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Nomadic pastoralism, also known as nomadic herding, is a form of pastoralism in which livestock are herding in order to seek for fresh on which to Grazing. True nomads follow an irregular pattern of movement, in contrast with transhumance, where seasonal pastures are fixed. However, this distinction is often not observed and the term 'nomad' used for both—and in historical cases the regularity of movements is often unknown in any case. The herded livestock include cattle, water buffalo, , llamas, sheep, , reindeer, , or , or mixtures of species. pastoralism is commonly practiced in regions with little arable land, typically in the developing world, especially in the steppe lands north of the agricultural zone of Eurasia.Elizabeth, Clifford, and Robert Pollard, Rosenberg, and Tignor (2025). 9780393918472, W.W. Norton & Company. ISBN 9780393918472 Pastoralists often trade with sedentary Agrarian society, exchanging meat for grains; however, they have been known to raid.
Of the estimated 30–40 million nomadic pastoralists worldwide, most are found in central Asia and the Sahel region of North and West Africa, such as Fulani people, Tuaregs, and Toubou people, with some also in the Middle East, such as traditionally Bedouins, and in other parts of Africa, such as Nigeria and Somalia. Increasing numbers of stock may lead to overgrazing of the area and desertification if lands are not allowed to fully recover between one grazing period and the next. Increased enclosure and fencing of land has reduced the amount of land for this practice.
There is substantive uncertainty over the extent to which the various causes for degradation affect grassland. Different causes have been identified which include overgrazing, mining, agricultural reclamation, pests and rodents, soil properties, tectonic activity, and climate change. Simultaneously, it is maintained that some, such as overgrazing and overstocking, may be overstated while others, such as climate change, mining and agricultural reclamation, may be under reported. In this context, there is also uncertainty as to the long-term effect of human behavior on the grassland as compared to non-biotic factors.
pastoralism was a result of the Neolithic Revolution and the rise of agriculture. During that revolution, humans began domestic animals and plants for food and started forming cities. Nomadism generally has existed in symbiosis with such settled cultures trading animal products (meat, hides, wool, cheese and other animal products) for manufactured items not produced by the nomadic herders. Henri Fleisch tentatively suggested the Shepherd Neolithic industry of Lebanon may date to the Epipaleolithic and that it may have been used by one of the first cultures of in the Beqaa valley.Fleisch, Henri., Notes de Préhistoire Libanaise : 1) Ard es Saoude. 2) La Bekaa Nord. 3) Un polissoir en plein air. BSPF, vol. 63, 1966. Andrew Sherratt demonstrates that "early farming populations used livestock mainly for meat, and that other applications were explored as agriculturalists adapted to new conditions, especially in the semi‐arid zone."Sherratt, Andrew (1983), "The secondary exploitation of animals in the Old World" in (World Archaeology Volume 15, Issue 1, 1983 Special Issue: Transhumance and pastoralism)
In the past it was asserted that pastoral nomads left no presence archaeologically or were impoverished, but this has now been challenged,Roger Cribb (1991) Nomads in Archaeology. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge. and was clearly not so for many ancient , who have left very rich kurgan burial sites. Pastoral nomadic sites are identified based on their location outside the zone of agriculture, the absence of grains or grain-processing equipment, limited and characteristic architecture, a predominance of sheep and goat bones, and by ethnography analogy to modern pastoral nomadic peoplesOriental Institute of Chicago "Nomads, Tribes, and the State in the Ancient Near East: Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives". Juris Zarins has proposed that pastoral nomadism began as a cultural lifestyle in the wake of the 6200 BC climatic crisis when Harifian pottery making hunter-gatherers in the Sinai fused with Pre-Pottery Neolithic B agriculturalists to produce the MunhataPerrot J. (1964), "Les deux premières campagnes de fouilles à Munhata" Syria XLI pp. 323-45 culture, a nomadic lifestyle based on animal domestication, developing into the YarmoukianMellaart, James (1975), The Neolithic of the Near East (London: Thames and Hudson), pp. 239-241 and thence into a circum-Arabian nomadic pastoral complex, and spreading Proto-Semitic languages.Zarins, Juris (1992) "Pastoral Nomadism in Arabia: Ethnoarchaeology and the Archaeological Record," in O. Bar-Yosef and A. Khazanov, eds. "Pastoralism in the Levant"
In Bronze Age Central Asia, nomadic populations are associated with the earliest transmissions of millet and wheat grains through the region that eventually became central for the Silk Road. Early Indo-European migrations from the Pontic–Caspian steppe spread Yamnaya culture Steppe pastoralist ancestry and Indo-European languages across large parts of Eurasia. By the medieval period in Central Asia, nomadic communities exhibited isotopically diverse diets, suggesting a multitude of subsistence strategies.
The movements in this example are about 180 to 200 km. Camps are established in the same place each year; often semi-permanent shelters are built in at least one place on this migration route.
