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Pastoral Nomadism and Tribal Power

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

G. R. Garthwaite
G. R. Garthwaite*
Affiliation:
Dartmouth College
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Extract

The nomadic tribes of Iran have long attracted interest, yet despite many descriptive accounts there have been few critical studies of them. Major obstacles to analysis have been a romanticization of nomadism, a dichotomization that emphasizes the differences between nomadism and agriculture, and a disregard for the historical setting and change. Discussions have tended to obscure important economic and social relationships between nomadic and sedentary society, and within the tribal structure itself; moreover, it has often been assumed that an organic or deterministic, link between pastoralism and tribal political structures exists.

The Bakhtiyārī are commonly associated with the central Zagros mountains. It is assumed that this rugged area in turn necessitates transhumant movement of the Bakhtiyārī with their flocks of sheep and goats and a tribal organization to accomplish this end. Furthermore, this environment isolates and gives the tribe autonomy vis-a-vis the state.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 11 , Issue 1-4: State and Society in Iran , 1978, pp. 173 - 197
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1978

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References

Notes

1. Braidwood, Robert J. “The Earliest Village Communities of Southwestern Asian Reconsidered,” Atti del VI Congresso Internazionale delle Scienze Preistoriche a Protostoriche, Vol. I (Rome, 1962),p. 122.Google Scholar Meldgaard, Jørgen Mortensen, Peder and Thrane, Henrik Excavations at Tepe Guran,Luristan (Copenhagen, 1964), p. IIIGoogle Scholar, note 15. Flannery, Kent V. “The Ecology of Early Food Production in Mesopotamia,” Science, Vol. CXLVII, No. 3663 (12 March 1965) , p. 1255.Google Scholar

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6. Fasā'ī records:

In that year (1234) [1818], by mediation of Haji Mirza Reza Qoli Nava'i, vizier of Fars, the title “Ilkhāni” was bestowed upon Jānī Khan-e Qashqa'i, ilbegi of Fārs. His son Mohammad ‘Ali he appointed ilbegi. Up to that year nobody in Fārs had been called by the title “Ilkhāni.” The head of the tribes in Korasan used to be called “Ilkhāni.”

Fasa'i, Hasan History of Persia under Qajar Rule (Fārsnāma-ye Nāṣeri), trans, by Busse, Herbert (New York, 1972), p. 160.Google Scholar

7. al-Din Shah, Nasir “Farmān” (Tehran: Sha'bān 1284/December 1867).Google Scholar

8. Fasa'i, p. 399.

9. Jean-Pierre Digard, “De la necessite et des inconvenients, pour un Baxtyāri, d'etre Baxtyāri, Utilisation de l'espace et puvoir polititique chez des pasteurs nomade d'Iran” (forthcoming, Production pastorale et societe, Cambridge).

10. Lois Beck, personal communication.

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14. Layard, describing Muhammad Taqi Khan's wealth, writes:

His wealth, like that of other chiefs of these nomade [sic] tribes, consisted principally in flocks and herds; actual specie they very seldom possess, and the enormous sum that the Mo'tamid had represented to be in Mohammed Taki's possession was such a ridiculous exaggeration as a Persian alone could credit. Mohammed Taki's actual property might have consisted of 1500 buffaloes, 50 excellent Arab mares, some of which were valued at very high prices, and could have been sold for 500 tomans (250b) in Khuzistan; the same number of good Cha'b stallions, 500 broodmares, and 500 horses of Lur and mixed breeds, and about 10,000 sheep and goats. This I consider as having been about the whole amount of his property. Mohammed Taki, a despotic chief, had of course a certain power over the property of those who lived under his authority.

Layard, “A Description…,” p. 15. Possibly these totals constitute the property of his ṭāyafah/tīrah rather than his personal holdings. (Cf fn. 19 below.)

15. Barth writes:

… It is a characteristic feature of wealth in herds that its net productivity rate for the owner declines as the size of the herds increases. No effective means have been developed among the Basseri to protect the rights of the big herdowner--the less the flocks are under the owner's constant supervision, the more he will be cheated out of his profits while made to carry real or fictitious losses….

What is more, the capital asset itself, the flock, is…subject to unpredictable fluctuations and severe losses from natural causes, averaging as much as 50% in some years….

As a herd-owner's wealth grows, there are thus growing economic incentives for him to transfer a part of his capital to another form than wealth in herds….The typical pattern for wealthy nomads is therefore to convert a fraction of their wealth in flocks into landed property.

Barth, pp. 103-104. Hole reached similar conclusions and notes:

one seldom sees a rich nomad.

The reason is that the potential for increase of herds is subject to great variation as a result of environmental, pathological, and economic factors.

Frank Hole, “Ethnoarcheology of Nomadic Pastoralism: A Case Study” (November 1975), p. 42.

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18. Stauffer, Thomas R. “The Qashqai Nomads: A Contemporary Appraisal,” The Harvard Review, Vol. I, No. 3 (Spring 1967), p. 33.Google Scholar Personal communication, Beck.

19. Mustaufi-yi Qazvini, Hamdallah Tārīkh-i Guzīdah, ed. by al-Husain Nava'i, ‘Abd (Tehran, 1339/1961), p. 540.Google Scholar

20. al-Din Shah, Nasir “Farman” (Tehran, Rabi’ al-Sani, 1279/September-October 1862) .Google Scholar

21. Safa'i, Ibrahim Asnād-i Bar Guzīdah as: Sipahsālār--Ẓill al-Sulṭān--Dabīr al-Mulk (Tehran, 1350), pp. 49-52.Google Scholar