“All modern Thoroughbreds carry the genetics of three stallions imported to England from the Middle East in the late 17th and early 18th centuries: the Darley Arabian, to whom 95% of today’s Thoroughbred pedigrees trace, the Godolphin Arabian, and the Byerly Turk (who may have been a Turkoman Horse rather than an Arabian), together with around 35 mares” (Wikipedia). There seems to be a great dispute over the origins of these stallions, however, their genetic influence (especially of the Byerly Turk) is quite minimal as the mare lines have the predominant genetic influence.

Cunningham et al. (2001) state that even though the three main male thoroughbred lineages are recognized through the Byerly Turk, Darley Arabian and Godolphin Arabian, pedigree analysis shows that 94% of modern lineages are from 30 foundation mares. The Barb mares show greater influence, as well as an earlier one, than the Turk mares on the development of the Thoroughbred, suggesting that Akhal-Tekes are not a prominent contributor to the English Thoroughbred.

With the analysis of lineage from Hill et al. (2002), they hypothesize that perhaps 12 families contribute to the 19 thoroughbred families, with many mares coming from the same family – including the Burton’s Barb mare (1660 – 1685), three unknown types between 1680-1710, the Byerly Turk mare and the Belgrade Turk mare.

The hypothesis of whether a common ancestor was an Akhal-Teke and the amount it contributes genetically can be tested by doing a similar analysis with the Akhal-Teke bloodlines. To my knowledge this analysis has not been done. I am interested to find out what MAAK and the Russian Institute of Horse Breeding are doing in developing the mare lines.

Origin of the Domestic Horse

At present it is thought that Thoroughbreds descend from a wide variety of populations (Hill et al. 2002). There are also close associations found between the Mongolian native horse and northern European horse breeds, but the greater differences between the northern breeds and the Thoroughbreds and Standardbreds suggests that there was also a southern division of origin (Bjornstad et al. 2003). Tikhonov et al. (1998) traced the dispersal route of the modern horse from America to Siberia and Central Asia to Africa and Eastern Europe. Genetic similarity was found within the modern breeds from Central Asia, such as the Yakut, Akhal Teke, Arabian, Yabou, and Caspian Pony. It is in Eastern Europe that the earliest domestication of the equine is found (Tikhonov et al. 1998). Perhaps that early domestication led to the development of the great riding horses such as the Akhal-Teke.

Historic Thoroughbred Dams:

In only the 18th and 19th centuries more than 200 pureblood, very high class Akhalteke stallions were imported to England. In the Stud Book of English thoroughbred stallions (look at Von Ettingem) 15% of the stallions used for the development of thoroughbred racing horses were originally from Turkmenistan.
Tatiana Riabova, “The History of Using the English Thoroughbred Blood in the Akhalteke Breed” in “The Akhalteke Quarterly”, January 1999 “

More notes to further this discussion, from Upton’s “Newmarket and Arabia, An Examination of the Descent of Racers and Coursers”:

First let us obtain the pure bred and perfect horse, then let us take care to keep his future generations pure.

In an exhausting account of the lineage of the English Thoroughbred, Roger Upton traces their “Thoroughbred” to it’s beginnings as a mixed breed of various types of horses that were available during Caesar’s time in Britain; with Roman horses (from Kelts and the Belgae), the Saxon horses (of Persian origin and probably much modified and altered through their travels), the Spanish horse, as well as that of Flanders. It was from this considerable variety that the Eastern and Arabian blood was mixed to create the English Thoroughbred.

After a century of breeding, Upton’s feeling was that their created breed was not as good a horse as the Arabian or purebred Eastern breeds. Although, following another hundred years the English Thoroughbred is now the fastest horse over the shorter races. It took that 200 years of specifically breeding for speed to become faster than the Akhal-Teke, which has been selected for endurance, and only recently for track racing.

Thorough-bred means bred from the best blood, completely bred; or, it might be put, completely or entirely bred from the best blood – not merely the best that may be at hand, but the very best procurable – such which has been kept pur, and has not suffered from degeneracy; bred completely from a pure and original race.

By the Brit’s own definition, the name “Thoroughbred” belongs to the Akhal-Teke.

References:

Bjornstad G, Nilsen NO, Roed KH. Genetic relationship between Mongolian and Norwegian horses? Anim Genet. 2003 Feb;34(1):55-8.

Hill EW, Bradley, DG, Al-Barody M, Ertugrul, Splan RK, Zacharov I, Cunningham EP. History and Integrity of Thoroughbred Dam Lines Revealed in Equine mtDNA Variation, 2002 International Society for Animal Genetics, Animal Genetics, 33, 287–294.

Tikhonov VN, Cothran EG, Kniazev SP. Population genetic parameters of aboriginal Yakut horses as related to modern breeds of the domestic horse Equus caballus L. Genetika. 1998 Jun;34(6):796-809.

Upton, Roger D. Newmarket and Arabia, An Examination of the Descent of Racers and Coursers. Henry S. King & Co., London 1873.