In sub-regions, such as in Chad, the nomadic pastoralist cycle is as follows:
In Chad, the sturdy villages are called hillé, the less sturdy villages are called dankhout and the tents ferik.Tsjaad by Dorrit van Dalen
Christian distinguished 'Inner Eurasia', which was pastoral with a few hunter-gatherers in the far north, from 'Outer Eurasia', a crescent of agrarian civilizations from Europe through India to China. High civilization is based on agriculture where tax-paying peasants support landed aristocrats, kings, cities, literacy and scholars. Pastoral societies are less developed and as a result, according to Christian, more egalitarian. One tribe would often dominate its neighbors, but these 'empires' usually broke up after a hundred years or so. The heartland of pastoralism is the Eurasian steppe. In the center of Eurasia pastoralism extended south to Iran and surrounded agrarian oasis cities. When pastoral and agrarian societies went to war, horse-borne mobility counterbalanced greater numbers. Attempts by agrarian civilizations to conquer the steppe usually failed until the last few centuries. Pastoralists frequently raided and sometimes collected regular tribute from their farming neighbors. Especially in north China and Iran, they would sometimes conquer agricultural societies, but these dynasties were usually short-lived and broke up when the nomads became 'civilized' and lost their warlike virtues.
The Eurasian steppe has been largely populated by pastoralist nomads since the late prehistoric times, with a succession of peoples known by the names given to them by surrounding literate sedentism societies, including the Bronze Age Proto-Indo-Europeans, and later Proto-Indo-Iranians, Scythians, Sarmatians, Cimmerians, Massagetae, Alans, Pechenegs, Cumans, Kipchaks, Karluks, Saka, Yuezhi, Wusun, Jie people, Xiongnu, Xianbei, Khitan people, Pannonian Avars, Huns, Mongols, Dzungars and various Turkics.
The Mongols in what is now Mongolia, Russia and China, and the Tatars or Turkic people of Eastern Europe and Central Asia were nomadic people who practiced nomadic transhumance on harsh Asian . Some remnants of these populations are nomadic to this day. In Mongolia, about 40% of the population continues to live a traditional nomadic lifestyle. Mongolia Today – online magazine In China, it is estimated that a little over five million herders are dispersed over the pastoral counties, and more than 11 million over the semi-pastoral counties. This brings the total of the (semi)nomadic herder population to over 16 million, in general living in remote, scattered and resource-poor communities. In the Middle Hills and Himalaya of Nepal, people living above about 2,000 m practise transhumance and nomadic pastoralism because settled agriculture becomes less productive due to steep slopes, cooler temperatures and limited irrigation possibilities. Distances between summer and winter pasture may be short, for example in the vicinity of Pokhara where a valley at about 800 meters elevation is less than 20 km. from alpine pastures just below the Annapurna Himalaya, or distances may be 100 km or more. For example, in Rapti zone some 100 km west of Pokhara the Kham Magar move their herds between winter pastures just north of India and summer pastures on the southern slopes of Dhaulagiri Himalaya. In far western Nepal, ethnic Tibetans living in Dolpo and other valleys north among the high Himalaya moved their herds north to winter on the plains of the upper Brahmaputra basin in Tibet proper, until this practice was prohibited after China took over Tibet in 1950–51.
The nomadic Sami people, an indigenous people of northern Finland, Sweden, Norway, and the Kola Peninsula of Russia, practise a form of nomadic transhumance based on reindeer. In the 14th and 15th century, when reindeer population was sufficiently reduced that Sami could not subsist on hunting alone, some Sami, organized along family lines, became reindeer herders. Each family has traditional territories on which they herd, arriving at roughly the same time each season. Only a small fraction of Sami have subsisted on reindeer herding over the past century; as the most colorful part of the population, they are well known. But as elsewhere in Europe, transhumance is dying out.
The Mesta was an association of sheep owners, (Spanish nobility and ) that had an important economic and political role in medieval Castile. To preserve the rights of way of its transhumant herds through Glen, the Mesta acted against small peasants.
In Chad, nomadic pastoralists include the Zaghawa people, Toubou people, and Amdang people. Farther north in Egypt and western Libya, the Bedouins also practice pastoralism.
There have been initiatives seeking to promote cross-border trade and also document it, in order to both stimulate regional growth and food security, but also to allow the effective vaccination of livestock. Initiatives include Regional Resilience Enhancement Against Drought (RREAD), the Enhanced Livelihoods in Mandera Triangle/Enhanced Livelihoods in Southern Ethiopia (ELMT/ELSE) as part of the Regional Enhanced Livelihoods in Pastoral Areas (RELPA) programme in East Africa, and the Regional Livelihoods Advocacy Project (REGLAP) funded by the European Commission Humanitarian Aid Office (ECHO).
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