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In cultural anthropology, sedentism (sometimes called sedentariness; compare sedentarism) is the practice of living in one place for a long time. , the large majority of people belong to sedentary cultures. In evolutionary anthropology and archaeology, ''sedentism'' takes on a slightly different sub-meaning, often applying to the transition from
nomadic A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the popu ...
society to a
lifestyle Lifestyle often refers to: * Lifestyle (sociology), the way a person lives * ''Otium'', ancient Roman concept of a lifestyle * Style of life (german: Lebensstil, link=no), dealing with the dynamics of personality Lifestyle may also refer to: Bu ...
that involves remaining in one place permanently. Essentially, sedentism means living in groups permanently in one place. The invention of agriculture led to sedentism in many cases, but the earliest sedentary settlements were pre-agricultural.


Initial requirements for permanent, non-agricultural settlements

For small-scale nomadic societies it can be difficult to adopt a sedentary lifestyle in a landscape without on-site agricultural or livestock breeding resources, since sedentism often requires sufficient year-round, easily accessible local natural resources. Non-agricultural sedentism requires good preservation and storage technologies, such as smoking, drying, and fermentation, as well as good containers such as pottery, baskets, or special pits in which to securely store food whilst making it available. It was only in locations where the resources of several major ecosystems overlapped that the earliest non-agricultural sedentism occurred. For example, people settled where a river met the sea, at
lagoon A lagoon is a shallow body of water separated from a larger body of water by a narrow landform, such as reefs, barrier islands, barrier peninsulas, or isthmuses. Lagoons are commonly divided into ''coastal lagoons'' (or ''barrier lagoons'') ...
environments along the coast, at river confluences, or where flat
savanna A savanna or savannah is a mixed woodland- grassland (i.e. grassy woodland) ecosystem characterised by the trees being sufficiently widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach the ground to ...
met hills, and mountains with rivers.


Criteria for the recognition of sedentism in archaeological studies

In archaeology a number of criteria must hold for the recognition of either semi or full sedentism. According to Israeli archaeologist Ofer Bar-Yosef, they are as follows: 1. Increasing presence of organisms that benefit from human sedentary activities, e.g. * House mice * Rats * Sparrows 2.
Cementum Cementum is a specialized calcified substance covering the root of a tooth. The cementum is the part of the periodontium that attaches the teeth to the alveolar bone by anchoring the periodontal ligament.Illustrated Dental Embryology, Histology, ...
increments on mammal teeth * Indications that hunting took place in both winter and summer 3. Energy expenditure * Leveling slopes * Building houses * Production of plaster * Transport of undressed stones * Digging of graves * Shaping of large
mortars Mortar may refer to: * Mortar (weapon), an indirect-fire infantry weapon * Mortar (masonry), a material used to fill the gaps between blocks and bind them together * Mortar and pestle, a tool pair used to crush or grind * Mortar, Bihar, a villag ...
In many mammals dark cementum is deposited during winter when food is scarce and light cementum is deposited in the summer when food is abundant, so the outermost cementum layer shows at which season the animal was killed. Thus if animals were killed the year around in some area it suggests that people were sedentary there.


