arabianheritagesourcestrain koheilan krush

The strain of Koheilan Krush

The Koheilan Krush horses originally come from the Muteyr tribe. This tribe lived in the Hedschas and came to the Nedschd in the second half of the 19th century. Lady Anne Blunt tells us in A Pilgrimage to Nejd: "The tribe from which he (Ibn Rashid) got the best blood , the Hamdani Semri and the Kehilan el-Krush, was the Muteyr (sometimes called the Dushan)." She discribes a chestnut Kehilet el-Krush mare in the stables at Hajl as rather plain headed and heavy in the neck, ..."but a very fine shoulder, a high wither, legs like steel, hind quarter decidedly coarse, much hair at the heels. More bone than breeding....though moving, and with the Emir on her back, one must be very captious not to admire." (1879)

Dr. Hazaim Alwair from Syria gave the following information on the strain (2007):

"The Keheilet Krush is a very prized strain, and perhaps one of the most famous of all. There are lots of poems about the Krush strain. In early days in Syria, Lady Anne Blunt bought the mare Burning Bush from the city of Hama, she was bred by the S´baa tribe. Later she aquired the Keheilet Krush mares Jawza (Jauza) and Aida from the Dawish clan of Mutayr.

The strain belonged to the Koheilan Ajuz strain and was in the possesion of the Sherifs of Jawf al-Yaman, who were descendants of the Prophet Mohamed. The most famous line of this strain is that bred by the leaders of the Mutayr tribe, the Al-Dawish are the sheikhs of the Mutayr, who obtained it from Ibn Krushan. Now Ibn Krushan didn´t breed these horses, but he had his name on the strain because you will always hear the Al-Dawish say they took these horses from Ibn Krushan. In time the Ajuz part of the name was dropped and she became the Keheilet Krush, or Keheilet Al Krush. They are also sometimes called Krush Al Dawish. Some of the best horses in Syria are of this strain.

The Keheilet Krush Al Baida strain is so called because they came with Mezel Abdul Mohsen, one of the leaders of the Shammar. This is called Krush Al Baida because she came with from Najd. When I asked his great grandson, he told me they bought these horses from Najd, they took them directly from the Mutayr and they called them Krush Al Baida because of the famous poem if Ibn Rashid about them."

Krush 1909 (left), and Jauza 1909 at Sheikh Obeyd, Egypt. Krush or sometimes also called Krushan was a desert bred Koheilan Krush. His sire was a Kehilan El Sueti of the Harb stock and his dam the grey Kehilet El Krush whose dam was the mare of El Duish known as the "white Krush" (Krush Al Baida) and famed for her speed. Jauza, a chestnut mare, desert bred, sire a Dahman Shahwan of Sheikh Mubarak Ibn Sabah, Emir of Kuwait, dam a Kehilat El Krush, favourite mare of the late Sheikh Sultan El Duish.

When the Ibn Sauds won over the Ibn Rashids in 1921 and conquered Hajl the stud of Ibn Rashid with the Krush mares came into the possession of the Ibn Sauds. One mare of this strain was presented by King Abdul Aziz al-Saud to Lady Wentworth of Crabbet Park. In 1927 this mare Dafina came to England. She was bred by the Muteyr in the Nedschd.

Dafina was presented to Lady Wentworth by King Ibn Saud in 1927, the same year as El Kahila to Inshass

Emir Abdullah, the ruler of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, founded the Royal Stud with beduin horses of his family from the Hedschas and from different tribes. Some of the mares had been used in the fights against the Ottoman empire, in which Lawrence of Arabia was engaged. Among the foundation stock was the Krushiah Jamila, one of the war mares. After King Abdullah was murdered in 1951, the Royal Stud nearly came to an end. Luckily most of the mares could be saved later on. Gazella, a white Krushiah mare, was rediscoverded pulling a plough.

Gazella, the white Koheilah Krushiah form the Royal Stables of Jordan

On the island of Bahrain you find horses of the Koheilan Krush strain also:

Krush, pictured at 25 years of age (top), dam of Krushan (below left), Sheikh Isa´s favorite stallion. In 1948 this mare was presented to the ruler of Bahrain by Sheikh Mohamed al Araibi, Sheikh of al Amara (a large district between Baghdad and Basra). Krushan is by the famous "Old speckled Jellaby", pictured at age 34 (below right). He died at 38! (Forbis photos)

Turkey´s most imortant foundation stallion was a Koheilan Krush:

Kuheylan Krush (Krush), top left -the most famous foundation stallion of Turkey, sired by a Saklawi Shieyfi out of a Koheilah Krushiah dam. He was known in Turkey as Baba Kurus. His two sons Krush (top right), sold to Egypt, and Krush II (left), leading sire at Karacabey Hara after his father passed on.

