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More Quotes of Otto von Monteton
"Therefore, the calf should feel hairs, in order to detect the sideways drifting of the ribs and the haunches, so that it is able to re-establish the straight line by the same pressure." (1877)
"A clumsy rider will hardly be embarrassed on a trained horse. The most skilled rider, on the other hand, can get into the most embarrassing situations on an untrained horse. For that reason: Always focus on the horses, not on the people. For in order to give correct aids, they have to sit correctly. But the most beautiful seat is useless on an untrained horse, and it is much more difficult to teach and to learn a good seat on an untrained horse, because everything becomes a struggle, whereas on a trained horse, who is completely supple, the seat falls into the correct shape all by itself and maintains itself in it."
"I want to mention one thing out of a thousand: the rider’s hand. I always call it the ‘glass of water hand’, because I don’t know a better description than to imagine carrying a full glass of water in each hand, without spilling anything. The invisible influence of the mind on the body achieves several things during this visualization. The fist must not make the same motions as the rider’s body. Otherwise the glass spills over. The horse must have an even, yielding contact. Otherwise it spills over as well. The muscles of the hand must be attentive and alive, but neither limp nor cramped. Otherwise the same scenario happens."
The principles of the training method are based on trust and respect, achieving obedience with the horse executing willingly the rider’s slightest “aids” and performing his duty to his last breath, without being helped by the rider. Methods that do not lead to this goal are useless. When horse and rider are in a permanent state of war, you can never count reliably on obedience. Correct dressage is only based on a secure trusting relationship. Equestrian art does not consist in defeating an enemy, but in the education and the gymnastic development of a trusting student whose body the teacher gradually gets so much under his control through anatomically correctly applied exercises that the physical power over the horse becomes so ingrained that it is impossible for the horse to be disobedient, even if the voluntary obedience should fail.
O.v.Monteton (1899, 47, translation: TR).
Everybody is taken with the races, nobody with art. Once again, I say: this modern day and age trains riders, but no horses, and no trainers, which is the same thing. The former is a craft, the latter an art, for riding is no art, but training is. The art says: The horse is the end, the rider is only the means, and this day and age confuses the means with the end.
O.v.Monteton (1877, 7, translation: TR).
The whole world worships progress, and the word “outdated” suffices to put the best thing down. Our fast paced time cannot wait for anything. It builds houses that fall down even before someone has moved in. How can such a time be expected to spend two years on riding a horse through, and the word “sport” makes it entirely impossible. For the word “sport” implies the concept of amusement. Equestrian art, however, is a very serious, difficult pursuit, that is not at all suitable to entertain the ladies or other ignorant people in a way that dazzles the senses, and “amusement” is inextricably linked with “not being able to wait” in the human heart.
O.v.Monteton (1877, 17f., translation: TR).
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