The Ecology of Pastoralism

1925–70

Preface

This volume has had a long period of gestation as the result of a number of circumstances. The original impetus was a session at the 1999 Annual Meeting of the Central States Anthropological Society in Chicago. My colleague Mark Shutes and I organized the session and delivered papers, along with Lawrence Kuznar and Daniel Ayana. Shutes discussed dairy farming in western Ireland, Kuznar examined alterations in Navajo land use and herd size, Ayana detailed the transformation from pastoralism to plow farming by the Oromo of Ethiopia during the seventeenth century, and Kardulias described the use of small islands for pasture in the Aegean. We followed this initial effort with a session at the 1999 Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, also in Chicago, at which Homayun Sidky added a paper on the nature of pastoral activities in the Karakoram Mountains of Pakistan and Thomas Hall contributed a commentary on the presentations.

The general idea from the outset had been to examine the various ways pastoralism serves as a highly flexible system. The flexibility derives from two basic sources: (1) the ability of various domesticated animals to adapt to differing environments and still provide a subsistence base for people and (2) the webs of intricate relationships pastoralists develop to accommodate their political, social, and economic needs. Shutes provided the inspiration for the sessions and argued vigorously both there and in other venues for the value of situating people in their environment as most broadly construed. As a student of both cultural ecology and cross-cultural comparative work, he focused on the networks that allow people to gain sustenance. His was not a formulaic approach, however. Shutes repeatedly noted the ways people innovated on the base provided by their dependence on particular animals, shifting approaches as necessary as conditions changed. This strategic approach laid bare the practical matters that impinged on human action. Our goal in putting together an edited volume from the two sessions was to explore the ways pastoralism is embedded in an environment whose framework is set by the terrain, the distribution of vital resources, and the needs of the animals herders tend. Equally important in understanding this dynamic relationship is the cultural landscape, as reflected in economic transactions for acquiring sufficient pasture and access to other resources, kinship ties, political structure (e.g., how the relationship between local and national administrations affects the movement of herders within and between political units), and the worldview that includes the values and beliefs of the pastoral mind-set. To enhance the comparative component of the collection, we decided to include contributions from scholars working in a number of world areas, including Northern Europe, Central Asia, the Mediterranean, South Asia, Africa, and the Americas. In this way, we hoped to explore the crosscutting similarities in pastoral adaptations while also pointing out significant differences.

After our initial solicitation of additional manuscripts, Claudia Chang submitted a contribution, but Daniel Ayana had to withdraw his paper. As we were seeking additional contributors, Shutes fell ill and died suddenly in February 2001. His untimely passing and a number of other commitments on my part brought progress on the volume to a halt for three years. On several occasions over the next seven years, I renewed work on the volume sporadically as time permitted. During that period, I contacted and received contributions from Nikolay Kradin, Mark Moritz, and, most recently, Michelle Negus Cleary and Erik Johannesson. A research sabbatical during the 2010–11 academic year provided the opportunity to finalize work on the volume. While not as diverse geographically as Shutes and I had originally hoped, the contributions do represent a wide range of areas and, it is hoped, will provide readers with interesting case studies demonstrating both the basic structure and the individual variation that characterize the herding lifestyle. A brief summary of the individual studies demonstrates the range of the volume.

The Introduction (chapter 1) discusses some key elements of a pastoral ecology to lay a foundation for the studies that follow. The stress is on the mutual dependence between herders and the animals they keep; the physiological needs of domesticated animals dictate certain types of actions by herders, most notably high levels of mobility, and these people in turn develop a series of cultural accommodations to meet those needs. The chapter also deals with the ways anthropologists have studied pastoralists and their reasons for doing so.

In chapter 2, Chang provides historical background on pastoral studies to demonstrate how schools of thought can influence what scholars say about herding societies. She traces the intellectual history of studies of Eurasian steppe nomads conducted in the twentieth century by Soviet-trained archaeologists, ethnographers, and historians. By way of examining the Soviet tradition of pastoral nomadic studies, Chang also charts the political and ideological divides between Western and Soviet-based scholarship on Eurasian steppe nomads.

