Ali Pasha Sherif | PF Arabians

Ali Pasha Sherif: The Guardian of Egypt’s Arabian Horse Heritage

Among the great names in the history of the Arabian horse, Ali Pasha Sherif occupies a uniquely important position. He did not begin the royal Egyptian tradition of collecting desert-bred Arabian horses, nor did he establish the international breeding programs through which many Egyptian bloodlines later spread around the world. His achievement was different, but equally significant: he preserved and developed an important part of the heritage assembled by Abbas Pasha I and passed it to the breeders who carried that heritage into the modern era.

Ali Pasha Sherif’s stud stood at a critical point in the history of the breed. It connected the celebrated nineteenth-century collection of Abbas Pasha with Lady Anne and Wilfrid Blunt, the founders of Crabbet Arabian Stud in England and Sheykh Obeyd Stud in Egypt. Through horses such as Mesaoud, Merzuk, Meroe, Sobha and Bint Helwa, the influence of Ali Pasha Sherif reached far beyond Egypt and entered Arabian pedigrees across Europe, North America, Australia and other parts of the world.

His horses became widely admired, but the documentary history of his stud is incomplete. His original studbook is believed to have been lost, and much of what is known today comes from Lady Anne Blunt’s journals, surviving memoranda, pedigrees, sale records and later historical research. For this reason, a responsible account of Ali Pasha Sherif must distinguish between documented evidence and claims repeated through later tradition.

From Egyptian Official to Arabian Horse Breeder

Ali Pasha Mohamed Sherif was born in Egypt in 1834. He belonged to a prominent family connected with the political and military establishment created under Muhammad Ali Pasha. His father, Muhammad Sherif Pasha, held senior administrative responsibilities and served as governor of Syria during the rule of Muhammad Ali.

Ali Pasha Sherif received part of his education in France, including military studies in Paris, and later served as an officer in the Egyptian army. He also held senior positions in Egypt’s government and eventually became president of the Legislative Assembly during the 1890s. However, his enduring international reputation rests primarily on his work as a breeder of Arabian horses.

He grew up during a period in which the horses collected by Muhammad Ali, Ibrahim Pasha and Abbas Pasha I were central to Egypt’s royal equestrian culture. Abbas Pasha, who ruled Egypt from 1848 to 1854, assembled one of the nineteenth century’s most celebrated collections of desert-bred Arabian horses and commissioned the investigation of their tribal histories. The information gathered by his envoys was preserved in the work now known as the Abbas Pasha Manuscript.

When Abbas Pasha died in 1854, his son Ibrahim Ilhami Pasha inherited the collection. Following Ilhami Pasha’s death in 1860, the remaining horses were offered at an extensive public sale. The rediscovered Abbas Pasha Sale List records 278 horses, excluding very young foals at their dams’ sides. The auction was conducted over eleven days in December 1860.

Ali Pasha Sherif acquired horses from this legacy. A widely cited historical account states that he obtained forty animals from the Abbas Pasha collection, although the precise circumstances by which every horse entered his possession remain difficult to reconstruct. Surviving records nevertheless establish that the breeding program he developed drew substantially upon horses descending from Abbas Pasha’s collection.

Preserving the Abbas Pasha Tradition

Ali Pasha Sherif was not simply the owner of surviving Abbas Pasha horses. He bred their descendants over several decades and maintained a collection that became famous among visitors to Egypt.

The significance of his work lies partly in timing. The dispersal of the Abbas Pasha stud fragmented one of the finest collections of Arabian horses in Egypt. Some horses entered European government studs, while others passed into Egyptian private ownership. Without breeders willing and able to preserve those lines, much more of the collection’s heritage might have disappeared.

Ali Pasha Sherif continued breeding from families associated with Abbas Pasha and added horses from other desert sources. His program was therefore not necessarily a closed preservation project in the modern sense. Rather, it continued the nineteenth-century Egyptian practice of combining carefully authenticated desert-bred horses and their descendants within a private stud.

The exact maximum size of his collection is difficult to establish conclusively from the readily available primary documentation. Later histories frequently describe a stud containing several hundred horses, with some accounts placing the number above 400. Such figures should be treated as historical estimates rather than precise annual census data. What is clear is that his stud was exceptionally large, highly regarded and influential.

The surviving evidence also suggests that Ali Pasha Sherif maintained written information on individual horses. Lady Anne Blunt’s journals refer to memoranda supplied by him, containing details such as a horse’s colour, strain, marbat or recognized strain branch, sire, dam, date of birth, name and sometimes price. These short documents were not equivalent to a modern registration certificate, but they demonstrate an effort to preserve identifying and pedigree information.

