Birgit Popp’s Forum “Who Is Responsible For Maintaining The Classical Principles Of Dressage?”(Sept. 2, p. 34) and Tiffany Tyler’s and Lita Dove’s reactions (Oct. 21, p. 40-41) have prompted me to suggest that these three people are each right and each wrong. It depends on how one perceives dressage today.

Ms. Popp upholds classical dressage, a term that seldom has the same meaning for all who use it nowadays. Some think that it means the equitation of la Gueriniere; for others it stands for the evolution from Hunersdorf to Steinbrecht, leading to the school of Hannover. Still others believe that classical dressage is the French school established in the 19th century with Gen. l’Hotte. There may be yet other interpretations of the term.

Whatever the understanding of the term “classical dressage” may be, it is generally agreed that the FEI rulebook reflects what is considered classical dressage today. This, at any rate, is the position that Mariette Withages, the chairman of the FEI Dressage Committee, has adopted, and we agree with her on this basic point.

Two masters–one German, the other French–wrote these rules 50 years ago. They agreed on the essential aspects; that is to say, on the well-known principles many talk about but would be hard-pressed to list. They form “the fundamental basis for the art of equitation” and are of all times and all kinds of equitation.

Like Ms. Popp, we uphold the classical art and demand that dressage competition be judged according to the rules currently in force. However–and this is surely at the root of today’s troubles–judging dressage is not carried out according to the spirit or the letter of the international rules.

One only has to read each sentence and each word of paragraph 401 to see that. And paragraph 419, which states that the FEI has organized dressage competitions in order to “preserve the equestrian art from the abuses to which it can be exposed,” is in complete disagreement with Ms. Tyler and Ms. Dove in their assertions that the discipline is no longer a form of art, only a sport.

As a matter of fact, these two people are right when they say that dressage has evolved, as have many sports, and that today’s dressage horse is no longer what it was even 30 years ago. But the rub is that the transformation of the discipline has occurred in the margins of the rules, although the rules have not changed.

This has caused the differences in the meaning of the concept of dressage, in the methods of training, and in the often-significant variations in the scores of the competitors. One does not rate the development of a ballerina in the same way as that of a body builder.

One can say that dressage is at a turning point in its history. Either the official rule must be followed, or the rule must be adapted to what has happened in dressage.

Or dressage has to be divided into two separate disciplines: Academic dressage would follow the current rules; the other, gymnastic dressage, which is the form today’s dressage has taken, would follow new rules yet to be formulated.

The last formula does not appeal to us, for it would lead to a compromise that would not satisfy the spirit. We prefer to either stick to the current rules or agree to adapt them.

Although the strict application of paragraph 401 has today become problematic, it still seems to us to be the most desirable, as it allows for the best alchemy of sport and art, as was originally planned by its creators.

Col. Christian Carde is an FEI I-rated dressage judge and the former ecuyer en chef of the French national school of equitation and Cadre Noir de Saumur. He competed internation-ally throughout Europe. Since his retirement from Saumur in February 1999, he has conducted clinics in the USA, Canada, Sweden, Finland and Italy. He directs an association called ALLEGE-IDEAL, International Dressage and Equitation Association for Lightness.