Archaeological findings show that the horse has existed on the Iberian Peninsula since prehistoric times, around the Ice Age. On one hand the horses came from the European branch descendants of the tarpan, a wild horse from eastern Europe and on the other from Przewalski, the wild horse from the steppes of Central Asia as the berber. Thus on the peninsula the two precursor breeds to all the breeds in the world were found together, giving rise to what we now know as the Pure-bred Spanish Horse.
These horses which are closely related to the Berber of North Africa were dark in colour and possess unmistakable agility and beauty. Inciatus, the famous horse of Caligula was Spanish and Julius Caesar admired these noble and docile animals. With the fall of the Roman Empire came the incursion of the germanic towns on the Peninsula amongst them the vandals who brought with them their teutonic horses (the ancient Frisian version) predominantly black in colour, influenced to a small extent our indigenous horses.
However it was not until the muslim invasion that the Spanish horse was gradually influenced by the berber horses of North Africa. At the end of the reconquest of Spain, began modern day history of the Spanish horse given that at the end of the fifteenth century the monks from the monastery la Cartuja in Jerez de la Frontera became horse breeders and with them the purest linage of Carthusian horse was preserved.
During Philip II´s reign stables were created and the Royal Stud was founded in Cordoba. During the Golden Age of the Spanish Empire, the breed begins to expand internationally, especially throughout America, at the hand of the conquerors who in the New World would found breeds such as Mustang, Criollo, Paso Fino and in Europe breeds such as Lipiano and Kladruber.
A hard stage for the Spanish Horse begins with the decline of the Spanish Empire as it became the trend to cross them with foreign breeds such as the Napolitan, damaging the breed. Only the attitude of the aforementioned Carthusian monks as well as a few breeders, could protect the purity of the breed.
Today the Pure-bred Spanish Horse enjoys very good health and is protected principally by the Spanish State via the military stud.