Nikolay Kradin provides a historical overview of pastoral activities in Eurasia in chapter 3. He explores the significance of climate, the types of livestock, the diet of nomads, mobility, and political structure. The key point is the need to employ an array of evidence in the effort to reconstruct nomadic lifestyles. Since nomads rarely write their own historical accounts, at least initially, scholars must use ethnohistoric sources and archaeological data in a judicious manner.

Sidky (chapter 4) discusses the Hunzakutz people who live in the western Karakoram Mountains of northern Pakistan, in what has been called one of the most formidable upland regions on earth. Relatively isolated in their remote, inhospitable, and resource-scarce high-mountain environment, the Hunzakutz have had to find practical solutions to basic problems, such as a shortage of arable land, lack of sufficient water for irrigation, and ever-increasing population pressure on resources. Their solution has been to operate a subsistence economy that combines the cultivation of cereal crops with animal husbandry and transhumant pastoralism. Traditionally, this production system—based on a range of complementary plant and animal species and the exploitation of multiple resource clusters spread over different altitudinal zones—has been adjusted to ecological circumstances. Sidky focuses specifically on the ecological dimensions of Hunzakutz pastoralism and how pastoral production is regulated through the careful management of herd size and composition, as well as the ability of various species (cattle, sheep, goats, and yaks) to utilize different ecological niches. Attention is also given to the overall articulation of pastoralism and farming as complementary food production systems.

Examining issues of specific importance to archaeology, Johannesson (chapter 5) argues that faunal remains in mortuary contexts are often a significant challenge to archaeologists, at least in part because of the often symbolic nature of funerary assemblages and ritual behavior. This has a particular impact on the interpretation of the evidence for the adoption of nomadic pastoralism in Mongolia and the subsequent emergence of the first nomadic state in the region, the Xiongnu, in the third century BCE. To identify the full range of animal exploitation during this time, which included both economic and symbolic utilization of faunal resources, Johannesson suggests it is necessary to adopt an inclusive interpretive framework that considers animals as constituting one line of evidence of mortuary practice to be contextualized in reference to other aspects of funerary behavior, such as mortuary monumental types and placement, as well as associated funerary assemblages. He employs such an approach to demonstrate that faunal resources were used strategically by the Xiongnu in mortuary ritual to convey cultural unity and political legitimacy.

Negus Cleary moves the discussion to the western end of Eurasia in chapter 6. The Late Iron Age fortified enclosures of ancient Central Asia, specifically those of the oasis of Chorasmia, present an architecture of interaction between steppe and sown. This interaction has been assumed to have involved conflict, constraint, and probably also commerce. A closer examination of these fortified sites reveals that they may not have been solely the constructions of sedentary agriculturalists and that they most likely played a different role than that of urban centers. Analysis of the ancient settlement pattern in Chorasmia reveals a low-density, non-nucleated system of buildings, enclosures, and facilities organized around water-supply canals. The fortresses and canals were integral to both the domination of the oasis territory and control of the local environment. This manipulated landscape appeared relatively suddenly and represents an interesting transitional period from the small preceding mobile, or semi-mobile, steppic communities toward a more sedentary, urbanized existence in the medieval period. While agriculture is clearly present in association with the fortresses, the lack of evidence for significant permanent domestic habitation and other factors suggest a greater role for pastoralists in the oasis during this period.

Moritz (chapter 7) argues that studies of African pastoral societies should consider the informal politics of the neo-patrimonial state in their analyses of pastoralists’ relations with the state rather than focus on the official laws and policies of an ideal bureaucratic state. To illustrate his argument, Moritz examines the role of the neo-patrimonial state in the lives of nomadic FulBe Mare’en pastoralists. He discusses pastoral development, access to grazing land, and insecurity, situating the analysis within the historical and geographical contexts of the Chad Basin.

Kuznar (chapter 8) moves us to the New World. He examines the Navajo (Dineh) of the American Southwest who are best known as traditional sheepherders. However, their subsistence economy has ranged from foraging to horticulture to small stock herding to cattle ranching. Today, while herding ceases to be an important subsistence activity for most Navajo, many still herd livestock; and modern pastoralism, like the herding that preceded it, is still characterized by flexibility. Kuznar examines the causes of historic shifts in Navajo pastoralism, as well as the mechanisms that enable flexibility in land use.

