From The Crabbet Influence Spring/Summer 1998 issue
3 page article, page 1
The word "Crabbet" conjures visions of the gaudy, flaxen chestnuts preferred by Lady Wentworth but the Blunt legacy also came in other shades and types. The elegant bays and browns descended from Queen of Sheba and Azrek were one inheritance whose survival owes much to breeders outside Crabbet Park.
Once upon a time Lady Anne and Wilfred Scawen Blunt decided to found a stud farm of pure Arabian horses. They visited the desert tribes and the Royal stud of Ali Pasha Sherif in Egypt and bought many horses of various strains and types. Today's Arabians carry lines to many of these early imports but the emphasis on a small number of sire and dam lines has progressively narrowed the variety of types actually visible, especially in those animals of straight Crabbet breeding.
Grey stallion purchased in the desert in the spring of 1887.
Queen of Sheba and Azrek were important horses to the early history of Crabbet but, although their names are laced through many modern pedigrees, the type of fine and flamboyant bay they represented is much rarer. They are bound together by more than a place in history as the few descendants who seem to owe them a significant debt do so predominantly through their joint son Ahmar. There was also a full sister to Ahmar, Asfura, but Queen of Sheba's influence breeds on more strongly via her other son Astraled. Azrek has a few other significant if not numerous lines of descent via Nefisa's son Nejran, Rose of Sharon's son Rafyk and Rose of Jericho's daughter Rose Diamond.
Queen of Sheba was a dark bay mare with four white feet and a star and snip on her face, known for her flashy way of going. She was tall for a desert bred mare, at 15hh, not classically pretty by modern standards but refined and somewhat light of bone. Her bay and dark chestnut descendants tend to inherit moderate to little white, a fine smooth look and significant style. Some of the most distinctive representatives of Queen of Sheba are to be found in the horses of Riffal breeding in Australia, a horse who carried a double cross to Astraled. Astraled, by the white legged Mesaoud, was a tall brown horse with no white and was very much Queen of Sheba's son. The Riffal horses are tall bays or browns with very little white, not usually pretty, but with a dry refined look that refuses to be described as plain.
Azrek was a compact, short backed and smoothly made horse who is best remembered for his action. He was also one of the prettier of the early imports with a short wedge shaped head and a well set if rather thick neck. The Blunts descriptions of him as a youngster in the desert tell us that, underneath the grey, he was bay. Indeed, in the long term, Azrek's descendants were entirely via his bay progeny due to the fact that he was born into an era with a general prejudice against greys. Later, when his descendants were predominantly bays, Lady Wentworth's preference for chestnuts and the Skowronek greys almost obliterated the Azrek type from the Crabbet gene pool.
Ahmar was by far the most prolific of the Azrek progeny and most of the other lines were combined with him in the cases where the Azrek look has survived. This means that there is considerable difficulty in differentiating between the traits owed to Azrek or Queen of Sheba. Ahmar himself was more like his sire as a body type than his dam but was more than capable of throwing the brown and breedy look so reminiscent of Queen of Sheba. This mix of the two lines is largely responsible for the survival of a very distinctive look that crops up in England, Australia and the USA.
The Ahmar type is a smaller than average bay, finely made, compact and pretty. They also usually display considerable style and movement. The family of the mare Farette, in England, is typical of this type.
This was not the type for which the heyday of Crabbet Park was predominantly known and every generation has had its casualties. A browse through the photos of the past discovers many enchanting images. Nejran's grey sister Nejiba was a compact and pretty mare, very much like her sire Azrek. She was given as a wedding present to Lady Wentworth, bred a few foals, only to be taken back and sold. Her line has long since vanished. Asfura's brown daughter Abla was one of the few to remain with Wilfred Blunt, after his daughter claimed the stud, while the last bays and browns from the line of Abla's daughter, Arusa, were sold abroad. Ahmar's daughter Selma was bred twice to Astraled to produce the mare Selima and the stallion Sotamm, both well thought of in their day. Nonetheless the majority of Crabbets inherit these lines via Oran (in Sotamm's case) or the Sharima family (in Selima's), horses that were big bold chesnuts rather than finely made, almost black, bays.Pictured right: NEJIBA (1892) (Azrek DB x Nefisa) gray mare. This Azrek daughter has no descent today although her bay brother Nejran survives through his daughter Rish. Photo from The Crabbet Arabian Stud, et al.
PAGE 2 of Queen of Sheba article.
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