Peoples of Equestria, Part Two

Q:  Hello, Twilight! I've been wondering with my girlfriend: where did that mule in Applebuck Season come from? On Earth, mules are born from the union of a horse and a donkey... Is it the same thing with you? If so, where are all the donkeys? Do they live in Equestria, like the cows seem to do, or do they have a country of their own like the zebras? And while we're at it, can you tell a bit more about griffons and dragons?

A: Ah, this is a question I've been expecting for some time now. It seems to me that this is a perfect opportunity for me to address the various intelligent peoples – equine, bovine, draconian and other – that we share Equestria and the world with.

Equine peoples

Donkeys are our distant relatives, and come from the land of Drakonia, on the eastern side of the Gulf of Equestria. They look like long-eared Earth ponies with tufted tails; they have cutie marks, but their marks run even more strongly in the family than ours. Although Drakonia is ruled by dragons and their water serpent cousins, most of the inhabitants are donkeys.

Donkeys are stereotypically thought to be hard-working, clannish, pragmatic and materialistic, and suspicious toward magic. Their attitude towards their dragon overlords is popularly thought to be servile and insolent at the same time. (In the interests of fairness, most donkeys appear to consider us Equestrians superstitious, flighty and naive, and to have an attitude towards Princess Celestia that is servile and insolent at the same time. It seems that in many ways, we are very much alike.)

Mules are, indeed, the offspring of pony-donkey couples. Most of them live in eastern Equestria; some, like Hardtack (the mule you saw) have moved further west or north. Those mules who live in Drakonia tend to end up as virtual slaves of their donkey kin, I'm sorry to say. They're generally patient, thoughtful and very hard-working people, and the common use of "mule" as an insult is unworthy of us. (The term is also used in the harness subculture, referring to the, ah, obedient participant. - R.)


Zebras, like my friend Zecora, hail from the southern continent of Zebrica over the sea. They look like Earth ponies, but their coats are always white or light grey, with dark stripes. They tend to wear their manes as either tall crests, or tied into numerous small braids. According to Zecora, her people live in numerous semi-independent tribal states, the largest of which – Neighrobi, Zanzebrar and Mareputo – are great cities whose queens command the loyalty of dozens of smaller towns and hundreds of villages.

Based on Zecora's tales and my own readings, zebras resemble Earth ponies in many ways. However, the Zebrican culture is shaped in important ways by the lack of pegasi to handle the weather, or unicorns to provide magic. Instead, the zebras have learned to channel their Earth magic through complicated ritual dances that enable them to control the weather or make crafts with skill and precision they would otherwise be hard pressed to achieve. The various magical guilds and ritual societies span the tribal lines, forming a network that binds the Zebrican states together with a fair amount of success. (Zecora is an initiate in one of these societies, the Daughters of Sun; although she won't elaborate, I believe that her rhyming manner of speech is related to this.)

Bovine peoples

Cattle are the most familiar to us Equestrians. Originally nomadic, they have mostly settled down and now live among ponies, on various farmsteads where the cows provide us with milk in exchange for room and boarding. Bulls are commonly found doing heavy farm work – plowing, drawing carts and wagons, pulling stones and stumps from the ground and so on –  especially in southern Equestria. Despite their many good qualities, most cattle are rather dim, herd-minded and prone to be spooked, and some less scrupulous farmers treat the cows and bulls living over at them less as working guests and more as unpaid servants. (That ain't no problem with us Apples; we treat 'em decently enough, an' the Carrots are upstanding folks, too. But there's some real sleazy folks up north, farmin' barley an' wheat an' oats, who squeeze them cows dry. - AJ)

Buffaloes, living on the great Buffalo Ranges to the west of Equestria, are another matter entirely. Much bigger, stronger and furrier than cattle, they retain their ancient, nomadic ways and can be both wily and fierce, not to mention pretty stubborn. Still, they are not particularly warlike, and despite some threatening situations, the pony settlers have mostly been able to maintain good relations with them.