Krush was purchased by Aral and Batu for the Turkish government in 1933 in the village of Halbe (Halba), near Tripoli, Lebanon, from Abdulmecit Agha for 2,300 French francs. An imposing masculine-type stallion, he was white with a greyish dapple and stood 1.55 high. He measured 181 cm round the chest and posessed a broad forehead of 20 1/2 cm. Born in 1921 , he was of most highly esteemed lineage, his dam beeing a Koheilah Krushiah and his sire a Saklawi Shieyfi. The Turks weren´t the only ones interested in this family for it caught the eye of Dr. Ahmed Mabrouk who was on a mission for the Royal Agricultural Society of Egypt... He reported in his book Journey to Arabia: "At Beyrouth I found a Krush, a nice grey horse who had won seventeen races at less than six years of age. This horse out of El Nawagia by Krush belongs to Saad El Din Shatila Pasha.The sire of the Krush horse which I bought was sold a few years ago to the Turkish government... It is worth mentioning that in the only three stables I visited in Beyrouth, I saw about thirty offspring of the famous stallion Krush." Although Dr. Mabrouk purchased this son of Krush and imported him into Egypt, he was not used by the Royal Agricultural Society in the perpetuation of their breeding herd, but put out to a depot for local breeders to use in producing race horses. (Forbis, Hoofbeats along the Tigris, 1970)

This Krush in Egypt was a Koheilan Al Nawwaq by strain and was used for breeding and had three registered offspring: the stallion Tamie (1937) out of Nagiya; the mare Bushra (1940) out of Kahila and the mare Madiha (1938) out of Bint Sabah, therefore a sister to Bukra and the Babson mare Bint Bint Sabbah, but regretfully none of them bred on. Another of Krush Halba sons, the stallion Gazwan, was the foundation sire for the now defunct Lebanese Arabian Horse breeding programme. Some of his sons and daughters have been exported to the U.S. in 1947 as part of the Hearst importation. A third asil line to Krush Halba now survives in Syria through his other son Abu Al-Tayyeb, also a Koheilan al Krush from the Fad´aan marbat. The Davenport mare Werdi also comes from this marbat. (Information thanks to Edouard Al Dahdah www.daughterofthewind.org).

Prof. Batu of the university of Ankara noted during his travels in Arabia that the strain of Koheilan Krush was the best to be found at that time. Prof. Batu disagrees with Raswan´s theory that the beduins adhere to certian strains. Batu states he found it most difficult to locate a tribe breeding within one strain and that eventually within one pedigree one finds a variety of strains or bloodlines.

In Egypt the Krush strain goes back to the dark bay mare El Kahila, presented to Inshass by King Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud in 1927. She was born in 1921. Her daughter El Zabia by El Deree was noted to be of the Koheilan Krush strain, although no strain was mentioned for her mother El Kahila.

Shahbaa (Hamdan X Shahd) 1951 and her son Sabeel by Gassir (1967) in El Zahraa

Shahbaa and her daughter Ramza 1963 by El Sareei

Safinaz (Alaa El Din X Ramza) 1970, one of the most beautiful broodmares at the E.A.O. in her times.

Ibn Safinaz (Seef X Safinaz) 1981 with 25 years at Imperial Egytian Stud

Ibn Safinaz (Seef X Safinaz) 1981 El Zahraa, the most influential Koheilan Krush stallion of our days. He goes back to the mare El Kahila, presented to King Fouad by King Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud in 1927.

Mokhtar, a Koheilan Krush in Syria. All his ancestors go back to the horses of the Shammar beduins. He is inbred to his granddam Mumtazah, main broodmare of the man Al-Qartah. This marbat belonged to the Shammar Sheikh Mayzar al-Abd al Muhsen al-Jarba, member of the Syrian parliament in the 1940s, going back to Krush Al-Baida from al Duwish of the Muteyr. (photo Loewenherz, and information from www.daughterofthewind.org)

Mokhtar in France