Glossary

A rope  for leading or tying an animal

Hunting bird that the falconer calls back on his glove, different from the decoy birds, claimed on the ground. The decoy is a piece of leather, that may be decorated with feathers and filled with a little meat, which the falconer keeps on revolving to attract his bird’s attention and make him fly back.

Third event of a traditional carriage competition, namely in a given time the team has to go through a certain amount of gates materialised on a limited track. The purpose is to assess the dressage of the horses and the drivers’ skill.

A town carriage, originating from England, enclosed, with two wheels, for two passengers. The coachman is sitting in a seat set very high at the back of the bodywork. It is a hiring carriage, the English equivalent of the Paris hansoms. There are also private versions which are made in luxury.

Those exercises and figures called haute école [high school] originate in the French riding tradition. These are exercises which help to get the collected balance of the horse, such as the piaffer, the passage, and the pirouettes in a canter. The figures on two tracks in the three gaits are part and parcel of the “lower school”. In France the school jumps have been developed within the Cadre noir in Saumur to take the shape they have today.

The purpose of the heraldic signs was to identify the knights in armour. They are therefore drawings or other coats of arms represented on the blankets, coats, shields... enabling to recognise the riders.

Flying high, the hunting bird, previously “unhooded” flies off when the dog stops or when game is thought to be around; it then soars up vertically from its falconer, as high as possible: when the game leaves, the bird goes into a dive, grabs the game (the word used is it “ties” it) or hits it violently with its claws (it is then said it “buffets” it), then gets hold of it, knocked out on the ground.

Period of Prehistory corresponding to the end of the last ice period and extending from 35,000 to 10,000 years before our era. It is characterised by the arrival in Europe of modern man (Homo Sapiens) and the development of parietal and furniture art.

The science dealing with the horse’s care, before the veterinarian profession was founded.

From the Greek hippos, horse, and iatros, doctor, this word used to refer to the specialist of the horse’s diseases before the veterinarian profession was founded.

The study of the horse. It covers all the knowledge related to horses: morphology, movements, anatomy, reproduction, breeds....

A craftsman who used to prepare the leather in the way Hungarian tanners used to do it.

Light leather hood covering the head of a falcon or of a goshawk (bird of prey close to the sparrow hawk) so that they keep calm. The word is now used in everyday language.

Instrument used to cut in the hoof horn, to cut grooves in it.

Ball game on horseback. There are six riders per team (of whom two substitutes). The players are forbidden to dismount the horse or pony to pick up the ball (which has six leather handles) when it is on the ground. The principle is to score a maximum of points in the opposite goal.

Born in 1835 in Paris where his father was the first coachman of the marquis of Hertford. After staying as a coachman in Vienna with Prince Péricles Gikha, then with the Honourable Spencer Cowper in Sandringham where he taught the prince of Wales to drive four horses, he settled in Paris, rue Jean Goujon, in 1866, and opens up a driving school. His famous teaching attracted the Paris high society and golden youth, the best of the amateur drivers, as well as wealthy foreign customers, especially American (he used to teach in French, English, German and Italian). He would give approximately 1,200 four-horse driving lessons a year. Upon his students’ request, Howlett published a Driving lessons book in French in New York in 1892 and it is still the bible of long rein four-horse driving.

Hunter is a sports discipline, originating in fox hunting. The rider and his/her horse – harnessed and presented according to a strict code – have to go over a jumping course. Unlike in traditional horse shows, the obstacles are more natural, bigger and more imposing, reminding of the possible natural obstacles faced when out hunting. Yet, they are not very high (maximum: approximately 1.25 metres). Moreover, the penalties over the course (refusal, falling pole) are not the only ones accounted. In Hunter style, the horse is also allocated a mark according to its style (good-looking, attitude, movement). In Hunter equitation, the rider will be allocated a mark for his/her savoir-faire (position, technique, discretion).