Aurochs, from the far-off Tauria, southwest of the Buffalo Ranges, are yet another matter. Physically, they look like large cattle or small buffaloes, with large horns but less fur than their nomadic cousins. Aurochs have settled down as sedentary farmers, living in large mud-brick cities on the river plains of Tauria. They are infamous for their short tempers, engage in head-butting and horn-wrestling contests at the slightest excuse, and don't like foreigners, which usually includes any other aurochs who live more than half a day's walk away.

Draconic peoples

Dragons are few in number but have great influence on the world around them. Creatures of fire and air, they embody the natural elements in the same way we ponies embody the Element of Harmony. Their appearances and personalities tend to change considerably throughout their lives, but at every age they are big eaters with literally omnivorous appetites.

Dragons begin their lives as eggs, which they lay in great numbers; only a few of those will ever develop and hatch, however. The baby dragons, like Spike, are small, chubby and friendly, and easily walk on their back legs. As they reach adolescence, they undergo a growth spurt, where their neck lengthens and their wings appear, giving them the traditional draconian shape. Adolescent dragons are probably the most active, and it is mostly they who rule Drakonia. As they grow larger and older, they get more territorial and wily, but also lazier and lazier, spending more and more of their time in slumber. These dragon "naps" can last from weeks or months in case of younger ones, to over a century with old dragons!

The dragon society is really more like a network of acquaintances, old grudges and friendships. With their long lives and low numbers, draconian politics are intensely personality-based, and the Emperor of Drakonia holds power only as long as he or she can win the support of the majority of other powerful dragons, whether through arguments, threats, bribery or magic. (Dragons have very powerful innate magics, and as they age they often learn spells and magic tricks similar to unicorns' abilities.)

Water serpents, often erroneously called sea serpents, are cousins to dragons. Long-lived and powerful, they are if anything even more emotional and vain than dragons, prone to gigantic mirths and deep melancholies. As their magic affects the rivers and lakes they dwell in, these emotional exhibitions can be troublesome to anypony living nearby! Water serpents can be found almost all over the world, but most live in Drakonia.

Other peoples

Griffons come from the mountainous and heavily forested lands north of Equestria. Gilda, I'm happy to say, does not represent the average griffon, but they are proud, independent-minded and touchy as a people, and the relationship between Equestria and the Griffon Kingdoms has always been a stormy one. Unlike the equine and bovine peoples, griffons eat meat, although they can subsist on fish and even purely vegetarian diet. This is another source of friction between griffons and their neighbors, along with their pretty ruthless treatment of the cattle living in their lands.

Like pegasi, griffons have aerial magic that enables them to walk on clouds, and approximately half of them live in floating castles or towns surrounded by fortified stormclouds. The rest live in aeries carved into the high mountains of north, or maintain a semi-nomadic lifestyle, wandering around their clan's territory.

Rainbow Dash wants me to emphasize that the fabled hippogriffs – the supposed offspring of ponies and griffons – are just that: fables. This does not stop them from appearing with some regularity as love interests and sympathetic villains in the more racy adventure stories and historical novels, however!

Other noteworthy people include the various non-pony residents of Zebrica: grouchy camels of Dromedaria in the deserts of northwestern Zebrica; the hugely tall but gentle giraffes who travel either alone or in small family groups, occasionally settling down among the zebras before continuing their travels; and the enigmatic okapis, rumored to have unicorn-like magic, who are said to dwell in great temple-cities on inaccessible jungle plateaus in the interior of Zebrica.

Merponies, or hippocampi have the upper bodies of ponies and lower bodies of great, multi-hued fishes. Strictly speaking, they are not a naturally occurring people, but normal ponies whose ancestors were turned into aquatic creatures to escape the sinking of their home island of Mythica during the first rise of the Nightmare Moon.

Diamond dogs are little-known, unpleasant underground race of miners and slavers. [With bad hygiene and awful taste in interior decoration! -R.] Despite these unlikeable traits, they can speak and are thus considered as people instead of monsters (such as hydras, manticores, cockatrices, chimeras, wyverns and others).


I hope that this brief overview of the various non-pony peoples of Equestria and the surrounding lands will give you a better understanding of our world!