THE HEAD
The lijam
اللجام
al-lijām — the bridle
The bridle holds the brow. Without it the bit has no seat. First lesson: to receive a measure, not to lessen the force, but so that it can be led.
FURUSIYYA
الْعُدَّة
The tack
The bit, the saddle, the rule. What is placed on the horse figures what the house places around the man.
وَأَعِدُّوا لَهُم مَا اسْتَطَعْتُم مِّن قُوَّةٍ وَمِن رِبَاطِ الْخَيْلِ
“Prepare against them whatever you are able of force and of horses held in tether.”
Qur’an, al-Anfal 8:60
الْخَيْلُ مَعْقُودٌ فِي نَوَاصِيهَا الْخَيْرُ إِلَى يَوْمِ الْقِيَامَةِ
“Goodness is tied to the forelocks of horses until the Day of Resurrection.”
Hadith — Sahih al-Bukhari 2850
Furūsiyya gives the formation of character a body. Before it is a symbol, it is a practice: the art of the horse. The sani are made to hold an animal still untamed, so that they understand, in the gesture itself, what it is to command oneself.
The bit is no accident of the tack, but the figure of the brake a man sets on what, in him, would carry him away. The passions are not bad in themselves. They become so by the use that is made of them. They are not extinguished, but bitted — as one trains a colt, not to break it, but to turn its force.
The colt that rears and tries to unseat the rider is like the one who enters Dar al-Hiraf. The community provides the bit, the bridle, the spurs and the saddle. But it is he himself who must stand firm.
Each piece of the ʿudda has an office with the horse and a figure for character. The same logic runs through futuwwa, brotherhood and javanmardi: the house offers the frame; the man must stand firm.
THE SADDLE AND THE HOUSE
One workshop: leather, iron, wood. The housing may be born with the corporations of Fez under the measure of the house. The ʿudda is not bought — it is made here.
THE VERSE
The ribat
رِبَاطِ الْخَيْلِ
ribāṭ al-khayl — horses held ready
The verse does not merely say “horses”. It says ribāṭ al-khayl: horses tethered, held ready, within reach. The root is that of ribāṭ — the tie that holds, the post one keeps, the fact of remaining where one has been placed.
The lead rope (ar-rasan) does not hobble the horse, but keeps it available. A horse that wanders is not free, it is nowhere to be found on the day it is needed. What the rope does for the horse, the order of the day does for the man: it holds him at his post, ready for what will be asked.
To watch without being called, to stay in place when nothing presses: this is the least spectacular part of the formation, and the first. It governs the order of the house — see daily life and At-Tadbir.
Al-udda
العُدّة
al-ʿudda — the tack, the horse’s equipment
1
اللجام al-lijām
The bridle
The bridle
2
الحكمة al-ḥakama
The bit
The bit
3
العنان al-ʿinān
The reins
The reins
4
اللبب al-labab
The breastplate
The breastplate
5
السرج as-sarj
The saddle
The saddle
6
الجل al-jull
The cloth
The cloth
7
البطانة al-biṭāna
The girth
The girth
8
الركاب ar-rikāb
The stirrups
The stirrups
9
الحقّب al-ḥaqab
The crupper
The crupper
Each piece, its office with the horse and its figure for character.
الحكمة
al-ḥakama
The bit
With the horse — speaks to the mouth
For character — the brake
العنان
al-ʿinān
The reins
With the horse — carry the hand
For character — intention
اللجام
al-lijām
The bridle
With the horse — holds the head
For character — orientation
السرج
as-sarj
The saddle
With the horse — gives the seat
For character — the rule
الجل
al-jull
The cloth
With the horse — covers and honours
For character — what is shown, without vanity
البطانة
al-biṭāna
The girth
With the horse — tightens without stifling
For character — measure
الركاب
ar-rikāb
The stirrups
With the horse — receive the weight
For character — the support of companions
المهماز
al-miḥmāz
The spurs
With the horse — awaken, without breaking
For character — demand
اللبب
al-labab
The breastplate
With the horse — holds the saddle forward
For character — what supports in front
الحقّب
al-ḥaqab
The crupper
With the horse — holds the saddle back
For character — what holds behind
The community provides the bit, the bridle, the spurs and the saddle. It is the sani who must stand firm.
CORRESPONDENCE
In the house
The “for character” column stays an image as long as it is not set on real things. Here is what each piece answers to in the house.
| The saddle as-sarj | The written rule and the order of the day — daily life |
| The bridle al-lijām | The direction of the master and of the muqaddem — the masters |
| The bit al-ḥakama | Restraint of speech, and the silence kept during the hours of work |
| The reins al-ʿinān | The intention with which a thing is undertaken: the same ride, according to the intention, forms or dissipates |
| The stirrups ar-rikāb | The companions who take a share of the weight — brotherhood |
| The spurs al-miḥmāz | The master's demand and fraternal admonition, which wake without wounding — At-Tadbir |
| The girth al-biṭāna | Measure: neither slackness nor excess of zeal, both of which unseat |
| The cloth al-jull | Dress and bearing, which honour without display — traditional dress |
| The breastplate al-labab | What holds in front: the commitment made on entering |
| The crupper al-ḥaqab | What holds behind: the bond that remains after leaving |
THE BRAKE
The bit
الحكمة
al-ḥakama — the bit
The bit does not take the fire from the horse, but gives it a language. So with the passions. They are not extinguished; they are bitted.
