regional stud farm. This move was most likely led to a renaissance of the Akhal-Teke breed and an increase in where he fell ill and died on December 28, 1919. prompted by the fact that from 1904 to 1905, 214 Akhal-Teke both the quantity and the quality of the horse population. mares were exported to Persia, Afghanistan, and India. After Count N. B. Scherbatov, the chief of Imperial Horse Following the revolution and the creation of the new Soviet12

Top left: Buckskin stallion Mele, breed champion of the All-Union Agricultural Exhibition. Sirotkin, 1939. From the Top right: Dark bay stallion Ovlak-Sakar II in front of the graves of Bureida and Gifari (fifteenth-century AD),Museum of Horse Breeding at the Moscow Timiryazev Agricultural Academy Mary,Turkmenistan.A. Shtorkh, 1977Above left: Black stallion Voron. I. Lozinsky, 1909. From the archive of TsGAKFFD of Saint Petersburg Above right: Buckskin stallion Mele-Kush,All-Russia Exhibition, USSR. D. Kryukov, 1923. From the Museum of Horse Breeding at the Moscow Timiryazev Agricultural Academy 13





Right: Stallion Shakhmed, Russia, 2011 Preceding spread: Stallion Esugeibatyr, Slovakia, 2012 Following spread: Stallion Dagat, Russia, 201132



“I couldn’t take my eyes away from a gray Teke… with along, straight neck and wondrously fine skin. He hadvirtually no mane. His muzzle, legs, and chest were apleasure to behold … he barely touched the ground as hedanced along, and one could see every ligament under hisskin, like a taut steel string. His whole body, covered insweat from excessive energy, was literally swathed in gold.That is the only way to describe the color of his coat inthe sunlight.”Pavel Ivanovich Nebolsin, Russian historian and ethnographer, circa nineteenth century







Right: Herd from Medeus Stud, Slovakia, 201248



Right: Stallion Pai, Russia, 2012 Preceding page: Stallion Khorezm, Kazakhstan, 2013 Page 82: Stallion Ulukbek, Russia, 2010 Pages 80–81: Colt Menelik, Russia, 201384



Above: Stallion Tokhtamysh, Kazakhstan, 201250

Above: Stallion Palvan, Kazakhstan, 2012 51





Above: Stallion Tyllagush, Russia, 201090

Above: Colt Gepard, Russia, 2010Following page: Stallion Prestij, Uzbekistan, 2013 Page 93: Stallion Dagat, Russia, 2012 91





Right: Mares Palba and Maudja, Kazakhstan, 2012 Following spread: Stallions Shakhmed and Gergebil, Kazakhstan, 2012 Pages 152–153: Stallion Gepard, Russia, 2013148



Above: Stallion Shakhmed, Kazakhstan, 201294

Above: Stallion Gergebil, Kazakhstan, 2012Following spread: Stallion Liman, Spain, 2013 Pages 98–99: Stallion Liman, Spain, 2013 95





Above: Stallion Gepard, Russia, 2013130

Above: Stallion Khanbegler,Turkmenistan, 2011Following spread: Stallion Gapur, Russia, 2011 131

Right: Mares Palba and Maudja, Kazakhstan, 2012 Following spread: Stallions Posman-Kara and Gala, Russia, 2012108