Snaffle Snaffoo

[Linda_Merims@ne.3com.com]

Susan Brehm" <RockingB@worldnet.att.net>  said:

> ...RideCamp is just like any
> other Internet forum, people can say anything.  But it is an
> extremely valuable source of information IMO...

Your caution is extremely well founded.  USENET (a system of
thousands of international newsgroups that dates from the
early 1980s) used to be called "The network of a million lies."

My favorite is the classic cartoon, "On the Internet, nobody
knows you're a dog" caption underneath a pooch reading his
screen.

It's worth what you pay...

My experience with this terminology is that the confusion
is largely a cultural one:  people who grew up in the
English-seat riding tradition vs people who grew up in the
Western-seat riding tradition.  To an English-seat person,
anything with a shank is a "curb."  (The pelham being a
special case compound of snaffle and curb.)   To a Western-seat
person, anything with a broken mouth is a "snaffle."

So, to an English-seat person, the idea of something with
shanks being called a "snaffle" seems nonsensical, while
to a Western-seat person it seems perfectly reasonable.
After all, you still will never see an English-seat person
riding a shanked bit *without* also having a snaffle
rein in there somewhere.  (I'm not sure how to classify
some of the newer jump bits--strange-looking beasties!)
The closest would be a Kimberwicke with a single rein on
the bottom slot, and to a show hunt seat aficianado, a
Kimberwicke is anethema.  It's only the Western folks who
will ride exclusively in a curb.

I might be wrong here, but isn't the use of a snaffle
(in the English-seat sense) on a Western horse a relatively
recent phenomena?  Like say the last 20 years or so?
In fact, isn't the use of broken mouthed bits on Western
horses *at all* a relatively recent phenomena?

One other piece of "crossover" that I havn't seen yet
is the use of black iron (cold iron, do the Western folks
call it?) in an English bit.  I gather the Western folks
rave about it as being a very agreeable substance to
a horse to have in its mouth, even more so than copper,
yet I've never seen a black iron bit in an English equipment
catalog (e.g., Dover's).

I havn't seen anybody answer Kristen's question about what
is a Tom Thumb vs what is an Argentine bit.  Being from
the English-seat tradition, I havn't a clue.

Linda B. Merims
lbm@ici.net
Linda_Merims@ne.3com.com
Massachusetts, USA



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