In chapter 9, Shutes presents a general argument and uses data from Ireland to support his view. He argues that despite wide geographic diversity, pastoralist societies exhibit a relatively narrow range of internal social organizational forms based principally on localized agnatic kinship bonds. This pattern of social unity within geographic diversity strongly suggests that the strategic elements inherent in any form of animal husbandry demand certain specific kinds of social formation regardless of the particular ecological circumstances within which it is being carried out. Shutes argues that if this suggestion is correct, then, logically, it should follow that an agricultural community that moves from mixed-crop farming to specialized animal husbandry production should experience significant changes in its existing patterns of social organization. Drawing upon ethnographic data from a rural parish in southwestern Ireland (chapter 10), Shutes examines the relationships between animal husbandry and local social organization and offers evidence in support of the idea that the adoption of such strategies by agricultural communities results in a transformation of existing social relationships.

Shifting to the other end of Europe, in chapter 11 Kardulias examines a specific pattern of land use in Greece. Substantial settlements from the Early Bronze Age to the Early Modern period on the arid island of Dokos off the eastern coast of the Peloponnesos attest to the human ability to cope successfully with the lack of freshwater sources. The ethnoarchaeological study of a resident herding family on Dokos provides important insights into water management and other subsistence activities in an austere environment. The study examines strategic planning in terms of herd management, use of local resources, and contacts with the mainland and provides analogues for understanding past human adaptation to island settings. Since the use of such islands is a common feature of Greek antiquity, the study can contribute to a broader understanding of human adaptation to island settings.

In his commentary, Hall (chapter 12) places the individual studies into the broad framework of macro-analysis, using the work of Gerhard Lenski as a starting point. Lenski’s scheme is evolutionary in nature, and he lays out a developmental pattern in which pastoralism has an important role because of its ability to produce a surplus of resources. Hall argues that among the reasons to study pastoral societies is the often unique position they hold as peripheral to sedentary groups, with whom they have complex relationships. In addition, herding societies have frequently played major roles in social change, rising and falling in complexity and size in concert with neighboring sedentary groups. Hall argues that world-systems analysis is one approach that is well-suited to exploring the interactions that define the relationships of pastoralists both internally and externally. In short, he suggests that studying pastoral societies is fundamentally important to understanding the structure of past and present civilizations.

While all books are collaborative efforts at some level, edited volumes are especially so. In putting together this volume, I have received able assistance from a number of individuals. The contributors to the original symposia have been patient as this project worked through various phases, including a long hiatus following Shutes’s death. They and the other authors have provided valuable original data that they could have presented in other venues. All of the contributors were responsive to the various requests for changes to their chapters; their collegial good humor made it possible to bring this book to fruition. I thank the two anonymous reviewers who made valuable suggestions that have enhanced the quality of the volume. It was not possible to follow all of their recommendations, but the individual authors made every reasonable effort to do so. Jessica d’Arbonne, acquisitions editor at the University Press of Colorado, has been a great help in guiding the book through the various steps of preparation leading to publication. Her responses to questions were always upbeat and timely. I thank Avinoam Meir for permission to reprint Mark Moritz’s article that initially appeared in Geography Research Forum (volume 25, 2005).

The College of Wooster has provided assistance that facilitated the completion of this project. Course release time made available through a grant from the Luce Fund for Distinguished Scholarship in 2007–8 and a sabbatical leave in 2010–11 made it possible to collect, edit, and revise the chapter manuscripts and to rewrite my own contributions. Stephanie Bosch, Brittany Rancour, Chelsea Fisher, and James Torpy aided in formatting the manuscript, hunting down references, and other tasks; these students were funded by the College’s Sophomore Research Assistant program between 2007 and 2013. Steve Flynn, emerging technologies librarian at the College of Wooster, provided valuable assistance in preparing the final figures, along with Stephanie Bosch. Bosch continued her work on the book in the capacity of an archaeology laboratory research assistant; she was most helpful in the final stages of editing and in compiling the index. Brett Arnold, Emily Butcher, Jacob Dinkelaker, Catie Gullett, Renee Hennemann, and Sarah Tate read drafts of the chapters carefully.

