Familiar with the Morgiana Hurdle, that Grade 1 staged at Punchestown recently?
Of course you are.
It’s one of those established milestones on the long road to the Cheltenham Festival.
Posh sort of race, won this year by Thousand Stars; posh sort of horse, already a Cheltenham Festival winner, not to mention this year’s French Champion Hurdle.
But who or what was Morgiana, the inspiration for this race instituted at Punchestown, postChristmas1972?
The inaugural running went to Lockyersleigh, owned by Oliver Onions, trained by Paddy Mullins and ridden by Mattie Curran.
He must have been pretty posh too, for his immediate victim was none other than 5/2 favourite L’Escargot (T. Carberry), by a short head.
Paddy got fond of the Morgiana, taking it in consecutive years with Grabel, unbeaten round Punchestown, invariably ridden by her trainer’s son Tony.
Eldest son Willie got his name on the board with Padashpan in 1993, while Paddy took another bite of that Morgiana cherry with Beakstown two years later.
The intervening renewal went to Danoli.
The GSB reveals a mare named Morgiana, foaled in 1874, her breeding credited to JH Houldsworth, who bought her in foal from Scottish ironmaster James Merry. Houldsworth never made it into the Biographical Encyclopaedia of British Flat Racing, but Mr Merry certainly did.
‘Mr James Merry was one of the less attractive figures on the Turf in the 19th century. An uncouth, ill-educated, suspicious minded Scot, he looked, and was, a hard, mean man.
He had inherited a fortune from his father, who had originally been an itinerant pedlar but had the wit and good fortune to discover and develop the high iron content of the Ayrshire hills.’
For all of that, he won seven classics, notably the Derby with Thormanby (1860) and Doncaster (1873).
Morgiana became a successful and long-lived broodmare, though hardly deserving of a Grade 1 race in her memory.
Her namesake came into this world in 1905, but did little to add to the lustre of her name, either on the racecourse or in the paddocks.
The name came into Turf currency again in 1935, when the ‘Eastern Slave’ filly won twice as a two-year-old, as yet unnamed.
The name does not occur again in the GSB, nor does it occur in the H-B Stud Book, prior to the inaugural Morgiana Hurdle taking place in 1972. Recourse to Google – a dangerous expedient – proved disappointing, many references to the Arabian Nights, AliBaba and the forty thieves and suchlike.
Totally unconnected to Irish racing and breeding circles as we know and cherish them.
Until this review appeared. . . ‘Morgiana – Juraj Herz’s delicious tale of terror is a fantastical and surreal phantasmagoria of dark desires and splintered minds – a twisted Czech take on Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?
‘Morgiana is the story of twin sisters, Klára and Viktoria who live a life of decadent opulence, somewhere in the late 19th century.
‘Klára is auburn-haired and beautiful, whilst Viktoria is wicked, sadistic, bursting with hate and jealousy – and who hatches a terrible revenge by slowly poisoning her more popular sister. As the poison takes hold, Klára begins to lose grip on her sanity.
‘Part fairy-tale, part Gothic horror, Morgiana is a full-blown hallucinatory experience.’ Could it be entirely coincidental that this film was originally released in 1972?
Unfortunately, at this distance in time not even The Sage can suggest why the Punchestown executive should have plumped for such an apparently enigmatic choice of titles for their new, posh Champion Hurdle rehearsal, which the Morgiana Hurdle quickly became and indeed remains.
One possibility remained – the annual volume of the Irish Racing Calendar, soon to become a thing of the past when a new broom began to sweep so clean in 1975.
Alas, it proved equally unforthcoming – ‘Morgiana Hurdle, £1,000 added, of which the second received £193.80 and the third £129.20; 4 yrs old and upwards. . . 2m. 4fur.; (£959).’
The mystery of the Morgiana Hurdle remains just that, unless some kind reader can resolve it.
For the time being it offers instead one of those pleasant instances of continuity that add to the relish of Irish racing generally. Lockyersleigh, owned by J.O. Onions, was trained by Paddy Mullins.
Forty years on his son Willie supplied the winner in Thousand Stars.
Chairing the Punchestown stewards’ panel 40 years on – Mrs J.O. Onions.