The Nooitgedachter is a rare South African breed with only approximately 700 individuals remaining on the stud book. The breed's history begins over 300 years ago when Dutch settlers brought horses—a mix of Javan ponies, Barb, Arab, and Spanish bloodlines—to the Cape in 1653. As settlers moved inland, these horses adapted to South Africa's climate, and in the early 1800s were taken into Lesotho where 100 years of natural selection in harsh mountain terrain created the legendary Basuto Pony—famed military horses used in the Anglo-Boer War, Crimean War, and exported worldwide. By 1952, the breed faced extinction from war losses and over-exporting, prompting the South African Department of Agriculture to establish a breeding program to preserve these horses while developing them into larger riding horses. Named after the Nooitgedacht research station near Ermelo, the breed was officially registered in 1984. Standing 13.3 to 16.2 hands, the Nooitgedachter is celebrated for exceptional hardiness, disease resistance and a remarkable people-pleasing temperament. They are used in dressage, endurance riding, jumping, and farm work.