1

in Kazakhstan 13 percent and so on). In total,

Nomads
NIKOLAY N. KRADIN
Russian Academy of Sciences and Far-Eastern Federal
University, Russia
Nomads (Greek: nomas) are, literally, those
who lead a nomadic life. Therefore, in the
very widest sense, everyone who leads a
mobile way of life can be termed a nomad,
including wandering hunter-gatherers, farm-
ers engaged in slash-and-burn agriculture, a
number of maritime peoples of Southeast
Asia, migratory populations such as the Gyp-
sies (Roma), and even present-day inhabi-
tants of megalopolises who reside far from
their place of work. However, in the most
common meaning, only pastoralists who
migrate together with their cattle are called
nomads. Therefore, nomadism is a specific
type of economic activity and, at the same
time, a specific pattern of culture where the
popular majority engages in mobile, extensive
nomadic pastoralism.
It is significant that not many pastoralists
are nomads. It is reasonable to relate nomad-
ism to three main features:
1 extensive pastoralism as the main kind of
economy;
2 periodic migrations of the greater part of
the population and domestic animals;
3 the specific material culture, mentality,
and ideology of steppe societies.
Nomads live in the arid steppes and semi-
deserts or high mountain areas where pastor-
alism is the most optimal kind of economic
activity (in Mongolia, for example, the lands
suited to arable farming represent 2 percent
of available land, in Turkmenistan 3 percent,
such areas cover about 25 percent of the
Earths land surface. The main food of
nomads comprises various kinds of dairy
products and, less often, animal meat, spoils
of the chase, products of arable farming,
and gathering. The economic system is
fragile and dependent on the environment.
Droughts, snowstorms (and ice), and epi-
demics (epizootics) can deprive a nomad of
the means of subsistence. In order to counter-
act natural crises nomads developed an effi-
cient system of mutual aid. In a situation of
livestock loss, fellow tribesmen would provide
an individual with one or two heads of cattle,
thus restoring a means of subsistence. But the
assisted group or persons were also bound to
reciprocate this help if necessary. Ancient and
mediaeval nomads could also lose livestock to
raids from foreign tribes. These forays were a
favorite recreation of nomads.
Because animals constantly require new
pastures, nomads were forced to move from
one place to another several times a year.
In the chronicles of settled civilizations,
accounts reflect a stereotypical formula
asserting that the pastoral nomads moved
about according to the availability of water
and pasture, had no walled towns or fixed
residences, nor any agricultural activities.
By virtue of this mobile way of life, nomads
lived unpretentiously, occupying light col-
lapsible dwellings (yurts, tents, marquees).
The household necessities of nomads were
few and dishes were commonly made
of unbreakable materials (wood, leather).
Clothes and footwear were sewn and made,
as a rule, of leather, wool, and fur. The yurt
was a major architectural invention of the
nomads. Its circular form allows the greatest
amount of interior living space. The yurt

The Encyclopedia of Empire, First Edition. Edited by John M. MacKenzie.

2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2016 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
DOI: 10.1002/9781118455074.wbeoe171
2
protects against cold in winter and against
heat in summer. It has optimal aerodynamic
qualities, rendering it tolerant of strong winds
and hurricanes. The yurt, without its timber
floor, weighs about 200 kg, 75 percent of
which is the weight of the felt. Yurts could
be assembled within one hour. Felt carpets
could be utilized for up to five years while a
timber frame lasted more than 20 years.
The specificity of pastoralism suggests a
dispersed life. Concentration of great herds
of animals in one place resulted in overgraz-
ing, excessive grass trampling, and a higher
risk of contagion from infectious diseases
among the animals. It was impossible to accu-
mulate cattle ad infinitum because their max-
imal number was determined by the steppe
landscapes limited capability. As such, irre-
spective of the stock-keepers nobility, his
entire herd could be killed by dzut (snow-
storm), drought, or disease. Therefore, it
became more profitable either to apportion
the livestock among poor kinsmen for pas-
ture, or to distribute them as gifts so as to raise
social status. Thus, pastoral nomadism could
not provide the stable food surplus that was
needed to support large groups of people
who did not participate in food production
the ruling aristocracy, officialdom, soldiers,
priests of settled societies.
