Humans interacting with Humans- Nomadic and Sedentary Societies and Interregional

Contacts

Professor Pacas

Establishing Inter-regional and social contacts

• What are some events that lead to contact between civilizations and their respective societies?

• Trade• Migration• Invasion• Wars and/or mercenary activities• Religious missionary activities• Exploration

What are some prerequisites to maintain a nomadic society?

Good grazing area over vast tracks of land to minimize clash between other nomads or sedentary civilizations

Mobility, strong and fast military ability for military to supply their arsenal from

easily acquired and worked resources.

Nomadic Societies

We suffer from a lack of better understanding of the diverse ‘pastoralist’ societies that lived along side early sedentary societies because the material culture of nomadic societies have traditionally been difficult to acquire.

• It is only by comparing older steppe cultures to later nomadic steppe cultures, whose material culture we have recovered, that we can get a glimpse of what early nomadic societies were like.

What are some of the prerequisites needed to establish a sedentary society/ civilization?

• A geographically strategic area with good agricultural lands.

• able to sustain a ‘large’ population • good source of water to support agriculture• basic needs and contact with other

communities.

Classical scholarship has deduced that the domestication of plant and animals plus a benign geographical location that facilitated the domestication of animals and cultivation of plants were exploited by these communities.

Realizing the efficacy of cultivating their own food supply led to the abandonment of nomadic hunter-gatherer societies and the adoption of a settlement.

What socio-cultural revolutions stem from the adoption of sedentary life style?

Labor division individual or collective ownership of land different complex political organization cultural norms or laws to regulate the

behavior within the community change in the religious practices of the

community perhaps to a cult tied to agricultural needs to name a few.

Labor Division

The need of the community to cultivate crops changed the basic division of labor existing in nomadic society where usually men were the hunters and women the gatherers into more complex and varied roles for different genders, ages and social groups.

It might not be too far fetch to assume that an early form of government bureaucracy emerged early on in this period.

Men and women probably still were expected to fill distinct gender roles but now they might both be tied to cultivation of crops.

Individual or Collective Ownership of Land

• Perhaps having a huge impact in cultural perceptions was the belief of ownership, whether individualistic or collective, of land.

• People now might believe that the settlement of a specified territory allowed them to have claim to that specific territory.

This belief would also give rise to a military complex in that the community was expected to defend the possession of land and defend it against incursions.

Most likely men, who already in hunter-gatherer communities began to enjoy a position of importance due to ability to provide ‘animal fat’ and important component in early modern humans’ diet, would assume this protective role as they were physically stronger than their female peers.

Patriarchy

The shift of the community to the dependence on the male to provide protection, is probably at the heart of males gaining dominance in the society that faced constant threat of incursions, and might lead to what could be termed a patriarchal society.

It is important to note though that this position that is arguably of privilege comes at a high price.

Collective society demanding that men lay their lives on the line for the protection of the collective community i.e. protection for both men and women.

Unfortunately much politicized scholarship seems to wrongfully accuse early societies as being violent patriarchies, anti-female or affirming the disposability of women in exchange for nurturing men.

This is missing the point and misconstruing these societies.

Since these societies were dependent on men to provide the military force to protect the community and since food was scarce only the most necessary components of the society could afford to be fed.

In a way that both men and women were disposable. Just that males at a much later age than the females.

• These societies depended on the preservation of land or the acquisition of land through military invasion.

• The quintessential role of the male warrior was required to preserve or expand the territory for the benefit of the entire society/civilization.

• This male dominance might also be reflected in the religion as the head of the pantheon in polytheistic or the god head in monotheistic societies would be represented as a male figure(s)

• More common in later centuries BCE and CE.

• In some sedentary societies that did not experience mass invasions or did not suffer from having limited resources- it was possible that the society might be matriarchal.

• It is believed that Minoan society was such a Matriarchical society in ancient Crete.

• Question: So what can be discerned about gender roles and gender relations from these particular aspects?

• What influences will dictate the relations between men and women in a ‘given’ society?

Complex Political Organization The need to organize militarily, agriculturally and ensure a

degree of coexistence within the community most likely led to the organization of complex political bureaucracy.

Leaders- be they kings, chieftains, village elders, or high priests would need a system that would ensure the smooth running of society.

How this was organized is guess work as these early civilizations did not employ writing to record government transactions.

The fact that they cultivated large territory, some degree of governance would be required.

Culture and cultural norms

The same can be said about cultural norms and laws for the community to ensure some degree of peaceful coexistence between all the members.

Plus the regulation of labor and military service would lend itself to allow us to deduce the existence of complex laws and governmental bureaucracy.