For those of you who love wierd and/or hard to spell words, przewalski is a breed of horse and also a russian explorer.
tchotchke means a trinket or bauble/knicknack

Hi, Aayla and welcome.

What language are these names from, please? I'm sure they are Slavic and my guess would be Polish.
"Tchotchke" looks a bit like Russian but trinket in Russian is something like "balabolka" and "przewalski" has a 'w' in it, which is also not a letter/sound used in Russian - their nearest is "B", pronounced "V".

Well the horses originate from Mongolia I believe, I'll find you a link to their website... przewalski horse foundation

The great Horsepeople of the Steppes, descendants of the
Khans.

Fascinating link, bexter - thanks.

Although I'm not convinced that przewalski is Mongolian - the site gives an alternative as "Takh", which does sound more Asiatic, perhaps? I've never studied any of the asiatic languages, so I'm totally ignorant of them.

Przewalski is the Polish spelling of the name Przhevalski. The horses were named after a Colonel Nikolai Przhevalski. Why the Polish spelling I wouldn't know but why the Russian colonel is explained in the Wikipedia article. Tchotchke is from the Yiddish. See again Wikipedia form more info on tchotchkes.

Nice information to me. It was my favorite in the zoo when I was a child . Just because of the word prrrzzwalski and it sure was a nice, sturdy little horse too.

Here's my own photo of them, taken at Taronga Western Plains Zoo (Dubbo NSW) while on holiday.



The zoo has a breeding program and a 16 yr history of reintroducing this breed back to Mongolia. The first lot of horses died from the cold but reports now say their population is growing by 7%, so thats good news.

Yes I missed this one. Lovely pics, Candy! Love their compact smooth form. Thanks for these. I'll keep them in my collection.