In arid areas, there is no one universal way
of migrating even today. No fewer than ten
different variants of seasonal roaming from
place to place are known. For example, the
majority of Mongols relocated with their
livestock an average of two to four times a
year. However, frequency and distance of
migration vary considerably based on the
pastures productivity. In the fertile Khangai
steppes, nomads wander within a radius of
215 km. The summer camps of the Khangai
cattle-breeders are usually located in wide
river valleys, while the winter camps are
established atop outer valleys for wind pro-
tection. In the semi-arid regions of the Gobi
Desert, this travel radius is much greater
(5070 km). There, summer pastures are
located in the open plains and winter camps
are established in the hilly and submontane
areas where the settlement would be pro-
tected from cold winter winds. On the
Onon River, nomads spend the winter in
quiet submontane valleys or even in the
mountains and, in summer, descend into
the wide productive river valleys. The largest
migrations covering 100200 km are
made by the Mongols of the Ubur-khangai
and Bayan-khongor aimaks. The number of
annual migrations in these aimaks can reach
50 or even more.
Of all species, the horse was of major mili-
tary and economic importance. The presence
of a great number of nomads horses in the
Eurasian steppes, or camels in North Africa
and Arabia, offered them significant advan-
tages in the exercise of war. The nomads have
never existed independently of the agricul-
tural world. They were in need of agricultural
products and handicrafts, which they
obtained by raiding rather than trading.
A certain mentality is characteristic of
nomads, which assumes the specific percep-
tion of space and time, where distances are
measured in days on horsebackor the
flight of an arrow. The way of life involves
rites of hospitality, unpretentiousness, endur-
ance, the presence of ancient and medieval
nomads cults of war, identification as
soldier-horseman with heroized ancestors
reflected, in turn, in both the verbal oeuvre
(heroic epos) and the figural arts (zoomorphic
ornament) and a cultic attitude to cattle, the
premier source of nomads subsistence. It is
important to note that there are now few clas-
sic nomads (those migrating continuously),
only some peoples of Arabia, the Sahara, and
the Eurasian steppes, and Mongols.
There is no straightforward explanation for
the origins of nomadism. In recent times it
was believed that pastoralism was conceived

in hunting societies. An alternative, now
more popular point of view, holds that
nomadism arose as an alternative to agricul-
ture in the unfavorable zones of the Old
World, where a part of the population within
producing households was squeezed out.
They were obliged to adapt to new conditions
and specialized in pastoralism. There are also
other points of view in a field in which the
emergence of nomadism is keenly debated.
Some researchers are inclined to believe that
the nomadism arose in the Middle East, on
the periphery of the first (early) civilizations
as far back as the 4th3rd millennia BCE.
Others are inclined even to find the signs of
nomadism in the Levant at the turn of the
6th8th millennium BCE. Some scientists are
of opinion that, for the present, this is too
early to talk of the existence of true nomad-
ism. Even the domestication of the horse
(Ukraine, 4th millennium BCE) and emer-
gence of chariots (2nd millennium BCE) do
not suggest just yet the changeover from the
arable-and-livestock economy to the real
nomadism. In the opinion of this group of
researchers, the changeover to nomadism
took place not earlier than at the turn of the
2nd1st millennia BCE in the Eurasian steppes.
There are a great number of different clas-
sifications of nomadism. The most com-
monly encountered schemes are based on
the degree of sedentism and economic activ-
ity: nomadic, semi-nomadic, and semi-settled
(when arable farming predominates) econ-
omy, and transhumance system (when part
of the population lives wandering with the
cattle). In some other constructions, the type
of nomadism is also taken into account: ver-
tical (mountainsplains) and horizontal,
which can be latitudinal, meridional, circular,
etc. In the geographical context, one can talk
of six great zones where nomadism occurred:
1 Eurasian steppes where so called five spe-
cies of animals are ranched (horse, great
3
cattle, sheep, goat, camel), although the
horse is considered to be the most impor-
tant animal (among the Turks, Mongols,
Buryats, Kazakhs, the Kirghiz, etc.). The
nomads of this zone have established the
powerful steppe empires (Scythians,
Xiongnu, Turks, Mongols, etc.);
2 The Middle East where nomads breed small
cattle while, for transport, use horses,
camels, and donkeys (Bakhtiari, Basseri,
Pashtuns and others);
3 The Arabian Desert and Sahara where the
nomads raise camels (Bedouins, Tuaregs
and so on);
4 East Africa, savannas south of the Sahara
where people raising great cattle (Nuers,
Dinka, Masai, etc.) live;
5 The high-mountain plateaus of Inner-
most Asia (Tibet, Pamir) and South
America (Andes) where the local popula-
tion specializes in raising of such animals
as yak, lama, alpaca and others;
6 Boreal, basically subarctic zones where
the population is engaged in deer farming
(Saami, Chukchi, Evenkis, and others).
