Author: Sediqa Hashemi
Volume 1, Second Edition
The Dappled Horse is one of the popular folktales among the Hazara people. The story goes that a reaper named Seyed Mirza would cut grass every day, piling it up in stacks, and would spend the rest of the day playing the game shir-o-boz (“lion and goat”).
One day, Seyed Mirza noticed a hoofprint among the stacks of grass. The mark looked like that of a horse. He was puzzled, because the piles were surrounded by water and mountains, and no animal could have reached them. He thought that perhaps a creature had emerged from the water and disturbed his bundles.
One day, as Seyed Mirza was heading through the Band-e Heybat forest to cut the grass in the lower meadows, his eyes fell upon a horse. He wondered how this horse could have come here, and thought perhaps it was a spirit or winged being that had taken the form of a horse. Unable to contain himself, he called out to a Seyed named Bidel and showed him the horse.
Bidel climbed to the top of the mountain and summoned all the millers, telling them to hurry up the hill and see the horse that was near him and Seyed Mirza. The millers came with their ropes; one of them threw his lasso toward the horse and nearly caught it. But just then, the horse leapt and plunged into the depths of Band-e Heybat. After a few seconds, it disappeared completely from sight. (Bamiani, 1368 [1989], pp. 27–28)
Source:
Bamiani, Mohammad Ebrahim (1989). Folkloric Tales of Ghorjistan. Kabul: Academy of Sciences of Afghanistan.
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