The notion of rampant derives from the French word rampant , in turn from the Old French ramper (which can be translated as “to climb” ). The term is used in the field of heraldry to refer to the animal that, on a shield, is represented with its open hand and its claws in a grasping or catching position .
The rampant animal , in this frame, appears standing on its hind legs and with its hands raised . One of the most common is the lion rampant , which is usually shown with its head in profile and the left hand lower than the right. This heraldic lion usually has its mouth open and its tongue protruding, in an apparently aggressive pose.
The rampant horse is another protagonist of heraldry. Anyway, in this case the image tends to be associated with the shield of Ferrari , the famous Italian automobile brand . Called Prancing Horse , it emerged in 1923 , when Enzo Ferrari met the Countess Paolina .
Count Francesco Baracca , son of the aforementioned countess, was an Italian hero of the First World War who had the habit of painting a horse on his airplanes. The story goes that his mother suggested Ferrari use the prancing horse as an amulet on his vehicles and thus the Prancing Horse was born.
At first glance, it is a black horse on a yellow background. The shield itself has a body made up of four faces: the upper two, straight, at an angle close to 170 degrees downward; the lower two close at the base but exhibit a curve similar to the tip of a leaf. The aforementioned yellow space is enclosed in a relatively thick black line. Above the top there are three other strokes, with the colors of the Italian flag: green, white and red.
Generally, on the sides of the leg that supports the prancing horse are the initials SF , which represent Scuderia Ferrari , the sports division of the brand's automobiles that participates in Formula 1 races. It is worth mentioning that in the Currently, the most common logo is rectangular, and has the brand name written below the horse. The colors are more vivid than in its first version, which dates back to 1929, and the strips of the flag's colors are not outlined in black.
Needless to say, to reproduce the logo perfectly, the prancing horse must comply with a series of well-defined rules. First of all, the tips of the legs must be drawn so that the imaginary straight line that joins each pair forms an angle of 58 degrees with the adjacent one, the one on which they rest. In addition, the hoof of the left hind leg and the right ear must rest on a vertical line.
In the theme park called Ferrari World , on Yas Island in Abu Dhabi, you can see the largest version of this logo: its dimensions are 65 meters high by 48 meters wide. As a curious fact, the capital of the German state Stuttgart, the largest in Baden-Württemberg, has a very similar design on its coat of arms, including the yellow background color. Although both have a prancing horse that represents them, they are not related in any direct way, but simply casual.
The adjective rampant is also used to refer to what is hooked like the claws of the rampant lion and to what is classified as a climber . On the other hand, what is in a growing or ascending phase is mentioned as rampant.