Historical regions of sedentary settlements

The first sedentary sites were pre-agricultural, and they appeared during the
Upper Paleolithic The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...
in
Moravia Moravia ( , also , ; cs, Morava ; german: link=yes, Mähren ; pl, Morawy ; szl, Morawa; la, Moravia) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia. The m ...
and on the
East European Plain The East European Plain (also called the Russian Plain, "Extending from eastern Poland through the entire European Russia to the Ural Mountaina, the ''East European Plain'' encompasses all of the Baltic states and Belarus, nearly all of Ukraine, an ...
between c. 25000–17000 BC. In the
Levant The Levant () is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean region of Western Asia. In its narrowest sense, which is in use today in archaeology and other cultural contexts, it is ...
, the Natufian culture was the first to become sedentary at around 12000 BC. The Natufians were sedentary for more than 2000 years before they, at some sites, started to cultivate plants around 10000 BC. A year-round sedentary site, with its larger population, generates a substantial demand on locally provided natural resources, a demand that may have triggered the development of deliberate agriculture. The Jōmon culture in Japan, which was primarily a coastal culture, was sedentary from c. 12000 to 10000 BC, before the cultivation of rice at some sites in northern Kyushu. In northernmost
Scandinavia Scandinavia; Sámi languages: /. ( ) is a subregion in Northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. In English usage, ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, Norway, and Swe ...
, there are several early sedentary sites without evidence of agriculture or cattle breeding. They appeared from c. 5300–4500 BC and are all located optimally in the landscape for extraction of major ecosystem resources; for example, the Lillberget Stone Age village site (c. 3900 BC), the
Nyelv Nyelv ( sme, Ođđajohka) is a small village in Nesseby Municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The village is located along the southern coast of the Varangerfjorden, along the European route E06 highway. The statistical area Nyelv, wh ...
site (c. 5300 BC), and the
Lake Inari Lake Inari ( fi, Inarijärvi/Inarinjärvi, se, Anárjávri, smn, Aanaarjävri, sms, Aanarjäuʹrr, sv, Enare träsk, no, Enaresjøen) is the largest lake in Sápmi and the third-largest lake in Finland. It is located in the northern part of L ...
site (c. 4500 BC). In northern Sweden the earliest indication of agriculture occurs at previously sedentary sites, and one example is the Bjurselet site used during the period c. 2700–1700 BC, famous for its large caches of long distance traded flint axes from
Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of Denmark , establish ...
and
Scania Scania, also known by its native name of Skåne (, ), is the southernmost of the historical provinces (''landskap'') of Sweden. Located in the south tip of the geographical region of Götaland, the province is roughly conterminous with Skåne ...
(some 1300 km). The evidence of
small-scale agriculture A smallholding or smallholder is a small farm operating under a small-scale agriculture model. Definitions vary widely for what constitutes a smallholder or small-scale farm, including factors such as size, food production technique or technology ...
at that site can be seen from c. 2300 BC (burnt cereals of barley).


Historical effects of increased sedentism

Sedentism increased contacts and
trade Trade involves the transfer of goods and services from one person or entity to another, often in exchange for money. Economists refer to a system or network that allows trade as a market. An early form of trade, barter, saw the direct excha ...
, and the first
Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...
cereals and cattle in
Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...
, could have spread through a stepping stone process, where the productive gift (cereals, cattle, sheep and goats) were exchanged through a network of large pre-agricultural sedentary sites, rather than a wave of advance spread of people with agricultural economy, and where the smaller sites found in between the bigger sedentary ones did not get any of the new products. Not all contemporary sites during a certain period (after the first sedentism occurred at one site) were sedentary. Evaluation of habitational sites in northern Sweden indicates that less than 10 percent of all the sites around 4000 BC were sedentary. At the same time, only 0.5–1 percent of these represented villages with more than 3–4 houses. This means that the old nomadic or migratory life style continued in a parallel fashion for several thousand years, until somewhat more sites turned to sedentism, and gradually switched over to agricultural sedentism. The shift to sedentism is coupled with the adoption of new
subsistence A subsistence economy is an economy directed to basic subsistence (the provision of food, clothing, shelter) rather than to the market. Henceforth, "subsistence" is understood as supporting oneself at a minimum level. Often, the subsistence econo ...
strategies, specifically from
foraging Foraging is searching for wild food resources. It affects an animal's fitness because it plays an important role in an animal's ability to survive and reproduce. Foraging theory is a branch of behavioral ecology that studies the foraging behavi ...
(hunter-gatherer) to agricultural and
animal Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the Kingdom (biology), biological kingdom Animalia. With few exceptions, animals Heterotroph, consume organic material, Cellular respiration#Aerobic respiration, breathe oxygen, are Motilit ...
domestication Domestication is a sustained multi-generational relationship in which humans assume a significant degree of control over the reproduction and care of another group of organisms to secure a more predictable supply of resources from that group. ...
. The development of sedentism led to the rise of population aggregation and formation of
village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred ...
s,
cities A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...
, and other
community A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, ...
types. In North America, evidence for sedentism emerges around 4500 BC.


