Combined Effects | Re-establishing the Lost Vocabulary of Classical, Forward Riding
- Jane Frizzell
- Oct 29
- 4 min read
Updated: 18 hours ago
A clear explanation of what the classical schools meant by Combined Effects — the rider’s deliberate coordination of distinct actions and single aids to form an intelligible language between horse and human.
Most modern readers — and riders — skim past the most important ideas without realizing it… just as they do in the saddle. They hurry through the words, the way they rush through the aids — clogging them together until every distinct action loses its value. In both cases, the result is the same: the message disappears, and the horse is left to guess — or worse.
There are key ideas — dare I say doctrines — that modern horsepeople turn up their noses at, even though they form the backbone of real equitation.
Here we’re going to restore one of the most essential, Combined Effects. It is the central idea shared by every legitimate historical master, because it names the entire syntax — and thus the mechanism — of the equitation language.
It’s impossible to understand or apply the masters’ methods if we’ve lost the meaning of their words. Combined Effects appears constantly in the historical manuals — Saumur, Fort Riley, Steinbrecht's Warendorf, and the SRS Vienna — yet most readers sweep over the referenced term, never realizing it is one of the few simple keys to the whole system. To read the old texts correctly, we must first recover the vocabulary of the dead masters.
Next Section: The Reader’s Test — Seeing Combined Effects (So We Can See If You’re a Rider)
If you’ve never noticed how often the legitimate, vetted masters use the term Combined Effects, that’s your first test.
The second is to see whether you can recognize it as a rider.
When you read Saumur, Ft. Riley, Warendorf, or Steinbrecht, mark each time the words effect or combined effects appear — and ask yourself:
What action or aid is being coordinated?
What does the horse feel, and how does he translate it?
What happens when a rider mixes the aids instead of their effects?
Write one clear example in the comments — or better yet, open your own copy of the manuals and prove the pattern exists.
Each instance you find is a small act of recovery. Every time you spot the phrase in use, you’re watching equitation happen on the page — the invisible, deliberate syntax of sensations that turns action into language, and language into the horse’s movement — in his purest way of going.
Now read what these terms, EFFECTS and COMBINED EFFECTS, actually mean — word for word, as restored in The Horse Trainer’s Glossary.
EFFECTS
"Leg without hand; hand without leg." — Maxim of Saumur as cited by Capt. E. Beaudant, FRENCH ARMY
The term EFFECTS, as instructed by every cavalry, institution, and classical master, refers to the results produced by the actions and 4 NATURAL AIDS in riding, especially —
the elementary actions ( GO, TURN, STOP ),
the 4 NATURAL AIDS ( VOICE, SEAT/WEIGHT, LEG, HAND ), and
the TWO forces of the HINDQUARTERS: CARRYING POWER and PROPULSIVE FORCE.
The EFFECTS of the actions and aids can be combined in infinite co-action. But the EFFECTS are not the AIDS themselves. The AIDS remain separate and independent. We do not combine the aids; we combine their effects.
When riders communicate through the distinct AIDS — and combine only their EFFECTS — the result is clarity. The horse can then translate the information into his own WAY OF GOING.
Example:
“These actions must be taught as soon as practicable, and separately, before they can be associated in producing combined effects.” — Saumur, Section 14
COMBINED EFFECTS
COMBINED EFFECTS = the strategic and deliberate coordination of independent riding actions and the 4 NATURAL AIDS to produce precise, intelligible outcomes.
This is the literal definition of EQUITATION: the art of arranging and sequencing independent actions so their combined effects communicate thought through sensation.
The elementary actions and the 4 NATURAL AIDS remain separate and independent, yet their deliberate arrangement, timing, and intensity can produce an infinite variety of combined effects.
The horse experiences not mixed signals but a coherent language of ideas — one he can both feel and interpret.
Like any true language, it is built from clearly assigned meanings. In EQUITATION, those meanings are associated mostly with physical sensations.
⚠️ A WARNING
When riders confuse AIDS with EFFECTS, they create contradictory, clashing signals.
Vague, idiosyncratic or self-invented, simultaneous, or incoherent use of the aids — without understanding their separate and specific meanings — destroys clarity of communication. It undermines the horse’s confidence and fractures his mental, emotional, and physical ability to participate.
This confusion prevents any possibility of a correct FORWARD and STRAIGHT WAY-OF-GOING.
Only riders who use the aids and riding actions singly, uniformly, and precisely can communicate ideas the horse can translate into precise, instantaneous effects which, by the rapid sequence of riding, become combined effects.
Examples:
“Aids are successive, never simultaneous.” — Colonel Dale Taylor, U.S. Army, Ft. Riley Instructor
“The rider/trainer has achieved his aim and fully trained his horse when both forces of the hindquarters – the carrying power and the propulsive force – bound by elasticity, are fully developed and when he can use and balance the combined effects of these forces in precise ratios and at will.” — Gustav Steinbrecht, GYMNASIUM of the HORSE
THE DARE — Before You Combine Effects
Before a rider can dare to combine effects, the elementary actions and single aids must first be squared away — absolutely distinct, and understood by both horse and rider. To “combine” without separation is to confuse; to mix is to muddle the horse’s movement — but worse, his mind.
So here’s your test: can you and the horse both execute Go, Turn, and Stop without slurring your words, losing your place, or clogging the aids? Can your horse translate each command instantly, without hesitation or tension? Until he can — and until you can — there are no combined effects, and you are not yet riding.
Which way do you want to ride?™
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