Transhumance

Transhumance is a type of pastoralism or nomadism, a seasonal movement of livestock between fixed summer and winter pastures. In montane regions (vertical transhumance), it implies movement between higher pastures in summer and lower valleys in winter. Herders have a permanent home, typically in valleys. Generally only the herds travel, with a certain number of people necessary to tend them, while the main population stays at the base. In contrast, movement in plains or plateaus (horizontal transhumance) is more susceptible to disruption by climatic, economic, or political change.

Traditional or fixed transhumance has occurred throughout the inhabited world, particularly Europe and western Asia. It is often important to pastoralist societies, as the dairy products of transhumance flocks and herds (milk, butter, yogurt and cheese) may form much of the diet of such populations. In many languages there are words for the higher summer pastures, and frequently these words have been used as place names: e.g. hafod in Wales, shieling in Scotland, or alp in Germany, Austria and German-speaking regions of Switzerland.

The word transhumance comes from French and derives from the Latin words trans "across" and humus "ground". Literally, it means crossing the land. Transhumance developed on every inhabited continent. Although there are substantial cultural and technological variations, the underlying practices for taking advantage of remote seasonal pastures are similar linguistically.

Khazanov categorizes nomadic forms of pastoralism into five groups as follows: "pure pastoral nomadism", "semi-nomadic pastoralism", "semi-sedentary pastoralism", "distant-pastures husbandry" and "seasonal transhumance". Eickelman does not make a distinction between transhumant pastoralism and seminomadism, but he clearly distinguishes between nomadic pastoralism and seminomadism.

There is evidence that transhumance was practised world-wide prior to recorded history: in Europe, isotope studies of livestock bones suggest that certain animals were moved seasonally.

The prevalence of various groups of Hill people around the world suggests that indigenous knowledge regarding transhumance must have developed and survived over generations to allow for the acquisition of sufficient skills to thrive in mountainous regions.^{[citation needed]} Most drovers are conversant with subsistence agriculture, pastoralism as well as forestry and frozen water and fast stream management.

In the Balkans, Albanians, Greek Sarakatsani, Eastern Romance (Romanians, Aromanians, Megleno-Romanians and Istro-Romanians) and Turkish Yörük peoples traditionally spent summer months in the mountains and returned to lower plains in the winter. When the area was part of the Austro-Hungary and Ottoman Empires, borders between Greece, Albania, Bulgaria and the former Yugoslavia were relatively unobstructed. In summer, some groups went as far north as the Balkan Mountains, and they would spend the winter on warmer plains in the vicinity of the Aegean Sea.

The Morlach or Karavlachs were a population of Eastern Romance shepherds ("ancestors" of the Istro-Romanians) who lived in the Dinaric Alps (western Balkans in modern use), constantly migrating in search of better pastures for their sheep flocks. But as national states appeared in the area of the former Ottoman Empire, new state borders were developed that divided the summer and winter habitats of many of the pastoral groups. These prevented easy movement across borders, particularly at times of war, which have been frequent.