The rise of nomadism is related to a period
of origin of the nomadic empires or imper-
ial confederacies (middle of the 1st millen-
nium BCE to the middle of the 2nd
millennium CE). A great many diverse opi-
nions have been proposed about the precon-
ditions for the origins of the nomadic
empires. These opinions can be classified as
follows: diverse global climatic changes; the
warlike and greedy nature of nomads; over-
population of the steppe; the need to replen-
ish an extensive pastoral economy by means
of raids on more stable agricultural societies;
unwillingness on the part of the settled peo-
ples to trade with nomads (the cattle-breeders
had nowhere to sell their surplus products);
personal activity of the steppe societies rulers;
ethnic mobilization.
The degree of centralization among nomads
is directly proportional to the extent of
4
neighboring agricultural culture or civiliza-
tion. That is the reason why, in order to trade
with oases or attack them, the nomads of
North Africa and the Near East united into
tribal confederations of chiefdoms, the
Eastern European steppe nomads living on
the margins of the Ancient Rus established
quasi-imperial state-like structures, while,
in Inner Asia, for example, the nomadic
empire became such an important
mode of adaptation. The imperial and
quasi-imperial organization of Eurasian
nomads first developed after the axial age
ended, from the middle of the 1st millennium
BCE at the time of the mighty agricultural
empires (Chin in China, Maur in India, Hel-
lenistic states in Asia Minor, Rome in Europe)
and in those regions, firstly, where there were
available large spaces favorable to nomadic
pastoralism (e.g., regions off the Black Sea,
Volga steppes, Khalkha-Mongolia) and, sec-
ondly, where the nomads were forced into long
and active contact with more highly organized
agricultural urban societies (Scythians and old
oriental and ancient states; nomads of Inner
Asia and China; Huns and Roman Empire;
Arabs, Khazars, Turks and Byzantium).
Nomadic empires were organized in
the form of imperial confederations. From
the outside, these confederations appeared
autocratic and state-like (they were created
to receive gifts and tribute from outside the
steppe) but from the inside were consultative
and tribal. The stability of steppe empires
directly depended on the skill of the khans
at organizing the production of silk, agricul-
tural products, handicraft articles and delicate
jewels in settled territories. As these could not
be produced under the conditions of a cattle-
pastoral economy, obtaining them by force
and extortion was the priority of the ruler
of a nomadic society. Being the sole interme-
diary between China and the steppe, the ruler
of a nomadic society had the opportunity to
control the redistribution of plunder from
China and, thereby, strengthen his own
power. It allowed him to maintain the exist-
ence of an empire that could not survive on
an extensive pastoral economy alone.
The majority of nomadic empires did not
exist for longer than 100150 years. Research-
ers have repeatedly cited a set of reasons that
could have caused the decline and collapse of
nomadic empires. Among them are:
natural phenomena (growing aridity of
the steppe, short-term climatic stresses
and epidemics);
foreign policy factors (invasion of enemies,
delayed wars, cessation of outside incomes,
crisis of nearby agrarian civilizations);
internal causes (demographic outburst,
loss of the internal unity and separatism,
gigantic sizes and weakness of the admin-
istrative infrastructure, class struggle,
internal wars of khans and civil wars, tal-
entless political rulers).
There were other events which potentially
contributed to the structural instability of
nomadic empires:
external sources of surplus products, which
integrated economically independent tribes
into a unified imperial confederation;
mobility and armament of nomads, which
forced the supreme power of an empire to
restore balance between different political
groups;
the specific tanistrial system of power
inheritance, by which each descendant of
the ruling lineage (mothered only by main
wives) was prioritized according to age for
administrative promotions, including the
right to a throne;
polygamy among the highest elite of
nomads.
Several great migrations of so called
pastoral nations and, later on, nomad-
pastoralists (Indo-Europeans, Huns, Avars,

Turks, Khitans, Mongols, Kalmycks, and
others) are known. In the period of the
Xiongnu, direct contacts were established
between China and Rome. The Silk Road
emerged in the time of the Roman emperor
Augustus. After the Mongolian conquests, as
a result, a unified chain of international
trade, along with technological and cultural
exchanges, was formed. As a result of these
processes, gunpowder, the compass, and
book printing were introduced into Western
Europe. In some studies, this period is called
the medieval globalization.
