An appaloosa is a kind of horse with a pale or light body and dark spots. The spots may be small or large, scattered or in a blanket over the hips; the spotted coat is what people notice first. The breed is tied to the Palouse country in the northwest of the United States. Though actually, the name is not a fancy scientific word. English speakers made it from the everyday phrase a Palouse horse, after the Palouse River and region where non-Native Americans first met these horses. People often write Appaloosa with a capital A when they mean the breed. You will meet the word in riding, western films, and farm talk more than in city English. A pale horse with no spots is not what speakers mean.