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE BRAKE
Gentleness
الرِّفق
ar-rifq — gentleness, forbearance
A bit too harsh wounds the mouth and closes the horse; a spur badly held opens the flank. The piece that was to give a language becomes an instrument of constraint, and the horse no longer obeys, but defends itself. What is gained that way is lost twice over.
The tradition is precise on this point: one does not brand the face of a beast, one does not use it as a pulpit, one waters it before drinking and unloads it before sitting down.
“Gentleness is not in anything without adorning it, and is not taken from anything without disfiguring it.”
Hadith — Sahih Muslim 2594
The brake, then, never has the last word, which belongs to measure. A discipline that breaks is not a discipline but a fault of workmanship — and a ruined mouth is not repaired. What holds for the rider's hand holds for authority in the house: see At-Tadbir.
THE BACK
The saddle
السرج
as-sarj — the saddle
The saddle gives the seat. In the house, the rule holds the same office: it makes lasting possible. That is also, on a larger scale, the meaning of At-Tadbir — the governance that gives the house its seat.
WHAT IS SHOWN
The parade
العُدّة
al-ʿudda — the tack
Cloths and breastplate: what the horse carries outward. The ʿudda may be rich; it must never be hollow. What is shown honours, or it betrays.
WHAT IS NOT SEEN
The grooming
العِنَايَة
al-ʿināya — care
The ten pieces of the ʿudda are the ones that are seen. The tack begins lower and earlier: the shoe (an-naʿl) checked before going out, the felt (al-labad) laid under the saddle so that the wood does not wound the back, the curry-comb passed over the coat, the leather greased and the buckles wiped once the horse is back in.
None of this shows. A badly set nail is not visible at the start, but at the third mile. A girth never cleaned is not visible either — it gives way on the day of the ride.
This is the exact counterpart of the parade. What is shown honours on condition that what is not shown has been done. A man is judged by what he does when no one is watching; the horse, for its part, is not deceived. The day of the house is built on gestures of this kind — see daily life.
THE WORKSHOP
The work of hands
الحِرَف
al-ḥiraf — the crafts
No piece of the tack comes of itself. One workshop gathers saddlery, iron and wood: the leather of the saddle, the bit, the stirrups and the spurs, the tree — and the wood of the Riad itself. The housing, woven then embroidered in gold thread — the sqalli — may be born with the corporations of Fez under the measure of the house; the buckles are chased and the leather dyed.
What is admired on the horse on a feast day is therefore, first of all, months of workshop. Furūsiyya and Dar al-Hiraf are not two separate departments of the house, since the rider wears what the craftsman has made, and the craftsman sees his work tried by the gallop — what is badly stitched comes apart at the first charge. Each judges the other without having to speak.
See the crafts of the hand and the disciplines.
THE RIDER
To hold oneself
الفارس
al-fāris — the rider
Authority is seen in the way a man holds himself beside the horse, not in the ornament. He who does not command himself does not command.
THE TROOP
The sorba
السَّرْبَة
as-sarba — the aligned troop; the tbourida, the ride of the guns
Everything above speaks of one man and one horse. In Morocco, furūsiyya shows itself otherwise: as a troop. The tbourida lines up a sarba — some fifteen riders, sometimes more — under a muqaddem who holds the centre of the line and gives the start.
The difficulty is not to go fast. It is to start together, to hold the line down the whole length of the ground, and to make the guns sound as one shot. A single rider ahead, a single one behind, and the line is lost for all: the troop is not judged by its best rider, but by its unity.
This is the most exact figure of the common life, and it comes from here, not from an abstraction: no one goes ahead, no one falls behind, the honour is undivided. Futuwwa and brotherhood say nothing else.
THE SĀʾIS
To hold and to serve
السائس
as-sāʾis — the groom
The sāʾis holds the horse, and that gesture, far from being servitude, is the one that makes furūsiyya possible. He who has rank does not refuse the humble office — the same demand in futuwwa.
THE COLT
Who enters
المُهر
al-muhr — the colt
The colt that rears is not a defect, but force before measure. The community offers the brake. It falls to him to stand firm.
This is the same young man the house is looking for: not the one already trained, but the one who has the force and accepts to be led. See Who we are looking for and The residency.
FILIATION
Where this comes from
What precedes does not come from a reverie about horses. Furūsiyya has its literature, and the tack fills whole chapters of it.
Ibn Akhī Ḥizām, the caliph's equerry in ninth-century Baghdad — Kitāb al-furūsiyya wa-l-bayṭara: training and care held together.
Aṭ-Ṭarsūsī, twelfth century — Tabṣirat arbāb al-albāb: arms and equipment described piece by piece.
Ibn Hudhayl al-Andalusī, Granada, fourteenth century — Ḥilyat al-fursān wa-shiʿār ash-shujʿān, “the adornment of horsemen”: the book that ties the equipment most explicitly to the moral bearing of the man who wears it.
Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, fourteenth century — al-Furūsiyya al-Muḥammadiyya: chivalry taken as a discipline of character before being a military art.
A word on the saddle. The Maghrebi saddle descends from the Andalusi saddle ridden a la jineta: short stirrups, bent leg, weight on the knee, the horse led by the voice and by shifts of balance rather than by the strength of the arm. It is a school of finesse before it is a school of force — and Spain, which learned it from this side of the sea, left it its name.
Furūsiyya forms the body; the ʿudda gives it its figure. The house does not train men in order to break them. It offers them a frame — bit, bridle, saddle — and asks them to hold to it.
“The riad is for its own, not its own for the riad.”