Years ago, the German photographer Jaroslav Poncar told me about running into the legendary French anthropologist Dr. Michel Peissel in Himalaya in the seventies. “People were saying, ‘Peissel is coming! It’s Peissel.’ So I went out to meet them—Peissel and his nice blonde companion,” Poncar added with a grin. Later, in Paris, Peissel and Poncar ended up living on the same street, and Peissel would hang around Poncar’s studio. He was, Poncar said, “a braggart.” Peissel would do things like forget to mention the two mathematicians he met during his seminal travels on the steppes—as if he were the only European to venture so far afield. “And! Michel did not discover that horse,” Poncar had sniffed, referring to an archaic Tibetan breed called the Nangchen, which Peissel is credited with bringing to light. “But the French love horses,” Poncar offered by way of explanation. I didn’t quite absorb his meaning. What he seemed to suggest was that Peissel could be forgiven because the French simply love horses so much. Recently, I attended the ninth edition of the equestrian competition Saut Hermès in Paris. There, people again and again recounted this fact: “The French love horses.”

In France, riding is the top outdoor sport, one enjoyed, according to the French Equestrian Federation, by two million men, women, and children. I had heard there are some five thousand equestrian centers here, a remarkable figure, but when I reached the federation to confirm, I was told, “In fact, we have 9,351.” A preponderance of France’s competitive horsemen and horsewomen came out of the pony clubs—France hosts more international equestrian competitions than any other nation and is home to Equidia, Europe’s only television channel dedicated to horse sports. (Not to mention, here in the capital, beyond carousels, all the major parks from the Luxembourg Gardens to Buttes-Chaumont tender pony rides.) Horse country is up in Normandy. It is where, for example, most of France’s national stud farms, created in 1665 for the benefit of the nation’s cavalry, are located, including le Pin, the very best one, and where Thierry Hermès, a half-French, half-German orphan, went to learn the harness-making trade before founding a workshop in 1837 in the Grands Boulevards quarter of Paris.  Read More