Women in Riding

If you study the literature or look at the monuments you’ll be forgiven for thinking that only men rode. Or that the few women who did ride were aberrations. Like Katharine the Great, who’s often mentioned. Or Joan of Arc.

The fact is that we were there, we just weren’t in position to write about what we were doing! The writers across time were generally riders who rode for military purposes who were preserving their ideas in order to pass them down to future cavalry officers. Kikkulli, Xenophon, Dom Duarte— all writing to pass on ideas to other men in military applications. La Guérinière, du Paty de Clam, Montfaucon de Rogles: again, men writing for men. The military was where the money was.

So how do we know we were there?

Let’s start with the Sythian warriors. Way back 4,000 years ago and more the Scythians rode, and their honored warriors were buried in tombs with their burial goods— including their weapons, tack and horses. The Scythians made war across the old world, scrapping with the Romans and making a mark for themselves that was hard to ignore. When their tombs were first excavated by the Russians a small museum was erected to display these ancient equestrian Kings and Princes. Decades later a western forensic anthropologist was allowed onto the site and pointed out that if you look at their pelvic structure, half of the “Kings and Princes” were clearly female.

We were there, we were honored… and modern men just couldn’t imagine it was so.

But it was.

Moving on through time the artistic record shows noble women riding. Riding was one of the ways a person showed their superiority, after all. And painting was expensive! So only the upper classes could afford to hire a portrait artist to record the activities of their daughters and sons.

Goya painted several equestrienne portraits, as did many painters across the 18th and 19th centuries.

In the latter part of the 19th century as the cavalry began to shift its roll in warfare there began to be openings for professionals in equitation that weren’t military in nature. During this time the equestrian theater became a force in the art world and beautiful structures were opened to house presentations of haute ecole. Among the riders exhibiting there was Francois Baucher, and he had many, many students. His famous students of the day all agreed that his finest protege was Pauline Cuzent, who rode both astride and side saddle and presented her horses in relaxed perfect carriage executing the movements of haute ecole.

Along with Ms. Cuzent at the end of the 1800s and into the 1900s you’ll find many female riders— too often memorialized for their riding attire, but do a little digging and you find out they were actually trainers and professionals in their own right.

Additionally, by the way, there were women of color riding with excellence in these times. And in France at least, the male trainers of color were common and their color wasn’t seen as even being worth singling out.

As we come into the 20th century there were still women riding and training. Annie Oakley for instance, wasn’t just a sharp shooter. And my grandmother Eleanor Cole Coolidge rode to the hounds in the early part of the 20th century with the Myopia Hunt Club in Massachusetts— she was an exceptional horseman, and knew many others who shared her passion and her skill.

Nowadays there are plenty of women riding, teaching and training. Still the majority of the clinicians are men, but it’s not because they’re better than us… rather it’s for a couple of reasons I think. First because women often have ties to home that we don’t choose to ignore. So traveling and dialing in to the solitary life of a clinician isn’t as often an option. And second, it’s because men are simply still SEEN as being more authoritative. We like the deep voices! We like those towering bodies. We’re accustomed to them being the ones in charge.

This older way of working no longer follows that patriarchal paradigm that the bigger, meaner, harsher, louder, bulkier, and more male are the top of the heap. There’s no heap. There’s just all of us working with our horses, quietly and in better and better connection— male AND female alike.

So… keep riding, and don’t you dare think you’re anything less than someone else because he’s toting around a Y chromosome! Just look at that thing. Isn’t it obvious that an X makes for a more natural seat? Onward, my friends. Enjoy your ride!