Some relevant traditional Hungarian horse-related spectacles

Horse-related programs have already been popular in the 19^th century at agricultural exhibitions and breed animal fairs, the history of which began in 1881. Nevertheless, the presentation and sale of horses was organized in 1929 for the first time, because the responsible association was not authorized to hold fairs for horses. Tradition was continued after the Second World War. Horse-related spectacles at exhibitions included presentation of different kind of horse-drawn carriages with both traditional folk carriages and those of representation style.

42 In addition to the presentation of horse-drawn carriages (60 altogether), the Roman Quadriga, tandem Show Jumping carousel, equestrian falconry, shows associated with stud-farms and grasslands of large area (“puszta”) and the Bábolna Trumpeters formed parts of the spectacles. In relation to the stud-farms and the “puszta”, the “Koch-five-in-hand” (also called

“Puszta five-in-hand”, “Lénárd-five-in-hand”, “Hungarian-post”) has been the most popular (Ernst, 2014).

The Bábolna Trumpeters has its origin in the 1930s, when Tibor Pettkó-Szandtner, captain of the Bábolna stud-farm with the help of a soldier musician organized a brass band from the war orphans brought to Bábolna (Hecker, 1994, p. 132).

The idea of the “Koch-five-in-hand” was born on the basis of a drawing made by the Austrian painter, Ludwig Koch in his book titled “Equestrian Art in Pictures” (Reitkunst im Bilde) published in 1923. Béla Lénárd decided to promote the idea: standing on the croups of two rear horses, drove its five-in-hand (two at the rear, three at the front) in gallop at the agricultural exhibition in 1958 for the first time. In later years, he did it with seven, eight, nine and eleven horses, as well. The “Koch-five-in-hand” was probably not only the idea of Ludwig Koch: probably it was a program of the circus of Renz then Wulff already between the 1870s and 1890s. The “innovation” of Béla Lénárd was that he drove his horses outdoor, in the “puszta”, where the speed of horses was much higher than that was achievable in the circus ring. The spectacle constitutes a permanent part of horse-related shows in Hungary still today (Ernst, 2014).

Horse drawn carriages represented certain traditional horse breeding regions and stud-farms. There has been a great variety in these traditional carriages, beginning with the way how horses are harnessed to a carriage through the horse breeds and the style of harnesses and carriages and ending with the clothing of drivers and grooms. Some typical traditional Hungarian carriages are mentioned as follows: Hortobágy Nóniusz seven-in-hand driven from the left rear horse (3+ 4); Bábolna Lipizzan six-in-hand consisting of mares harnessed to mail coach in collar (2+4); Bábolna Arabian six-in-hand consisting of mares (2+4); Mezőhegyes Nóniusz five-in-hand consisting of stallions (2+3); five-in-hand of the city of Debrecen harnessed to landau carriage (2+3); Gyöngyös Lipizzan five-in-hand consisting of stallions (2+3); five-in-hand of the Brewery of Kőbánya harnessed to dray (Pataki, 2013).

43 4. METHODOLOGY

4.1 General observations

In order to obtain a clear overview of the characteristics of the horse industry, the measures should be relevant and useful and based on indicators. In this way the measured characteristics will be able to provide firm foundations for their continuous improvement (European Commission, 2014; p. 33.).

The operational characterization of the horse industry based on aggregate and specific indicators provides the basis for economic impact estimation and its evaluation besides presenting a true view of the operation of the horse sector. The indicators used for the characterization of the horse industry can be of both stock and flow type depending on the objective of the analysis; however, more general is to use indicators of stock type. Beyond this, they are non-economic and economic, quantitative and qualitative and generally “historic” in contrary to predictive ones.

Although economics provides tools of great variety for the operational and economic characterization of various economic sectors, the specific characteristics of the concrete sector in question must be known well in order to be able to create indicators for measures of above described qualities and to correctly apply methodologies to estimating the economic impacts.

These specific characteristics are the drivers for the economic impacts of an event, sport discipline, installation, etc. (Barajas Alonso - Salgado Barandela – Sánchez Fernández, 2012;

pp. 442-448).

During the characterization of the horse sector including the economic impact estimation of the Hungarian Horse Industry, several problems were encountered that caused many inconveniences. Nevertheless, the problems arisen to the horse sector were similar to problems arisen in terms of, for instance, the “sport sector”. In reference to Barajas Alonso - Salgado Barandela – Sánchez Fernández (2012; pp. 452-456), problems encountered can be grouped as conceptual, statistical and methodological. The authors explain these problems by the fact that the sport sector has grown more rapidly than basic precise theory would have been formulated and homogenous and solid database could have been established (p. 452).

It seems as if their general theory seemed to be the case in the horse sector, as well. The Equestrian Revolution is quite a new phenomenon covering many “new activities” that are

44 carried out with horses. Data have mostly been available on those horse-related activities that can be linked to the horses’ roles before the Equestrian Revolution. This means that data have generally been available on horse breeding, which has formed the basis for the production of horses; horse racing, whose primary “mission” has been to test the performance of horses by which the quality of horses, in general, has been possible to improve through selection criteria, not only that of the racehorses, but also that of other breeds (because Thoroughbreds are used in the breeding of other breeds, as well); and, equestrian, especially the Olympic disciplines that derive from the roles that horses played in light cavalry. Due to the formation of the FEI, a lucky situation occurred in terms of some equestrian disciplines besides the Olympic ones that were recognized by the FEI gradually (in 1970, 1982, 1983, 2000 and 2006). Thanks to the FEI database, information can be obtained on each of the FEI disciplines of each of the affiliated National Federations. It is not the case with tradition-specific (culture-specific) disciplines, on which no robust data has been accessible. Data from horse breeding, racing and equestrian have been and will be required; but at the same time, as horses’ roles have transformed, new activities have arisen, on which data are necessary in order to develop useful researches. As examples, equine therapy, equestrian tourism and horse-related leisure activities can be mentioned.

Among conceptual problems, the one most generally referred to is the confusion and the inaccuracy of terminology that directly affects the quality of statistics and the process of making significant comparisons at the international level.

Methodological problems arise due to conceptual and statistical problems and, beyond these, due to the fact that chosen methodologies are often applied by making severe mistakes, especially by consultant companies and public entities (Crompton, 1995; p. 14; Crompton, 2006 in Barajas Alonso - Salgado Barandela – Sánchez Fernández, 2012; p. 457 and in Salgado Barandela – Barajas Alonso – Lera López – Sánchez Fernández, 2013; p. 41). Studying the most generally made mistakes, they principally derive from disregarding specific characteristics of the analyzed topic.

Problems encountered throughout data collection and procession and methodology specification did not impede the elaboration of the study. In order to be able to develop a useful research, all difficulties were overcome by 1) finding indicators different from those that had been intended to include in the research, but represent well the horse sector and/or 2) finding

45 alternative methods for data evaluation and analysis, and/or 3) slightly modifying the original research concept.