04/18/2024
Worth the read
Did you know there is an authentic American riding method or Seat. Most people don't. In fact, most Americans think that their discipline is a Seat when this is not often true today. For example, Hunter Seat Equitation is not an authentic Seat. It is fifty years old while Xenophon's horsemanship, a method referenced since the 4th century BC being 2,500 years old, is a true method.
The authentic American seat is called the Fort Riley Seat, or sometimes the Balanced Seat in civilian books. The images below represent the evolution of our national American riding method. The story of our national method begins with Fredirico Capprilli, an Italian Captain Cavalry (top left) who came up with his Forward Seat in 1904. Prior to Caprilli, the nearly universal method, generally called the "chair seat", of riding went back to Xenophon. There have been several significant changes since Xenophon, such as those from William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, in the 17th century that included improvements more natural for the horse.
The top right image reflects the next step in the development of the American method that came from the French Cavalry School at Saumur. This step includes an unsettled controversy between the Italian Cavalry and the French. The Italians claim that soon after 1904 the French stole Caprilli's Forward Seat and renamed it the Saumur Seat. Be that as it may, the next step in development of the Fort Riley Seat came in 1914 when the US Army, seeing that WW1 was inevitable, decided that the US Army needed a central cavalry training school to replace the long standing, Colonial regimental system of training cavalry.
At the time of this decision, the US Cavalry did not have a horsemanship training manual with each regiment having their own training tradition. This made it difficult to transfer cavalrymen between regiments. The French came to our rescue when they provided the US Army their Saumur classified cavalry riding manuals. The French manuals were the basis of horsemanship training at the Fort Riley Kansas Cavalry School until the 1920s.
After WW1 Harry Chamberlin, shown jumping in the bottom left image (with the 1940 US Olympic Team from Fort Riley beneath him), updated the Saumur manuals creating the final version of the Fort Riley Seat. While the Fort Riley Seat is little more than 100 years old, its roots go back thousands of years to Xenophon and through horsemen Cavendish. This is very different from the new riding methods or styles from individuals like Morris, Parelli or the other new fragmented variations on authentic horsemanship like modern reining, current western pleasure and modern dressage.
Lastly, the bottom right image of a cowboy represents the western ranch riding influence on the Fort Riley Seat. Chamberlin, an intense student of horses and riding methods, appreciated the cowboy's practical effectiveness he saw in Fort Riley recruits. Many Fort Riley instructors, like Gordon Wright, came from the ranks of the Cavalry cowboys who thought nothing of sixteen hour days in the saddle.
Our uniquely American Seat became the envy of the horse world until the 1960s when US military riders began to retire or pass on. As a boy, I was fortunate to have a Fort Riley method instructor starting in 1953, ten years after the US Cavalry replaced the horses with mechanized fighting vehicles.
The family tree of global horsemanship is ancient and has many branches. The methods that have endured the test of time. The changes in horsemanship since Xenophon up until the 1970s were the result of new military battlefield advantages with horses. When one nation's cavalry found a better way, other country's cavalry copied and adapted innovations from their enemies or allies.
After the 1970s American horsemanship has been in chaos having lost its connection to military goals and standards, while most European countries kept theirs. Later I will explore these horsemanship methods from countries like the Spanish Riding School, the Russian Hussars, the Ottoman Empire horsemen as well as others like the Portuguese and Spanish methods.
The point is that if you are receiving riding instruction, it is important that you are learning an authentic riding method or seat with an evolved history. The American horse world is now confused by the many instructors who teach the new commercial methods, from Morris, Parelli, etc. or a random combination of methods they usually call "my own combination of what I learned".
These instructors have no real method and you, in order to learn how to ride safely and effectively, must have an instructor who teaches an authentic Seat. It is OK if an instructor includes other influences, but they must teach from a core system or Seat in order to give you a safe practical way to ride.
