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Imperial Itinerance and Mobile Pastoralism

Imperial Itinerance and Mobile Pastoralism Mobility in pastoral societies has often been treated as either a necessity for efficient pastoral production or else as a method of avoiding state power. Yet both the examples of itinerance in medieval Europe and the attested itineraries of medieval Inner Asian rulers suggest that power projection, not power avoidance, was a key component of Turco-Mongolian imperial mobility. By using new historico-geographical evidence, the itineraries of several pre-Chinggisid and Mongol empire figures—Ong Qa’an, Batu, Ögedei, and Möngke—may be mapped. The results show that imperial itinerance must be distinguished from pastoral mobility. They also show that movement in vast agglomerations of mob-grazing herds was not just a temporary response to military crisis but continued long into the peacetime of the Mongol empire. These results challenge a functionalist understanding of mobility and state structures in Inner Asia. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Inner Asia Brill

Imperial Itinerance and Mobile Pastoralism

Atwood, Christopher P.
Inner Asia , Volume 17 (2): 293 – Dec 9, 2015
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Publisher
Brill
Copyright
© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
Subject
Special Section
ISSN
1464-8172
eISSN
2210-5018
DOI
10.1163/22105018-12340046
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Mobility in pastoral societies has often been treated as either a necessity for efficient pastoral production or else as a method of avoiding state power. Yet both the examples of itinerance in medieval Europe and the attested itineraries of medieval Inner Asian rulers suggest that power projection, not power avoidance, was a key component of Turco-Mongolian imperial mobility. By using new historico-geographical evidence, the itineraries of several pre-Chinggisid and Mongol empire figures—Ong Qa’an, Batu, Ögedei, and Möngke—may be mapped. The results show that imperial itinerance must be distinguished from pastoral mobility. They also show that movement in vast agglomerations of mob-grazing herds was not just a temporary response to military crisis but continued long into the peacetime of the Mongol empire. These results challenge a functionalist understanding of mobility and state structures in Inner Asia.

Journal

Inner Asia – Brill

Published: Dec 9, 2015

Keywords: Batu; ger; itinerance; Kereyid; mob grazing; mobile pastoralism; Möngke; Mongol empire; Ögedei; Ong Qa’an; pastoral nomadism; yurt

References

  • Vliianie perekhoda k osedlomu obrazu zhizni na preobrazovanie sotsial’nogo stroia, semeinobytovogo uklada i kul’tury prezhnikh kochevnikov i polukochevnikov (na primere Kazakhov i Kirgizov) (Influence of the switch to settled forms of life in the transformation of social structure, mode of family life, and culture of the former nomads and semi-nomads (in particular the Kazakhs and Kirghiz))
    Abramzon S.M. Orazob A.