Nomads in the Sedentary World

Anatoly M. Khazanov, Andre Wink

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9780700713707
• eBook ISBN: 9781136121944
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Ciencias sociales
• Subtopic: Estudios étnicos

Studies the role played by nomads in the political, linguistic, socio-economic and cultural development of the sedentary world around them. Spans regions from Hungary to Africa, India and China, and periods from the first millennium BC to early modern times.

CHAPTER 1

NOMADS IN THE HISTORY OF THE SEDENTARY WORLD

ANATOLY M. KHAZANOV

The problem of the interrelations of pastoral nomads, or extensive mobile pastoralists in general, with sedentary agricultural and urban societies has two sides. The first side, the impact of sedentary societies on nomads, has been studied in a more or less scholarly way. Research has been done not only on local or regional levels, but also in cross-cultural and diachronic perspectives. Remarkably, some differences notwithstanding, many scholars have come to similar conclusions. Nomadic societies, it appears, could never be characterized as autarkic and closed systems by any of their main parameters. Specialized mobile pastoralists were dependent on non-pastoralist, mainly sedentary societies because their economy was not entirely self-sufficient.¹ However, the more I study pastoral nomads the more I come to the conclusion that not only their economic and sociopolitical but also their ideological and cultural dependence on non-pastoralists was quite significant, because nomadic societies never were, nor could they be, closed systems by any of their major parameters. Therefore, just as the pastoral nomadic economy had to be supplemented with agriculture and crafts, so too did nomadic cultures need sedentary cultures as a source, a component, and a model for comparison, borrowing, imitation, or rejection. The sedentaries might be conceived by the nomads as the ‘others’, but their cultural contribution to their nomadic counterparts should not be underestimated. Historical sources and numerous archaeological data demonstrate beyond doubt that a substantial part of their material culture (clothes, utensils, even arms, and, of course, luxury items) was procured by the nomads from the sedentaries. Even ideological opposition was never complete. Suffice it to observe that nomads did not create any world religion, but made significant contributions to the dissemination of religions around the world.²

The picture becomes much less clear and the difference of opinion much greater when one turns to the other side of the problem and asks the question: what impact have pastoral nomads had on the development of the sedentary world? The picture is far from clear even if we look only at cultural influences and borrowings. It can easily be established that in certain regions and in certain historical periods nomads contributed to the cultures of their sedentary counterparts. The most obvious examples that come to mind are horseback riding and mounted warfare. The development of military arts and arms in Central Asia, Iran, and some other Middle Eastern countries, in late ancient and early medieval Europe, as well as in India, China and some other regions, was certainly influenced by their interrelations with different nomadic peoples, including direct military confrontation. Medieval European knights might be descendants, if not direct then collateral, of the ancient heavily armed cataphract cavalry that had originated in the Eurasian steppes.

Still, a certain caution is desirable even with regard to specific artefacts like the composite bow, armour, sabre, or stirrup. Not infrequently their invention is attributed to nomads, even when such claims lack definite proof. In several cases we can be sure, at the moment, of nothing more than that their origin was connected with cavalry. For example, the archaeological data indicate that, in the sixth century AD the Turks had invented a new type of saddle with iron stirrups that soon afterward spread across Eurasia. But the earliest iron stirrups, dating to the end of the third century AD or the beginning of the fourth century AD, were discovered not in the Altai Mountains but in the tombs of North Korea and adjacent regions of Manchuria. It now seems, therefore, that the Turkic nomads did not invent iron stirrups; they just borrowed them and contributed to their further development and dissemination.

It is not my intention to deny that nomads influenced the cultures of their sedentary counterparts. Nomadic arms, ornaments, and modes of fashion were often imitated in sedentary countries. Thus, in the seventh and eighth centuries Turkic decorated belts spread from Iraq to China. In the Tang period, Chinese dress styles were strongly influenced by those of the nomads. The Egyptian mamluks, while fighting the Mongols, wore Mongol accoutrements and let their hair flow loose in the Mongol style.³ In Europe, the Russian, Hungarian and Polish aristocracies imitated the dress and hairstyle of the nomads. However, not infrequently the most brilliant and impressive inventions and displays of nomadic cultures were at least stimulated by their contacts with the sedentaries.

To provide some examples, I can refer to the famous but in many respects still enigmatic ‘animal style,’ the ornamental art with prevailing zoomorphic designs that in ancient times had been popular in Eurasia, from the territory of modern Hungary to China. The semantics of this style were apparently fairly complicated, being related to the nomads’ aesthetic concepts, religious beliefs, and their system of values. In all, the animal style was a reflection of their worldview. However, this worldview had originally been expressed in the form of plastic arts under the influence of the art of sedentary countries and perhaps even with the help of their artisans. These artisans also played an active part in the further evolution of the animal style. They not only made decorations ordered by their nomadic customers and in accordance with nomadic traditions and tastes; they even introduced new motifs, which were often promptly accepted by the nomads.⁴

Another example is the Turkic runic alphabet, quite remarkable because it was used for five or six centuries and was spread from Mongolia to Hungary. For a long time the origin of this alphabet remained a mystery. There was even an opinion that it had been invented by the Turks themselves. However, recent studies have shed light on the issue. The alphabet turned out to be the result of an adaptation of the Sogdian letters to Turkic phonetics that was most probably carried out by Sogdian scholars.⁵ Still, the nomads played a very important role as middlemen in various kinds of cultural exchange between different sedentary societies. Their contribution to transcontinental circulation and transmission of cultural and technological artefacts and innovations, of ideas and concepts, and even of religions is very significant. In this respect, the multiethnic and multicultural empires created by the nomads had some positive effects.