Finally, I extend deep gratitude to my late colleague and collaborator on other projects, Mark Shutes. His passing was a significant loss for his family, friends, and the discipline of anthropology that he loved and respected. Mark had an unquenchable curiosity about all aspects of the human condition, but he reserved most of his immense energy for the investigation of the intricate relationship between humans and domesticated animals. He was a comparative anthropologist with a wide-ranging intellect and remarkable curiosity about how people think and act in social settings. With his engaging teaching style, infectious enthusiasm for fieldwork, and astute observations laid out in clear prose, Mark was the consummate teacher-scholar. It is with an enduring sense of admiration for his many skills and of loss at being deprived of his invigorating company that this book is dedicated to his memory. P. Nick Kardulias Wooster, Ohio

The Ecology of Pastoralism

1

Introduction

Pastoralism as an Adaptive Strategy

P. NICK KARDULIAS

A Pastoral Ecology

Animal husbandry has been one of the main subsistence patterns for many cultures around the world since the Neolithic period. In the past, pastoral peoples have proved to be central players in major historical transformations, including the emergence of major empires such as those of the Mongols and Arabs. In the study of pastoralists, anthropologists and archaeologists pay specific attention to the ecological factors that govern pastoral activities, unlike analysis performed by economists or specialists in development. The studies in this volume demonstrate the careful way pastoral peoples past and present have organized their relationship with certain animals to maximize their ability to survive and adapt to a wide range of environmental conditions over time. In addition, the contributors demonstrate that pastoralism has a significant impact not only on basic subsistence but also on the network of social, political, and religious institutions of the respective societies. The book builds on the work of others who have studied herding cultures from an anthropological perspective (e.g., Campbell 1964; Dyson-Hudson and Dyson-Hudson 1980; Galaty and Johnson 1990; see also Spooner 1973; Khazanov 1984; Barfield 1989, 1993; Chang and Koster 1994; Kradin, Bondarenko, and Barfield 2003; Salzman 2004; Parman 2005).

The contributors take a broad view of ecology. The biological approach to ecology considers the relationships between organisms and their surroundings, with a focus on the utilization of the various resources that sustain life (hydrology, soils, geology, fauna, and flora) within particular climatic regimes. The balances among these various elements determine the ability of a certain zone to sustain a given number of organisms (i.e., carrying capacity). Human ecology is specifically concerned with how people fit into local environments and as a result ties the physical features of a region to the cultural mechanisms people deploy in their efforts to adapt to the environment (Bates 2001:28). For several reasons, the study of pastoralism is an ideal way to explore ecological relationships because it involves symbiotic connections between humans and domesticated animals, with a series of cascading effects in political, social, economic, and religious organization. Conversely, an ecological framework offers perhaps the best way to explain the inherent flexibility of herding/animal husbandry systems. Such groups adapt well to a wide range of environmental and social conditions. On the one hand, they can never really be completely isolated or self-sufficient. They need, or at least seek out, links to other groups and areas through trade, migration, and raiding. On the other hand, pastoral folk often demonstrate a remarkable ability to thrive in marginal zones and exhibit political autonomy in doing so. While they are often participants in market systems, they can manipulate such economic systems through the pliable network of social and political relationships they possess. This ability to mediate their involvement with outside groups is the key to the endurance of such cultures. Dyson-Hudson and Dyson-Hudson (1980:27) opined that to advance our understanding of the complex relationships between ecology and human social organization, we need detailed studies both of animal and of human behavior. A key goal of the various contributors to this volume is to present just such analyses, providing information about environmental conditions while also heeding Fratkin’s (1997:236) call to consider the political setting.