In the period of modernization, pastoral
nomadism failed to compete with the indus-
trial economy. The emergence of firearms
and artillery gradually eroded the military
dominance of nomads over farmers. Nomads
no longer played dominant roles in world his-
tory, and the political status of the steppe
societies changed. They became part of the
colonial periphery of the industrial world-
system. In Inner Asia, nomads became the
vassals of two great world empires the
Chinese and Russian.
In the 20th century, forcible attempts were
made to realize collectivization and sedentar-
ization in the Socialist republics, which
turned out to be unsuccessful. The Socialist
method of pastoralist reformation has
resulted, on the one hand, in intensification
of the economy, the breeding of new varieties
of stock, and an increase in the production of
meat, wool, and milk. A process of sedentar-
ization was carried out and the living condi-
tions of pastoralists were improved. Houses,
schools, and shops were constructed for them
and electrical equipment was installed in their
seasonal sites. On the other hand, the seden-
tarization of the population and increase in
the number of animals resulted in the degra-
dation of pasture, while plowing of the
steppes contributed to erosion.
After the collapse of the Socialist system, a
return to the nomadic mode of life and
5
semi-natural economy took place in many
countries. The population of domestic animals
in Russian Siberia, Kazakhstan, Kirghizia, and
Turkmenistan decreased significantly. In the
first half of the 1990s, Mongolia was also in
decline caused by the destruction of collective
farms, privatization of livestock, and the tran-
sition to a market economy. The crisis was
accompanied by inflation. However, after the
first five years of crisis conditions, the situation
stabilized. The number of individual farms
increased and total livestock numbers grew
by 17 percent, reaching 40 million head in
the current period. In herd composition, the
number of sheep decreased sharply while the
number of goats rose, which resulted in an
increase in load on pastures. In China under
the control of the Chinese government, a
deliberate policy of nomadic sedentarization
has been accompanied by widespread mech-
anization and a changeover of livestock to a
stable nursing system was completed within
the past several decades. As a result, total
livestock numbers increased from 10 to 74
million head. This can be considered a gigantic
upswing in the economy. However, a consid-
erable proportion of the pastures in Inner
Mongolia are at the present time on the edge
of serious degradation. About 40 million
people continue to engage in nomadic pasto-
ralism (in North, Central and Innermost Asia,
the Middle East, and Africa). In countries such
as Niger, Somalia, Mauritania and others,
nomadic pastoralists constitute a compara-
tively large portion of the population.
Among ordinary people, the prevailing point
of view is that nomads were simply a source of
aggression and robbery. In reality, there has
been a broad range of different forms of contact
between the sedentary and steppe worlds, from
military confrontation and conquest to peaceful
trade relations. The nomads played an impor-
tant role in human history. They contributed
to the development of extreme ecological zones
which were poorly adapted for sedentary
6
settlement. The pastoral nomads have elabor-
ated the flexible adaptive strategies which con-
tributed to the colonization of these empty
spaces and the establishment of contacts
between agrarian civilizations and nomad
groups. Thanks to their agency work, political
and trade contacts were established and techno-
logical, cultural, and other innovations were
disseminated. Many nomadic societies made
their contribution to the treasury of world cul-
ture and to global ethnic history. However, pos-
sessing a formidable military standing, nomads
have also exerted an essentially destructive
influence on the historical process and, as
a result of their military invasions, many
cultural values, nations, and civilizations were
overthrown.
SEE ALSO: Mongol Empire, Great; Steppe
empires; Xiongnu Empire
FURTHER READING
Barfield, T. 1993. The Nomadic Alternative. Engle-
wood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Humphrey, C. and D. Sneath. 1999. The End of
Nomadism? Durham, NC: Duke Univer-
sity Press.
Khazanov, A. M. 1994. Nomads and the Outside
World, 2nd ed. Madison, WI: University of Wis-
consin Press.
Khudyakov, Y. S. 1980. Vooruzenie eniseiskikh kyrgy-
zov VIXII vekov (The armament of Yenisei Kyr-
gyzes, 6th12th centuries). Novosibirsk: Nauka.
Kradin, N. N. 2014. Nomads of Inner Asia in Tran-
sition. Moscow: URSS.
Legrand, J. 2011. Mongols et Nomades: Socit, His-
toire, Culture. Textes, Communications, articles
19732011. Ulaanbaatar: Admon.
Salzman, P. C. 2004. Pastoralists: Equality, Hier-
archy, and the State. Boulder: Westview.
Scholz, F. 2008. Nomadism: A Socioecological Mode
of Culture. Ulaanbaatar: International Institute
of the Study of Nomadic Civilizations.