Unfortunately, Ali Pasha Sherif’s complete studbook has not survived. Researchers have identified only limited extracts and related records. This loss explains why some pedigrees connected with the stud remain incomplete or disputed and why Lady Anne Blunt devoted so much effort to investigating them.

Lady Anne Blunt Encounters the Stud

The most important international connection in the history of Ali Pasha Sherif’s horses was his relationship with Lady Anne and Wilfrid Scawen Blunt.

The Blunts founded Crabbet Arabian Stud in England in 1878 after travelling in the Middle East and acquiring horses from Bedouin breeders and other regional sources. They later established Sheykh Obeyd Stud near Cairo, giving them a permanent base for breeding Arabian horses in Egypt. Crabbet eventually became one of the most influential Arabian studs in the world.

Lady Anne possessed a deep interest in the provenance of Arabian horses. She spoke Arabic, kept extensive journals and recorded detailed observations concerning the horses she encountered. Her writing provides some of the most valuable surviving evidence about Ali Pasha Sherif’s stud.

She was particularly impressed by the quality and character of his horses. On March 6, 1891, Lady Anne wrote of the “indescribable air of distinction” she found in the horses and mares of Ali Pasha Sherif, associating their special quality with the breeds originally collected by Abbas Pasha. Her words show that she regarded Ali Pasha Sherif’s program not merely as another Egyptian stud but as a living continuation of the earlier royal collection.

Between 1889 and 1896, the Blunts acquired a number of horses from Ali Pasha Sherif. Later research based upon the Abbas Pasha Sale List and surviving records indicates that these horses traced to stock sold from the Abbas Pasha collection in 1860. Lady Anne attempted to reconstruct their complete pedigrees, but the information available to her was often partial.

Her surviving notes and journals remain especially important because Egypt’s first published Arabian studbook appeared decades later. In the absence of a complete Ali Pasha Sherif studbook, the Blunt records preserve details that might otherwise have been lost.

Mesaoud and the Road to Crabbet

The most famous horse bred by Ali Pasha Sherif and acquired by the Blunts was Mesaoud, a chestnut stallion foaled in Egypt in 1887.

Mesaoud was by Aziz and out of the mare Yemameh. He was bred at Ali Pasha Sherif’s stud and purchased by the Blunts as a young horse, together with other representatives of the same breeding tradition. He was sent to England in 1891 and became one of the principal foundation sires at Crabbet.

At Crabbet, Mesaoud produced more than 100 recorded purebred Arabian offspring and became deeply embedded in the stud’s breeding population. His descendants were exported internationally, spreading his influence far beyond Britain. The Eastern Crabbet Arabian Horse Society identifies him as a foundation stallion whose blood remains widespread among Crabbet Arabians.

Mesaoud’s importance was not based on a single famous descendant. His influence multiplied through numerous sons and daughters and through repeated appearances in later pedigrees. As Crabbet horses were exported to continental Europe, North America, Australia and other regions, Mesaoud became one of the principal channels through which Ali Pasha Sherif’s breeding entered the international Arabian population.

The Blunts also acquired important mares from the stud. Horses connected with Ali Pasha Sherif’s breeding contributed substantially to the mare families developed at Crabbet and Sheykh Obeyd. Their descendants later appeared in Egyptian, British, American and other national breeding programs.

Ali Pasha Sherif’s worldwide legacy should therefore not be reduced to Mesaoud alone. Mesaoud is the best-known representative, but the broader influence came through a group of stallions and mares whose descendants were preserved by the Blunts and other breeders.

The Dispersal of the Stud

During the final years of Ali Pasha Sherif’s life, his collection began to disperse. Horses were sold privately and through auction, and the Blunts made determined efforts to acquire representatives of lines they considered valuable.

The final major sale took place in Cairo on March 26, 1897, shortly after Ali Pasha Sherif’s death. Lady Anne Blunt attended the auction with her daughter Judith, later Lady Wentworth, and Mutlak, a horseman who had previously worked for Ali Pasha Sherif. Her journal records the horses presented, several prices realized and her own purchasing decisions.

At the sale, Lady Anne purchased the mare Bint Horra with her foal and the mare Bint Nura es Shakra. Her journal also records regret over horses she did not secure. This firsthand account gives a rare view of the final dispersal and demonstrates how quickly some of the remaining lines were scattered.

