On the basis of a précis of available knowledge on traditional nomadic ways of life and livelihoods on the Tibetan Plateau this book presents an analysis of current conditions of livelihood security in pastoralist areas. The example of the remote Eastern Tibetan region of Yushu illustrates how nomadic societies in times of transition use the resources at their disposal for securing their livelihood. This predominantly rural district is an ecologically vulnerable and economically marginal highland region within China’s present-day Qinghai Province. In case studies that were surveyed with qualitative and quantitative methods, the basis for local livelihoods of pastoralist and agro-pastoralist households was assessed. In this context the extraordinary role of caterpillar fungus is elucidated – a resource that is virtually unknown in the Western World but which is of vital importance for Tibetan nomads in the plateau’s Eastern half. The study at hand discusses in which way resource-oriented operation schemes and exogenous factors interact, thus defining the extent of livelihood security, vulnerability and resilience of pastoral households, local groups and the super-ordinate society in this part of the Tibetan Plateau.

During the fourteenth century, the Bedouins (ʿarab) of Egypt experienced a significant increase in power. The Bedouins were the group with the largest military and political power in the Mamluk Empire, after the ruling Mamluks themselves. This study offers the first comprehensive overview on Bedouin groups in politics and society of Mamluk Egypt with a focus on the ambivalent relationship between Bedouin and Mamluk representatives. What characterised the Bedouins’ way of life during this period, how were they perceived by the urban elites and how did the Bedouin-Mamluk-relationship change over time? These are the main questions this study deals with. In doing so, it focuses on the symbolic communication between Mamluks and Bedouins. It is shown that both groups used a common repertoire of rules, gestures and institutions that were essential to negotiating, shaping and adjusting their relations.

Beduinen machen Geschichte und gründen inmitten des Kulturlandes Kleinstaaten. Diese im islamischen Mittelalter einzigartige Sonderentwicklung des 10. Jahrhunderts hat zum Wort von der Beduinisierung des Fruchtbaren Halbmondes geführt. Kurt Franz legt eine kritische Gesamtdarstellung der Kräfteverhältnisse zwischen den Nomaden und Sesshaften jener Zeit vor. Er nähert sich dem beduinischen Blickwinkel an und zeigt das Nebeneinander von territorial-institutionellen und mobil-beuteorientierten Expansionsstrategien. Dabei wird die Auffassung vertreten, dass die Schutzherrschaft der Beduinenemire ein neues Modell indigener Herrschaft bildete, welches als regionale Alternative zur Herrschaft von Militärsklaven hätte dienen können.

When a pre-modern author writes about nomads, his writing is immediately suspected of being soaked with literary formulae. This suspicion, which is no doubt justified, is for the historian linked to the question: what kind of reality can be seen behind, or better: through such formulae. This is the guiding question behind the contributions of this volume, which, on the basis of case studies, seeks to analyse the various „images of nomads“ in their respective historical and discursive contexts.

Die vorliegende Studie untersucht Aspekte der Archäologie und Geschichte der ‚Alttürkenzeit’ in Zentralasien (ca. Mitte des 6. bis Mitte des 8. Jahrhunderts). Im Fokus der Untersuchung stehen Wechselbeziehungen zwischen den Pastoralnomaden der politischen und kulturellen Sphäre den Türk-Nomaden und der sesshaften Bevölkerung der Oasen des Mawarannahr. Die Grundlage der Analyse bilden archäologische, literarische und epigraphische Quellen, die erstmals gleichberechtigt und im direkten Vergleich zu Wort kommen.

Pastoral Morocco explores the mobility of people and livestock in the context of neo-liberal globalization. Mobility is defined as a strategy to maintain and enhance access to resources, and hence comprehended as a strategy of pastoralists to cope with insecurity and new risks. Pastoral livelihoods in Morocco are, as the authors point out, increasingly shaped by processes unfolding outside the realm of animal production, for instance by dynamics of labor migration, changing property rights, and new means of communication. This volume examines local consequences of agro-pastoral restructuring. It investigates, for example, the invention of pastoral cooperatives, analyzes territorial changes triggered by urbanization and new spaces of enterprises, assesses the importance of cross border trade and sheep-commodity chains, scrutinizes the complexity and vulnerability of livelihood portfolios and it ultimately inquires the genealogy of conflicts over pastures. Pastoral Morocco draws on intensive empirical fieldwork and captures the regional diversities of the country. It is the first English language volume that combines Moroccan and European expertise about the changing world of mobility and insecurity that Moroccan pastoralists inhabit.

The book examines the relations between an economic phenomenon, pastoralism, and a social one, patrilineal descent-reckoning. These relations are described and analyzed on the basis of long-term fieldwork and through the investigation of the existing historical and ethnographic sources. By developing a historical anthropological approach, the book offers a new perspective on pastoralism in a region that has remained largely unexplored up to now. It is of interest for specialists of Central Asia as a cultural area, for anthropologists and historians as well as for all those who are willing to initiate themselves in the past and present of Kyrgyzstan.

Der erste Band dieser Reihe analysiert erstmals systematisch Stammeskonflikte aus dem 2. und 3. Jahrhundert der Hidschra. Dabei wird deutlich, dass der Wechsel von der Umaiyaden zu den ’Abbasiden für die Stämme ein weniger einschneidendes Ereignis war als bisher angenommen. Unter Hinzuziehung ethnologischer Forschungsergebnisse wird das Verhalten einzelner Clans und Stammesführer analysiert und insbesondere Eigeninteressen kleiner Stammeseinheiten beleuchtet. Zunehmend kommen hierdurch Zweifel an der praktischen Bedeutung übergeordneter Stammeskonföderationen auf. Die Studie stellt daher gängige Erklärungsmuster, die von einer polaren Spraltung der Stämme in Qais und Yaman ausgehen, auch für die Umaiyadenzeit in Frage.

The unique pastoralist economy, society, and culture on the Tibetan plateau has experienced profound changes during the 20th century: An ever closer integration into the Chinese state, a wide array of policies directed at ‘development’, modernization, and urbanization, and dramatic economic transformation. In its fifteen field-work based chapters, written by Tibetan, Han Chinese and Western scholars from the social and environmental sciences, this volume presents a selection of current perspectives on these recent transformations and explores their specific impact on local pastoral livelihoods.