Hackney Horse

The Hackney is a breed of horse from England that counts as one of the world’s most elegant Franchises. The word hackney is likely derived from old French word for fortifications “haquenee” and was used from the medieval times onwards, to denote a riding horse.

The Hackney descended from the famous British trotters from Norfolk and Yorkshire, the Norfolk Trotters, which were common in England in the 1700s.

The modern Hackney you seen most often at exhibitions and shows and in competition use but there is also a hackney pony, standing up to 142cm in height that derives from the Pennines Fell pony.

The elegant Hackney developed between 1700 and 1800 from the now extinct breed of Norfolk Trotters, and another English horse breed the Norfolk carriage horse that were very common in Britain.

The Hackney was an offshoot of a breeding development program in Yorkshire to develop a Yorkshire Coach horse. Both breeds had their common ancestor in a stallion called Original Shales, born in 1755.

Shales was the son of a mare named Blaze who was a typical riding horse, which at that time was called a Hackney. Blaze in turn was the daughter of a successful racing stallion, which in turn was the grandson of the Darley Arabian, one of the ancestors of the English full blood race horse or thourghbred as it is known of today.

This pedigree showed a perfect reason to form a new horse breed between the English and Arabic horse blood lines. Shales, was the breed’s ancestor, together with his sons Driver Scot Shales, and a stallion called Marshland who had Shales blood on both sides of his pedigree.

Farmers bet on to getting a trotting horse of the same quality as the old British breed lines, but they wanted to have the characteristics of good riding horses which made the Hackney somewhat stronger than the previous blood lines.

In 1883 the hackney breed first club was formed, The Hackney Horse Society in Norwich, and it was even now that it gave the breed the official name of Hackney after the old name used for a riding horses.

The club began to watch the horses at racetracks, even without a coach many of the race times were impressive. A colt called Bellfounder trotted 3 km in 6 minutes and 14 km in 30 minutes.

In 1800 the development of the Hackney pony saw the new breed sharing the Hackney studbook.
The Hackney is still used to race with, but the breed also serves as a riding horse and as a breed showing horse. Hackneys are recognized for their high stepping action and their typical characteristic long legged stretch stance.

Hackney is famous for its fine movements with liquid and light step, which is described as rhythmic and mysteriously fast. The Hackney is trained for the movements but much of the action is in the genes, through selective breeding the blood lines in the breed’s original foundation bloodstock.

The movements are characterized by high knee lift and the tail is held high when the horses are in motion, this is called a Lofty Trot. Hackneys have long legs with good hocks. The nose profile is slightly convex, the ears are small and the muzzle is well formed. The eyes are large, but the horses must have courage and wisdom in their eyes.

The neck is fairly thin but finely muscled, the Hackney is quiet by nature but will be able to demonstrate energy when on display.