The most recognised horse in the world belongs to a car company. It appears on every Ferrari ever made, a small black prancing horse on a yellow shield, and most people who see it know exactly what it means. Far fewer know where it came from.
The horse belonged first to a man named Francesco Baracca.
Baracca was Italy’s greatest fighter pilot of the First World War, a cavalry officer turned aviator who shot down 34 enemy aircraft before his death in combat in June 1918. He was twenty-nine years old. On the fuselage of his planes, he painted a black rearing horse, adopted in tribute to the Piemonte Cavalleria regiment he had once served, which had carried the same symbol since 1692. The horse flew into battle thirty-four times and was never defeated.
In 1923, five years after Baracca’s death, a young racing driver named Enzo Ferrari won a race at the Circuito del Savio in Ravenna. After the ceremony, he was introduced to Baracca’s parents, Count Enrico and Countess Paolina, who had come to watch. The Countess took him aside and made a proposal: use her son’s horse on your cars. It will bring you luck.
Ferrari accepted. He placed the horse on a yellow shield, the colour of Modena, his home city, and added a strip of the Italian flag across the top. The prancing horse made its competitive debut on July 9, 1932, at the Spa 24 Hours, on the cars of Scuderia Ferrari.
The horse has not changed since. It still faces right, still rears on its hind legs, still carries the weight of a story most people never think to ask about. In the decades since, it has become one of the most commercially powerful symbols on earth, printed on watches, scarves, clothing, and limited editions of everything. Ferrari’s revenue from licensing the horse alone runs into hundreds of millions each year.
Enzo Ferrari always said the horse brought him luck, as the Countess promised. Whether or not one believes in that kind of thing, it is difficult to argue with the record. From that first appearance at Spa in 1932 to the present day, no symbol in motorsport has accumulated more victories, more desire, or more mythology.
Baracca never knew any of it. He was shot down over Monte Montello on a summer morning and the horse went on without him.