The Arabian Horse

The Arabian horse is the oldest breed of horse in the world. For many years it was used by the Arabian knights as war horses in the deserts of Arabia. Noted for its dish faced head, it is a equine of great beauty. Many consider this horse to be the most stunning and exquisite horse in the world. I personally prefer something more like a Thoroughbred horse, but I love an original, natural Arabian horse as much as anyone.

The Arabian horse is also known for its endurance over long distances, making it an ideal competing endurance horse. Arabian horses have many unusual characteristics that aren’t found in most other horses. Such as: Arabian horses only have 17 ribs while most other horses have 18, they have only 5 lumbar vertebrae while most other horses have 6 and they only have 16 tail vertebrae while most other horses have 18!

No-one knows why they are like this; perhaps when God created them he wanted them to be different from most of the other horses? Whatever the reason, none of these missing bones compromise the Arabian horse’s performance!

Because of these good personal characteristics the Arabian horse has been used to improve many horse breeds such as the Thoroughbred horse, the Appaloosa horse and the Anglo-Arab horse

Arabian horses come in the colors of dappled gray, black, chestnut, bay and brown and stand from about 14.2 to 15.3 hands.