During the show one of the stallions was unsaddled and lead around the arena so we could see all the brands on him. All the Lipizzaner horses have many brands on them. One on their left jaw "L" for Lipizzan. They also have a brand, numbers on the right side....now I can't remember what the number was for!
On the left side again, the "F" on this horse stands for the stallion line of "Favory" from Kladrub, Bohemia born in 1779. The next brand under that is the dam's bloodline. The hip brand is the Royal Crown of Piber.
Above is a picture of the Royal Crown of Piber, it doesn't show up very well in the picture. This brand tells you that the horse was born at the Piber stud farm in Austria. (This one was the only one in the troupe that had this brand).Piber is the official breeding farm of the Spanish Riding School of Vienna, Austria and only in Piber is there a complete family tree of every Lipizzaner whose ancestry goes back to the classical founding stallions.
(click on the picture above to better see the information there)Every Lipizzaner stallion in the world has a two-part name. The first part is always his father's blood line. The 2nd part is his mother's name or a given name. There are only six male Lipizzaner bloodlines (and only 18 bloodlines for mares). That means that every Lipizzaner stallion in the world will have one of only six possible first names.
Very interesting!!!
A picture I took of the inside back of the book that I bought at the show. Lots of good information in it, it was $15 well spent. There is a history lesson in there, the story of how General George S. Patton saved the horses during WW II. Also pictures and story by a soldier named Vito Spadafino.
Cover of the book; it is for sale on their web site www.lipizzaner.com plus a lot of other things and there is more information there.If you ever get a chance to see them do go, very beautiful to behold!
