Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to analyze the origins of specialized nomadic pastoralism in the Ordos and its neighboring areas.  In this case both archaeological materials and historical literature allow us to explore this problem with respect not only to ecological and technical changes, but also social and ethnic constraints.
During the period 5000-2000 B.C., this area was occupied by a mixed-farming population.  Their artifacts are similar to those of Yang-shao and Lung-shan farmers in the south, except for a large amount of microlithic tools and animal bones which might represent optional subsistence dependent on animal products.  After 2000 B.C.  most of the late neolithic settlements were abandoned due to dry climate.  Nomadic pastoralism failed to occur at this time probably because the horse, the key animal for steppe nomadism, had not yet been introduced to this area.
However, even though the domesticated horse was introduced to North China by about 1400 B.C., from the Shang to the Western Chou horses were used by northern peoples mainly in warfare, and specialized nomadic pastoralism did not occur. Nevertheless, even though all these ecological and technical situations favored the emergence of nomadic pastoralism, it was the social and ethnic constraints - the competition for agricultural resources along the northern edge of the Central Plains, the formation of the Hua-hsia ethnos for protecting agricultural resources, and the building of the Great Wall by the Hua-hsia states - that finally stimulated the re-occupation of the Ordos by pastoral nomads by about 500 B.C.