Lipica - Lipizzano
Italian breeds of horses

Origins and aptitudes

The Lipica’s place of origin is Lipizza (Lipica), a small locality near Trieste, which is today in Slovenia, but was Italian up to the Second World War and before that, Austrian. Its origins date from the mid-16th century, through an initiative of the Archduke Charles of Stiria, third child of the Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria. Factors contributing to the choice of the Lipizza area included the good quality of the horses which populated Carso and the Aquileiese area and the favourable climate, plus its proximity to areas of great horse-breeding tradition and the production of excellent horses.
The current production of the thoroughbred Lipica-Lipizzano Horse derives from two Italian stallions (Conversano and Napolitano), two Klaudrubs, one Danish and one Oriental Arab.
It is the horse of the celebrated Spanish School of Viena, founded in 1729 by Charles of Austria.
At the end of the Second World War, Italy (like Austria and Yugoslavia) managed to maintain a very numerous and complete nucleus of the ‘families’ making up the Lipizzano Breed. In an exciting episode, in the spring of 1945 the records of the breed and a precious herd were delivered to the Italian Ministry of Defence, which maintained the latter in the Centres of Montemaggiore. Later on, this responsibility fell to the Ministry of Agriculturem which entrusted the management to the Experimental Institute for Zootechnology, located a short distance from the State Experimental Agency of Tor Mancina in Monterotondo. In the Italian State Experimental Agency, the white Lipica-Lipizzano horses have been bred with pure blood lines for 50 years, with great seriousness and competence.
Italy, thanks to the State’s breeding of Lipizzano Horses, has been able to be a member of the Lipizzan International Federation. The Stud Book of the breed was established in 1984 by the Italian Horse-breeders’
Association. Today the horses are bred not just in Lipizza, but in Austria (Piber), in Italy (Monterotondo - Roma) and in Hungary.
A saddle and carriage horse.

Morphology

Height at the withers:  150-160 cm.
Weight: 480 - 550 kg.

Lipica Horse (photo www.uvi.gov.si/slo)