Many horses from the dispersal were subsequently lost to recorded purebred Arabian breeding. Because comprehensive registration systems were not yet in place in Egypt, the identities and later histories of some animals cannot now be established. The horses acquired by breeders who maintained careful records, especially the Blunts, consequently became disproportionately important to the survival of the stud’s documented heritage.

Ali Pasha Sherif’s Place in Egyptian Breeding

Ali Pasha Sherif belonged to an era before the establishment of the Royal Agricultural Society, which was founded in 1908. His work was conducted as a private breeder, not through a national studbook or centralized government breeding authority.

Nevertheless, his horses became part of the foundation from which later Egyptian Arabian breeding developed. Bloodlines preserved through Sheykh Obeyd, Crabbet and other private Egyptian collections eventually entered later breeding programs. The historical progression was not a simple, uninterrupted line from Abbas Pasha to Ali Pasha Sherif and then to the Royal Agricultural Society. Several royal and private studs, as well as later desert-bred imports, contributed to the Egyptian Arabian population.

Ali Pasha Sherif’s role was therefore not that of the sole founder of modern Egyptian breeding. Rather, he was one of its most important custodians. His program preserved a significant body of Abbas Pasha-derived breeding during the decades between the dispersal of the original royal collection and the creation of Egypt’s organized twentieth-century programs.

This more precise description avoids overstating his influence while still recognizing its scale. His legacy became particularly powerful because the horses preserved by the Blunts entered breeding populations with international reach.

The Limits of the Historical Record

Writing about Ali Pasha Sherif requires caution. His studbook is lost, not every horse was photographed, and contemporary records survive unevenly. Some claims about the size of his collection or the ancestry of individual horses come from accounts written years later.

Lady Anne Blunt’s journals and memoranda are among the strongest available sources because they were created close to the events and often record information received directly from Ali Pasha Sherif or his representatives. Even these records, however, sometimes contain gaps or inconsistencies. Lady Anne herself continued reviewing pedigree information years after the horses had been acquired.

Modern researchers have improved the picture by examining the Abbas Pasha Sale List, surviving portions of Ali Pasha Sherif’s records, Crabbet herd books, European studbooks and Lady Anne’s papers. This research has confirmed some connections and corrected or clarified others. It has also shown that the history of these horses cannot responsibly be reconstructed from pedigree tradition alone.

Conclusion

Ali Pasha Sherif stands between two great eras in Arabian horse history.

Behind him stood Abbas Pasha I and the extraordinary collection of desert-bred horses assembled in nineteenth-century Egypt. Ahead of him stood Lady Anne and Wilfrid Blunt, Crabbet, Sheykh Obeyd and the international expansion of organized Arabian horse breeding.

His achievement was to preserve, breed and document an important portion of the Abbas Pasha heritage during a period when it might easily have disappeared. Through his cooperation with the Blunts and the horses they acquired from him, that heritage became part of breeding programs far beyond Egypt.

The surviving record is incomplete, and responsible history must acknowledge its limitations. Yet those limitations do not diminish Ali Pasha Sherif’s importance. The documented evidence shows that his stud preserved valuable Abbas Pasha-derived families, produced horses of lasting international influence and inspired Lady Anne Blunt’s admiration and historical research.

Abbas Pasha assembled the great collection. Ali Pasha Sherif carried an important part of it forward. The Blunts then introduced its descendants into an international network of breeding programs. Without Ali Pasha Sherif, one of the most important connections between the desert Arabian heritage of the nineteenth century and the modern Arabian horse would have been considerably weaker, and many of its most influential bloodlines might have been lost.

Selected Sources

Forbis, Judith, and Gülsün Sherif. The Abbas Pasha Manuscript and Horses and Horsemen of Arabia and Egypt During the Time of Abbas Pasha, 1800–1860. Ansata Publications, 1993. [openlibrary.org]
Al-Dahdah, Edouard, Kate McLachlan and Moira Walker. The Arabian Horses of Abbas Pasha. Research based on the Abbas Pasha Sale List and related original documents. [daughterof...hewind.org], [tuttoarabi.com]
Blunt, Lady Anne. Journals and surviving memoranda concerning Ali Pasha Sherif’s horses. [daughterof...hewind.org], [cmkarabians.com]
Qatar National Library. Judith Forbis Ansata Arabian Collection: photographs and documentary material concerning Ali Pasha Sherif, Lady Anne Blunt and Sheykh Obeyd Stud. [ediscovery.qnl.qa]
Eastern Crabbet Arabian Horse Society. “A Brief History of the Crabbet Stud.” [ecahs.org]