Andalusian Horses

The andalusian horse has existed since the beginningAlmost all horses you see in films are andalusian
of times. Horses from the Iberian peninsula werehorses and most horses that you see in circus and
famous for being excellent war horses already aboutother spectacular shows are also Andalusians.
500 BC. but evidence of the existence of the IberianThe Carthusian monks were good business men and
equine can be found in cave paintings on the peninsula,very good horse breeders. They were the ones that
that date back to 20.000 -30.000 years before Christ.started the first studbooks of the breed and continued
The Andalusian has had its own studbook since theto excel the breed. They are the founders of the so
1400s and so becomes one of the oldest breeds.called Cartujano bloodline within the P.R.E. studbook,
The king Filip the second of Spain was a great horsethat is thought to be the purest lineage of the
lover and he stands out in the making of theAndalusian horse. But one of the most important things
Andalusian breed. He had read the great Greekthat they did apart from breeding the horses were
philosopher Xenophon's scriptures about the perfecttrading them, and already by the mid 1500 the
horse, descendant from the four elements; earth, wind,Andalusian horses were famous in all of Europe.
fire and water. So Filip embarked on creating whatAlthough these horses were rare you could find one in
was to become the most expensive and beautifulmost royal courts in northern Europe.
horse in Europe.Today the andalusian horse continues to be one of the
He wanted to create an equine as beautiful and goodmost sought after breeds of horse and it still carries
natured as the earth, supple as water, fast as the windthe nobleness of past times. The Andalusian horse is a
and explosive as fire and I must say that hemediums sized horse that stands between 157 and
succeeded in his mission. The Spanish horse is namely167 cm tall at the wither. If it gets too big it looses
all that. He is gentle but tough, high spirited andsome of it's agility, and that is not desirable as one of
courageous, intelligent, willing and breathtakinglythe key traits this horse has is its compact easy to
beautiful. He also maintains his cool in the mostcollect conformation.
stressful of situations.