In the ethno-linguistic history of the Old World the impact of pastoralists and pastoral nomads is hard to overestimate. I will not dwell on the spread of Indo-European languages because it is still unclear whether the first Indo-Europeans were pastoralists or incipient agriculturalists. However, the spread of Semitic languages, of the languages that belong to the Iranian branch of the Indo-European linguistic family, and of many Altaic languages, especially the Turkic ones, was certainly connected with the migrations, conquests and/or political dominance of the pastoralists and nomads.⁶

The enormous role played by the nomads in the political history of Eurasia, and even of Africa, also does not need any re-emphasis. The only comment that I would like to make in this respect is that many nomadic conquests were not a cause but rather a consequence of the weakness and disintegration of sedentary states. Such conquests often resulted in radical border changes, or even in the destruction of some states and empires and in the emergence of new ones. Changes like this, however, are most noticeable in the short- and middle-term historical range. Far from always did the conquests irreversibly alter the political configurations of entire historical regions. It is true that the Seljuq victory over Byzantium at Manzikert in 1071 eventually brought Anatolia into a quite different political constellation. But it is also true that when the dust of the Mongol conquest settled the main historical regions that had preceded it (China, India, Central Asia, Iran, Turkic Anatolia, and the Russian lands) resurfaced once again. However, the important question remains: to what extent did the nomadic conquests alter the overall order and basic socio-political structures of conquered sedentary countries and regions?

Nomadic conquests were accompanied by dynastic changes and by more or less serious changes in the ethnic and social composition of the newly emerging conquest states, especially of their upper strata. But, more often than not even the turnover of ruling elites was not complete, and a certain institutional continuity can be traced in many cases. It was much easier for victorious nomads to replace ‘people of the sword,’ the military estate, than ‘people of the pen,’ the bureaucracy. A series of conquests destroyed the dihqāns, the traditional land-owning aristocracy in Iran and Central Asia that also had important military functions.⁷ Their elimination was so complete that the very meaning of the word ‘dihqān’ in Central Asia underwent a serious change. Instead of aristocracy it began to be applied to peasantry, and nowadays, with the repeasantization of former kolkhozniks in such countries as Uzbekistan, the latter more and more often are again being called dihqāns. But neither the Seljuqs nor the Qarakhanids who struck the final blow to the dihqān aristocracy, or other conquerors for that matter, ever considered the encroachment upon the privileges of another group of Muslim society: the religious nobility, the ulama and the Sufi shaykhs.

Likewise, in China, the literati officials survived all nomadic conquests. The alien dynasties sooner or later discovered that the bureaucracy was indispensable and that to be able to rule the country they had to rely upon its assistance. The old and much-quoted aphorism of the ancient Chinese orator, Lu Tsia, taught to the Great Khan Ögödei by his Chinese counsellor, Yehlu Ch'uts’ai, was very indicative indeed: ‘Although you inherited the Chinese Empire on horseback, you cannot rule it from that position.’ Even the Mongols in China eventually had to revive the old Confucian examination system. It seems that with regard to political structures and institutions the change caused by nomadic conquests was often less drastic than it has sometimes been assumed. Such figures as Nizam al-Mulk, Rashid al-Din, Yehlu Ch'uts’ai, or Andalusian secretaries of the Almoravids, exemplify the limitations faced by the new rulers who had to adopt or adjust to the administrative models that had existed in conquered states.

The problem of innovations in the conquest states is as important as a certain continuation of political tradition and practice. One may ask whether victorious nomads introduced new institutions in conquered countries and what happened to these institutions in the long run. It is also important to inquire whether a fusion of nomadic institutions with the sedentary ones took place in such cases. Whatever one may think about the nomads, they had their own political culture. Their sedentary contemporaries might consider them barbarians, but they were rather sophisticated barbarians. To illustrate this I may refer to several concepts and institutions that for many centuries have been widespread in the Eurasian steppes. There was the notion of charisma and the divine mandate to rule bestowed upon a chosen clan.⁸ There were specific models of rule (including dual kingship), imperial titles, and imperial symbolism.⁹ There was the notion of collective or joint sovereignty, according to which a state and its populace belong not to an individual ruler but to all members of a ruling clan or family as corporate property, and a corresponding appanage system. There were specific succession patterns based on different variations of the collateral or scaled rotating system and seniority within a ruling clan. With these we meet a patrimonial mode of governance which implied a redistribution of various kinds of wealth among...

Table of contents

• Fornt Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• CONTENTS
• Preface
• Notes on Contributors
• 1 Nomads in the History of the Sedentary World
• 2 Nomads in the Sedentary World: The Case of Pre-Chinggisid Rus’ and Georgia
• 3 The Khazar Qaghanate and Its Impact on the Early Rus’ State: The Translatio Imperii from Ītil to Kiev
• 4 Cuman Integration in Hungary
• 5 The Influence of Pastoral Nomad Populations on the Economy and Society of Post-Safavid Iran
• 6 Turko-Mongolian Nomads and the Iqtä‘ System in the Islamic Middle East (ca. 1000-1400 AD)
• 7 Sharing out the Empire: Apportioned Lands under the Mongols
• 8 Nomads in the Tangut State of Hsi-Hsia (982-1227 AD)
• 9 India and the Turko-Mongol Frontier
• 10 Steppe Empires, China and the Silk Route: Nomads as a Force in International Trade and Politics
• 11 The Nomadic Factor in Africa: Dominance or Marginality
• 12 Conclusion