THE CAMBRIDGE MEDIEVAL HISTORY I 182

Family Life Among the Nomads

12-10. Family Life Among the Nomads

We see that from the earliest times the Altaian nomad has lived by animal-rearing, and in a subsidiary degree by hunting and fishing, and here and there by a very scanty agriculture. As among some hordes, especially the old Magyars, fishing and hunting are made much of, many believe that they were originally a hunting and fishing folk, and took to cattle-rearing later. This is an impossibility. The Magyars, just as were the others, were pure nomads even during winter, otherwise their herds would have perished. Hunting and fishing they pursued only as stopgaps when milk failed. A fishing and hunting people. cannot so easily become mounted nomads, and least of all organised in such a terribly warlike way as were the Magyars.

The innate voracity of the Turko-Tartars is the consequence of the climate. The Bedouin in the latitude of 20° to 32°, at a mean temperature of 86° F., can easily be more abstinent and moderate with his single meal a day (meat, dates, truffles) than the Altaian in the freezing cold, between the latitudes of 38° and 58°, with his three copious meals. The variable climate and its consequences — hunger in winter, superfluity in summer — have so hardened the Altaian that he can without difficulty hold out for days without water, and for weeks (in a known case forty-two days) in a snowstorm without any food; but he can also consume a six-months'old wether at one sitting, and is ready to repeat the dose straight off!

Originally the Altaian clothed himself in skins, leather, and felt, and not till later in vegetable-stuffs acquired by barter, tribute, or plunder. Today the outer coat of the Kazak-Kirghiz is still made of the shining skin of a foal with the tail left on for ornament. The Tsaidan-Mongols wear next their bare skin a felt gown, with the addition of a skin in winter only, and leather breeches. All Central Asiatics wear the high spherical sheep-skin cap (also used as a pillow), the tshapan (similar to a dressing-gown and consisting of fur or felt in winter), leather boots, or felt stockings bound round with rags. Among many tribes the hair of the men is worn long or shaved off entirely. Herodotus tells of a snub-nosed, shaven-headed people in the lower Ural, and the Magyars, Cumans, and others were shorn bare, but for two pigtails.

The wife occupies a very dependent position. On her shoulders falls the entire work of the household, the very manifold needs of which are to be satisfied almost entirely by home industry. She must take down the tent, pack it up, load it on camels, and pitch it; she must prepare leather, felt, leather-bottles, cords, waterproof material, and colours from various plants; she must spin and weave wool and hair; she must make clothes, collect cameland cattle-dung, knead it with dust into tough paste, and form and dry it into cakes; she must saddle and bridle horses and camels, milk the sheep, prepare kumiz, kurut, and airan, and graze the herds of sheep in the night — for the husband does this only by day, and in addition only milks the mares; his remaining occupation is almost entirely war and plundering. To share the domestic work would be for an Altaian paterfamilias an unheard-of humiliation.

Originally the choice of a wife was as unrestricted among all the Altaians as among the Mongols, who, according to Piano Carpini and Marco Polo, might marry any relative and non-relative except their own mothers and daughters, and sisters by their own mothers.

But today several nomad peoples are strictly exogamic. The bride was chosen by the father, when still in her childhood; her price (kalym) was twenty-seven to a hundred mares, and her dowry had roughly the same value. Polygamy was consequently only possible among tribes rich in herds, but it was a necessity, as one wife alone could not accomplish the many duties. Virgin purity and conjugal fidelity are among the Turko-Tartars, and especially among the Kirghiz, somewhat rare virtues; on the other hand, Marco Polo agrees with Radloff in praising the absolute fidelity of the Mongol women.

The upbringing of the children entails the extreme of hardening. During its first six weeks the newborn child is bathed daily, summer and winter alike, in the open air; thenceforward the nomad never washes, his whole life long. The Kalmuck in particular is absolutely shy of water. Almost to puberty the children go naked summer and winter; only on the march do they wear a light khalat and fur-cap.

They are suckled at the breast to their fifth year. At three or four they already sit free with their mother on horseback, and a six-year-old girl rides like a sportsman. The education of the boys is limited to riding; at the most falconry in addition. On the other hand, the girls are put to most exhausting work from their tenderest years, and the value of a bride is decided by the work she can discharge. Among nearly all Altaian peoples the son thinks little of his mother, but towards his father he is submissive.

Hereditary right is purely agnatic. As soon as the married son is able to look after himself, he is no longer under the authority of his father, and if he likes he can demand as inheritance a part of the herds adequate to establishing a separate household. Then however he is entirely settled with, and he cannot inherit further on the death of his father when there are younger sons — his brothers — still unportioned.

If impoverished the father has the right to take back from his apportioned sons every fifth animal from the herds (kalmucks). The daughters are never entitled to inherit, and on marrying receive merely a suitable dowry from their brothers, who then receive the kalym. If only daughters survive, the inheritance goes to the father's brothers or cousins, who in that case receive the kalym as well.

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