20 August 2007

A basket of water?



This beautiful Friesian was one of the horses attending yesterday's Blessing of the Animals in the village of Gorbio. He's a horse trained in dressage but had great difficulty yesterday walking on the cobbles - slipping all the time. He (and a friend below) are taking a drink out of fountain, constructed in 1902 for the use of mules and donkeys. It's made in the form of a packsaddle, with the water containers - one on each side - reminding one of large paniers (baskets). You can see the entire fountain HERE.

The photo below shows the entrance to the Medieval village.

12 comments:

  1. oh wow what a beautiful horse this is. I never heard of such kind of Blessings, but then again they are god's creatures after all. Maybe a blessing for the pigeons too ;)

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  2. Jilly, gorgeous horse.

    I love the photo of the kid looking under the fountain. Kids will be kids.

    --steve buser
    New Orleans Daily Photo

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  3. I do hope the horse didn't fall. How frightening it must have been to slip, slip, slip.

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  4. Jilly, I enjoy all your street photos. Cool!

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  5. So you can bring a horse to water and you can make him drink ;-)

    That's a clever fountain - would the middle of the panier be reserved for the Homo Erectus?

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  6. Some churches in Baton Rouge have Blessings of the Animals in October, on the feast day of St Francis. It's nice that there are fountains to provide a refreshing drink for the horses!

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  7. Very nice photo. I love horses as you know and I can imagine they would have problems walking on the pavement there as their iron shoes offer no gripping edges.

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  8. Nice to see them having their drinks. Nice to see the benediction.

    Tks for visting and "having a laugh"...I need some humour!!! (send it off for "reset to factory settings"...another week!!)

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  9. What a cool fountain! And I love these pictures of the horses.

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  10. It was great to find your blog. Stop by and see more about horse blessings (and other pet blessings) at my blog located in the website http://www.blessingoftheanimals.com and let me know if I can snatch a pic and post a link for my readers.

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  11. Lovely to see the fountains being used to good purpose. In my childhood village there is a place called the "Watering Trough" which is where horses used to stop for water when stagecoaches were around. The trough is no longer there but the name has stuck -- it was used to label the bus-stop!

    There is a church not far from us that has an annual service for animals.

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