While herding/animal husbandry systems retain their cultural integrity despite links with outside groups, they are also syncretic cultures, that is, they transform rather easily from less structured to more formal organizations. Such groups have undergone more adjustments than many other cultures, yet they have been able to retain their sense of place and purpose. Pastoral strategies are easily transferred from place to place and are not linked to territory in the same way as sedentary farmers. The products of herding and animal husbandry systems (such as leather, meat, milk) are universally desired by other groups and constitute a form of fluid wealth that can be converted into multiple forms of capital, savings, and credit, thus enhancing the economic flexibility of such groups. In addition, the animals themselves possess an inherent adaptability. They are subject to easy mutations, can live in cold or intense heat, and can adjust to resource depletion through migration. In addition, sheep and goats are non-selective grazers, so they can live in many different climates, some of which are completely unsuitable for agriculture. In this manner, herding/animal husbandry creates a viable ecological niche for humans where none would have existed otherwise. This is not to say there are no dangers associated with a pastoral system. At times, pastoralism can be as sensitive or more sensitive to seasonal variations in temperature. For example, an early or late frost can lead to the deaths of many lambs in sheepherding societies, creating a problem of volatility in animal population and structure.

Politically, such groups can exhibit strong central organization, but without a massive concentration of resources, because of the need to disperse resources to build alliances, form factions, and so on. As a result, pastoral groups are usually able to organize hierarchically between groups yet retain egalitarian structures within groups. While their contrasting subsistence patterns can bring pastoralists and sedentary agriculturalists into conflict, there are also significant instances of an almost symbiotic cooperation. Despite the difference in mobility, herders can develop social and political organization that often mirrors that of farmers in complexity if not in exact form. Just as their herds can expand and contract in number under various environmental conditions, pastoral societies can fluctuate in size and structure depending on a number of factors. The segmentary lineages of East African cattle pastoralists are perhaps the prime example of this process (Evans-Pritchard 1940). Lineal groups that normally compete with one another may unify against an external threat but then dissolve back to the looser association once the outside danger has passed. In eastern and Central Asia there have been times when the process of consolidation crossed a threshold and chiefdoms and states arose out of a pastoral context. In short, pastoral societies have been and continue to be dynamic and critical to our understanding of cultural evolution. The chapters in this book explore some of these dimensions of herding/animal husbandry systems in various areas of the world, with a focus on Eurasia, Africa, and North America.

Studying Pastoralism

While studies of pastoral societies have occupied the anthropological imagination almost since the inception of the discipline, research on the topic has increased dramatically since the mid-1970s. Several factors account for this expansion. One is that, in some regions, pastoral people represent a traditional form of life that is rapidly disappearing under pressure from the modern world, which restricts their movement across political boundaries or entices members away from animal husbandry with promises of a better life in settled communities. At the same time, many countries present the image of the traditional herder as a unifying cultural theme, part of a national ethnic identity. As a result of this interest, some have come to study pastoralists as representatives of the customary life that had existed for millennia but is rapidly vanishing. A second reason is the opening of regions to investigation by Western scholars. The collapse of the Soviet regime in particular has made it possible for scholars to study regions largely closed to the West for much of the twentieth century. This is particularly true for the vast swathe of the Eurasian steppe that is home to many pastoral groups. There has been a veritable explosion of research by Western scholars in the region from Mongolia to the Ukraine. Among the excellent studies of this area are those by Anthony (2007), Barfield (1993), Chang (2006), Chang et al. (2003), and Frachetti (2008); and long-term projects across this vast area have become the norm. Symposia on current research in Eurasia, often with a focus on pastoralism, have become annual occurrences at major conferences, such as the Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This growth in studies of Eurasian pastoralism is reflected in the present volume by the presence of four chapters dealing with this area. I should note that excellent work had also been done by non-Western scholars, especially Russians, prior to 1991 (e.g., Khazanov 1984; Kradin 1987), but only a portion of this scholarship reached a broader audience.