Forced sedentism

Forced sedentism or sedentarization occurs when a dominant group restricts the movements of a nomadic group.
Nomadic A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the popu ...
populations have undergone such a process since the first cultivation of land; the organization of modern society has imposed demands that have pushed aboriginal populations to adopt a fixed habitat. At the end of the 19th and throughout the 20th century many previously nomadic tribes turned to permanent settlement. It was a process initiated by local governments, and it was mainly a global trend forced by the changes in the attitude to the land and real property and also due to state policies that complicated border crossing. Among these nations are Negev Bedouin in
Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...
,
Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
and
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...
,
Bashkirs , native_name_lang = bak , flag = File:Bashkirs of Baymak rayon.jpg , flag_caption = Bashkirs of Baymak in traditional dress , image = , caption = , population = approx. 2 million , popplace ...
, Kyrgyz, Kazakhs,
Evenks The Evenks (also spelled Ewenki or Evenki based on their endonym )Autonym: (); russian: Эвенки (); (); formerly known as Tungus or Tunguz; mn, Хамниган () or Aiwenji () are a Tungusic people of North Asia. In Russia, the Eve ...
,
Evens The Evens ( eve, эвэн; pl. , in Even and , in Russian; formerly called ''Lamuts'') are a people in Siberia and the Russian Far East. They live in regions of the Magadan Oblast and Kamchatka Krai and northern parts of Sakha east of th ...
, Sakha in
Soviet Russia The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Russian SFSR or RSFSR ( rus, Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, Rossíyskaya Sovétskaya Federatívnaya Soci ...
, Tibetan nomads in China, Babongo in
Gabon Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the nort ...
, Baka in
Cameroon Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west-central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; the C ...
, Innu in
Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
,
Gypsies The Romani (also spelled Romany or Rromani , ), colloquially known as the Roma, are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group, traditionally nomadic itinerants. They live in Europe and Anatolia, and have diaspora populations located worldwide, with sign ...
in
Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...
and
Czechoslovakia , rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי, , common_name = Czechoslovakia , life_span = 1918–19391945–1992 , p1 = Austria-Hungary , image_p1 ...
, etc. As a result of forced sedentarization, many rich herdsmen in
Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive region, geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a ...
have been eliminated by deliberate overtaxation or imprisonment, year-round mobility has been discouraged, many smaller sites and family herd camps have been shut down, children have been separated from their parents and taken to boarding schools. This caused severe social, cultural and psychological issues to Indigenous peoples of Siberia.


See also

* Nacirema people *
Western culture Leonardo da Vinci's ''Vitruvian Man''. Based on the correlations of ideal Body proportions">human proportions with geometry described by the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius in Book III of his treatise ''De architectura''. image:Plato Pio-Cle ...
* Indian reservation * Negev Bedouin *
Nomad A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the po ...
*
Seasonal human migration Seasonal human migration is the movement of people from one place or another on a seasonal basis. It occurs most commonly due to seasonal shifts in demand for labor. It includes Migrations such as moving sheep or cattle to higher elevations duri ...
* Timeline of agriculture and food technology *
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 val ...


References


External links

* Emily A. Schultz, Robert H. Lavenda
The Consequences of Domestication and Sedentism
From a college textbook – Anthropology: A Perspective on the Human Condition Second Edition. pp 196–200 * Keith Weber, Shannon Horst. 2011
Desertification and livestock grazing: The roles of sedentarization, mobility and rest
* David Western, Rosemary Grooma, Jeffrey Worden. 2009
The impact of subdivision and sedentarization of pastoral lands on wildlife in an African savanna ecosystem
* Shuji Sueyoshi, Ryutaro Ohtsuka. 2007
LONG-LASTING EFFECTS OF SEDENTARIZATION-INDUCED INCREASE OF FERTILITY ON LABOR FORCE PROPORTION AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT IN AN ARAB : A CASE STUDY IN SOUTH JORDAN
* Fagan, Brian. 2005
''Ancient North America.''
Thames & Hudson, Ltd.: London. * Halén, Ove. 1994

Almkvist & Wiksell, Stockholm. * Sofer, Olga. 1981 ''Sedentism During the Paleolithic'' * Habu, Junku. 200

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press in the world. It is also the King's Printer. Cambridge University Pre ...
* , a short film presented by Israel Land Administration describing the challenges Bedouins face in their sedentarization in Israel's southern Negev region
Should Pastoralists be sedentarized?
Drylands Coordination Group {{Authority control Anthropology Archaeological theory Nomads