• 12 parts
  • Checked September 2026

Parts of a Sleigh

A horse-drawn cutter from the side, then the frame under it: runners, knees, beams and raves.

Parts of a Sleigh

Name Date

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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
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Write the name of each numbered part.Answer key

  1. Runners
  2. Body
  3. Seat
  4. Dash
  5. Shafts
  6. Arm rail
  7. Fenders
  8. Shoes
  9. Knees
  10. Beams
  11. Raves
  12. Braces

Drawn for this site on 2026-09-30 from plain geometry. Licence: own work.

Each numbered ring is a button. Use the arrow keys to move between them and Enter to choose. Names are read out in Study, and once a part is answered.

Next step Next: the bridle on the horse that pulls it

All 12 parts on the diagram

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The whole sleigh 8

  1. Runners Usually wood shod with metal. They curve upward at the front so they do not dig into the snow.
  2. Body It sits above the runners. A cutter's body has one seat for two people.
  3. Seat A cutter has one seat, for two people. It has a cushion and an upholstered back.
  4. Dash A cutter's dash is high and curves in an S. Its panel is set between the fronts of the runners.
  5. Shafts The horse's harness is attached to them. They are fastened to the curved fronts of the runners.
  6. Arm rail A rail round the top of the body beside the seat. A sleigh maker's catalog of 1911 lists them nickel-plated.
  7. Fenders A guard along each side, carried outside the body. They were made of wire, wicker, leather or wood.
  8. Shoes The strip of steel on the bottom of each runner. It touches the snow.

The gear underneath 4

  1. Knees Short uprights between a runner and a beam. One maker says its knees are mortised and glued into both.
  2. Beams They run across the sleigh from knee to knee. The body rests on top of them.
  3. Raves The bottom rails of the body's two sides. Carriage builders also called them the bottom sides.
  4. Braces Wrought-iron rods that stiffen the gear; they are clipped to the knees. Also called stays.

How this list was compiled: Every name checked on 2026-09-30, a name kept only where two sources use it: Susan Green, Horse Drawn Sleighs (Astragal Press, 1995), a collection of the carriage trade's own sleigh drawings and descriptions, read through archive.org's full-text search, https://archive.org/details/horsedrawnsleigh0000susa (runners, shoes, knees, beams, raves or bottom sides, stays, fenders, dash, arm rail, shafts, body, seat); Lull Carriage Co., Sleigh Catalogue Number Fifteen (1911), https://archive.org/details/BinderLULLSLEIGHS (runners, raves, knees, beams, braces, body, dash, arm rails, shoes, shafts, fenders, cushion); carriage hardware catalogues of 1876 to 1903 on archive.org (cutter runners, raves, knees and beams, fenders, shafts, shoes); and Wikipedia, Sleigh, text only (body, runners shod with metal and curved up in front, seat, dash, shafts, cutter). Licence: own work

The drawing: Drawn for this site on 2026-09-30 from plain geometry; no maker's sleigh, nothing traced. Licence: own work

How it works

This sleigh is a cutter: a light sleigh with one seat for two, pulled by one horse. The first drawing is the whole sleigh; the second is the frame under the body.

Read the full guide

The sleigh first, then what holds it up

Numbers 1 to 3 are the runners, the body and the seat. Numbers 4 to 8 finish the side view: the dash in front of the feet, the shafts for the horse, the arm rail, the fenders and the steel shoes under the runners. Open the second drawing for 9 to 12: the knees stand on the runners, the beams cross from knee to knee, the raves lie along the beams, and iron braces stiffen it all.

  • Read the frame from the snow up: shoe, runner, knee, beam, rave, body.
  • Raves had a second name in the carriage trade: bottom sides.

Questions and answers

What are the parts of a sleigh called?

The runners it slides on, with steel shoes underneath; the knees, beams and raves that carry the body; the body with its seat and arm rail; the dash in front; fenders along the sides; and the shafts for the horse.

What are the runners on a sleigh?

The two long strips the sleigh slides on in place of wheels. They are usually wood shod with metal, and they curve upward at the front so they do not dig into the snow.

What is the front of a sleigh called?

The dash. On a cutter it is a high panel with an S-shaped curve, set between the fronts of the two runners.

What is a cutter sleigh?

A kind of North American sleigh: light, with one seat for two people, and drawn by one horse. The name dates from about 1800 in the United States.

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