Castilian Horse Breeders International

Preserving the history and promoting the future of the Spanish Gaited Horses.

At the time Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas, present day Spain was known as the “Kingdom of Castile”.  After the success of the Conquistadors and with the Americas firmly under Castilian control, the Kingdom’s seat of government was established in present day Lima, Peru.  Wealthy and powerful families, the Castilian Elite, sent representatives to the New World and established a presence to better exploit its riches. 

One breed was very special and unique to Castile, so unique in fact that its way of going, an extremely smooth ambling gait, was then and is today, called the “Paso Castellano”.  Simply translated to English, it is the “Castilian Walk”.  It is a broken pace that begins with the legs on a side ( LR LF ) moving forward harmoniously at exactly the same moment as if rod-connected like the large wheels of a steam-driven locomotive.  Unlike a pure pace, the rear leg finds support before the front with a four-beat cadence varying with speed from an isochronal (1…2…3…4)  to near a pace (1.2……3.4).  It is this way of moving more than any other characteristic that defines the Castilian Horse.

We call this horse today the same name by which it was known 500 years ago: CABALLO CASTELLANO, or in English, THE CASTILIAN HORSE. In addition to giving a smooth comfortable ride, the Castilian Horse is strong, durable, energetic, handsome and obedient, taking long strides and covering many miles with little effort on the part of the rider or horse.   The propensity for this lateral movement is natural and genetically passed.  

The Castilian Horse is not a large horse, the very best specimen’s stand no more than 14-3 hands with the average being 14 to 14-2 hands, some quite outstanding females may be 13-2.  The strength of these individuals, even though of lesser stature than some breeds, is remarkable.

The Castilian Horse has a balanced conformation, the length of the legs approximately equaling the depth of the body measured at the girth.  The taller breeds gain height with long legs sometimes as much as 1½ times the depth of the body.

The undeveloped nature of the lands made horseback the premier means of travel and the choice of the wealthy and elite.  The lower classes either traveled on foot or, at best, rode a donkey.  During this period the very best riding horses from the Kingdom were brought to the Americas.  At this time, even in Europe, wheeled transportation was still rudimentary as a suitable, widespread road system did not yet exist.  Quite obviously, roads existed in some towns and large cities, but travel over long distances still depended on a riding horse. 

This brings us to the question: “What kind of horse?”  By this time in history, the horse had long been domesticated and selectively bred for suitability to various tasks—large docile horses as draft animals; strong, brave horses for war; and horses with a special ambling gait that provided a smooth and comfortable ride for rulers, the nobility and rich merchants who could afford them. 

The Castilian Horse is not a color-driven breed; all normal colors common to horses are acceptable.  Despite hundreds of years of human intervention, some wise and some unwise, many outstanding examples of Castilian Horses exist today.  They may be called for geo-political reasons by other names but they are nonetheless examples of the Mother Breed: “The Castilian Horse”.

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Attempts to breed taller Castilian individuals have been failures that resulted in taller horses with longer legs but caused a loss, or at minimum, reduced quality of the Paso Castellano gait.

The mission of Castilian Horse Breeders International™ is to identify and register as Castilian Horses, individuals that meet strict standards of gait, strength, conformation and temperament.  The individuals so identified will also be ranked and graded as Castilian, CastilianSelect™ or in the case of a few superior specimens, CastilianElite™.