Some definitions are in order to lay the groundwork for this discussion. The basis of pastoralism is animal husbandry, the breeding, care, and use of herd animals such as sheep, goats, camels, cattle, horses, llamas, reindeer, and yaks (Bates 2001:104). Salzman (2004:1) adds that the animals are raised on ‘natural’ pasture unimproved by human intervention. However, he notes that direct and indirect human action can create pasturelands; these activities can include deforestation and burning to suppress tree growth. The reliance on domesticated animals for subsistence is not monolithic, since many pastoral groups also grow some crops, for both human and animal consumption. This basic fact means that pastoralists have to view their landscape in a composite fashion, considering the needs of both the herds they tend and the plants that can form an important part of the food base. This expansive vision of their subsistence base leads pastoral people to think at an extra-local level. Because the substantial herds on which they depend require sufficient pasturage that is often at a premium in any particular locale, they must be aware of available land in several regions. This necessity requires broader geographic knowledge than many farmers possess. Whereas a farmer may be most concerned with one area and invests substantial energy in plowing, building terrace walls to reduce erosion, and erecting permanent structures such as houses, barns, and threshing floors and thus places great emphasis on the location where these features exist, a pastoralist sees the value of land in a somewhat more transient fashion—as a place to be used and valued, to be certain, but in a system with multiple foci instead of one. In addition, while the farmer needs immobile structures for everything from residence to storage, the pastoralist places a premium value on portability, a fact that complicates the study of pastoral archaeological sites (see Cribb 1991). As with most things in anthropology, however, there is overlap between the farming and pastoral lifestyles. As Barfield (1993:4) suggests:

One of the most enduring stereotypes is the myth of the pure nomad, one who subsists entirely on meat, milk, or blood, abhors farmers, farming, and grain, despises sedentary life in general, and never has contact with villages or cities except when he loots and burns them. Nothing could be further from the truth. The historical and ethnographic record is full of nomads who also farm, trade, serve as soldiers, smuggle, or drive trucks, just to mention a few occupations . . . even those nomads who did appear purely pastoral, such as the Bedouin of the Empty Quarter or horse riders of Mongolia, maintained an ideal of purity largely by means of the subsidies they received from neighboring sedentary societies with whom they had important political and economic relationships. While nomadic pastoralists have always viewed animal husbandry as the culturally ideal way of making a living, and the movement of all or part of the society as a normal and natural part of life, they never rejected other opportunities. However, these activities were always viewed as adjuncts to pastoralism which remained the key element of their cultural and social identity.

One of the key features of pastoralism reflected in Barfield’s description is thus an inherent and necessary flexibility. While the keeping of animals may be paramount, in thought if not completely so in action, pastoral peoples combine strategic thinking and pragmatism in deciding what particular activities are appropriate under given conditions. When we consider the often fragile or marginal environments pastoralists occupy, keeping various options open is to be expected. While pastoralists are often listed among the traditional societies of the world, it is important to think of them in dynamic rather than static terms.

As Salzman (2004:2–3) notes, pastoralists must be well attuned to their environment to raise their animals successfully. Among the key factors they must understand are elements of climate, topography, vegetation, human and animal population profiles, and sources of disease. In an ecological calculus, The pastoralists try to identify for their particular environment the optimal combination of location and timing to maximize benefit for the animals—high quality and quantity of pasture, good water, and favorable temperatures—and minimize detrimental influences—extreme temperatures, lack of water or pasture, exposure to disease, and vulnerability to human or animal predators (ibid.:3). These considerations lead to decisions concerning how and when to move herds. It is in the context of such strategic thinking that we see enacted the distinctions between horizontal and vertical forms of pastoralism. The available resources will dictate the conditions, and pastoralists decide where to move based on their assessment of the situation on the ground. In areas with little topographic relief and relatively uniform growing conditions for plant cover, people tend to adopt an extensive strategy in which they roam across substantial distances. The areas covered may become larger if the necessary resources are especially patchy, as in desert regions. High-relief zones offer the attraction of using highland pasture zones that otherwise provide few resources of use to humans. Transhumant pastoralism thus makes it possible to convert an otherwise nonproductive zone into an ecological niche useful to humans.

A key to a successful pastoral adaptation is to maintain flexibility. As Bates (2001:106) observes, people determine the degree of mobility based on an assessment of prevailing conditions. These decisions involve not only the herds’ immediate needs for water and pasture but also determinations of appropriate group size and structure. To make appropriate choices, pastoral people must have an intimate knowledge not only of the environment where their herds graze at any particular time but also of the prevailing conditions in those other areas to which they may move in search of additional pastures. This fact makes the pastoral environmental view more expansive than that of others who are locked into one