It has been revealed that the UNESCO Intergovernmental Committee will consider the proposal for Portuguese Equestrian art to be included in the Intangible Heritage of Humanity. The Portuguese art of horse riding “is distinguished by the way the riders dress, the harnesses that are different from other schools, and the way of handling the horse”.

The Portuguese Association of Purebred Lusitano Horse Breeders, in collaboration with the municipality of Golegã and Parques de Sintra, submitted the application for Intangible Heritage of Humanity. According to the text in the UNESCO classification application, practitioners are dispersed throughout 20 countries on five continents, with the largest group being at the Portuguese School of Equestrian Art (EPAE), in a community of practitioners which includes both amateurs and professionals.

According to the National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage, which has been in place since 2021, "Portuguese riding is a practice that translates into excellence in horse teaching, expressed in the performance of high-school movements and airs, which derives from the teaching practised in European equestrian art academies. It has particularities that distinguish it, fundamentally those that come from the working equitation of bullfighting and bullfighting, in the field or in the arena, or in equestrian games”.

Moreover, the same note explains that this practice “is embodied in the work carried out since the 18th century in the Royal Picaria, having achieved a continuous diffusion which brings together numerous individuals and groups of practitioners”.