The Raswan Index [Hardcover]

Carl Raswan (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Mrs Carl Raswan (December 1990)
• ISBN-10: 9994353098
• ISBN-13: 978-9994353095
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,497,335 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Brief Note on "The Raswan Index", April 25, 2006

By 

NanaMeggie "Nana" (Eureka, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Raswan Index (Hardcover)

All my life I have heard of this magical thing called "The Raswan Index", knowing that somehow it held many secrets for any lover of Arabian horses. My mother, the equine artist Lois Gossner, loved the Arabian horse more than any other. Most of her painting career was devoted to portraits of horses from all over the world, but the Arabian was her heart. It was she who first told me the story of Carl Schmidt (who wrote the Index) and his horse "Raswan".

Recently I found an original copy of the Index in my mother's estate papers and after reading just a small part of it, I can personally attest to this man's tremendous effort in the work he has given to all breeders and lovers of Arabs. The entire tale of this man, his horse and his quest to document the very intricate bloodlines of the desert Arabian horses makes fascinating reading even though the "book" is literally a collection of loose pages, pamphlet, letters, announcements, and odd bits, all derived from an original manuscript of over 5,000 pages!

Carl Schmidt has many times been referred to as THE source on the blood lines of the desert-born Arabian horse. I believe it was in the 1920s that he was visiting the Arabian stud farm of Anne, Lady Wentworth of Sussex, England, when he saw her Arab stallion "Raswan" for the first time. He was especially taken with the horse and Lady Wentworth eventually gave Raswan to Schmidt as her parting gift when he was getting ready to return to the States.

Schmidt took the name "Raswan" for his own after the tragic and brutal murder of his beloved stallion. As of yet, I do not know the reason why the horse was killed or what the circumstances were surrounding the situation at the time, but Schmidt was devastated by the death, as one can well imagine.

To my knowledge, each volume was printed in very small amounts, one in particular was a run of only 380 copies being printed. From what I can gather from his correspondence (also included with the Index) Schmidt would do his printing on an "as-needed" basis, and probably covering his printing costs with full pre-payment per order or down payments of one to three dollars. I think you could get the whole set for five dollars total. Schmidt was definitely not out to make a lot of money on this project, he preferred to simply insure the information be available to interested parties; but five dollars for something of this depth is an incredibly cheap price, if not out-and-out give-away fo his work.

One charming footnote is that when Schmidt published Volume 4, he included the properly bound cover for the entire set with the thought that you could apparently just tuck all your loose bits into this one cover. Unfortunately, it is only big enough for one volume, not four, and especially not the planned six to eight volumes in the set! Schmidt also wanted his readers to do their own editing of subsequent volumes as they were published. He included with each volume a set of "corrections" printed on 5x7 glue-backed red-inked paper sheets which came with a set of very complete instructions as to how and where to insert these sheets into and throughout the entire body of work!

So, in its original scattered and pasted-together state, is the Raswan Index an "easy" read? Not really. Is it fascinating, interesting and hard to put down? Yes! And resoundingly so, even if you're not all that fond of horses, this is well worth the time and effort to read just for the intrigue, even if page by single page.

A final note:
Obviously, due to the way it was published, this is out of print and unavailable for the time being and as far as I know right now. If it is truly the case of not ever being properly published as a book, I hope to bring it all together and publish it myself in the near future. If anyone reading this has any information to add to this project and/or about Mr. Schmidt/Raswan, please feel free to write me at [e-mail].

I would dearly love to see Mr. Raswan's life's work come alive again and be preserved and available to all horse lovers and breeders, particularly those lovers of the Arabian.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Drinkers Of The Wind, September 9, 2001

By 

Bill Palmer (Arizona) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Raswan Index (Hardcover)

Carl Raswan is THE reference for the peidgree of the Arabian Horse.
Carl spent many years in the deserts of North Africa tracing the source of the Arabian breed. He spoke with the descendents of the originators of the blood lines pre-eminate in the breed, today.
Carl Raswan, not only did the extensive background work needed to document the lieage of these great horses; he also learned ,and passed on ,the history and culture of the people of the great
African deserts.