Editing Nomad (section)

{{Short description|Person without fixed habitat}}
{{Other uses}}
[[File:Encampment of Gypsies with Caravans.jpg|alt=|thumb|A painting by [[Vincent van Gogh]] depicting a caravan of nomadic [[Romani people|Roma]]]]
{{Economic anthropology}}
{{wiktionary | nomad}}
'''Nomads''' are communities without fixed habitation who regularly move to and from areas. Such groups include [[hunter-gatherer]]s, [[Nomadic pastoralism|pastoral nomads]] (owning [[livestock]]), [[tinker]]s and [[Merchant|trader]] nomads.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/NOMAD|title=NOMAD|via=The Free Dictionary|access-date=2022-12-10|archive-date=2022-12-10|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221210200206/https://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/NOMAD|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/nomadism|title=nomadism &#124; society &#124; Britannica|website=www.britannica.com|access-date=2018-07-09|archive-date=2021-05-05|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210505193646/https://www.britannica.com/topic/nomadism|url-status=live}}</ref> In the twentieth century, the population of nomadic pastoral tribes slowly decreased, reaching an estimated 30–40 million nomads in the world {{As of|1995|lc=y}}.<ref>{{cite journal|date= April 5, 1995|title= Nomads: At the Crossroads – The Facts|journal= [[New Internationalist]]|issue= 266|url= http://www.newint.org/features/1995/04/05/facts/|access-date= January 10, 2013|archive-date= April 28, 2021|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20210428075941/https://newint.org/features/1995/04/05/facts|url-status= live}}</ref>

Nomadic hunting and gathering—following seasonally available wild plants and game—is by far the oldest human subsistence method known.<ref>{{Cite web|url= https://explorable.com/subsistence|title= Subsistence|website= explorable.com|access-date= 2019-02-24|archive-date= 2021-04-26|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20210426194958/https://explorable.com/subsistence|url-status= live}}</ref> Pastoralists raise herds of domesticated livestock, driving or accompanying them in patterns that normally avoid depleting pastures beyond their ability to recover.<ref>{{Citation|last1=Homewood|first1=Katherine|title=Pastoralism, conservation and the overgrazing controversy|date=1988|work=Conservation in Africa|pages=111–128|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0521341998|last2=Rodgers|first2=W.A.|doi=10.1017/cbo9780511565335.009}}</ref> Nomadism is also a [[Lifestyle (sociology)|lifestyle]] adapted to infertile regions such as [[steppe]], [[tundra]], or [[desert|ice and sand]], where mobility is the most efficient strategy for exploiting scarce resources. For example, many groups living in the tundra are [[reindeer herders]] and are semi-nomadic, following forage for their animals.

Sometimes also described as "nomadic" are various [[vagrancy (people)|itinerant]] populations who move among densely populated areas to offer specialized services ([[craft]]s or [[trade]]s) to their residents—external [[consultant]]s, for example. These groups are known as "[[List of nomadic peoples#Peripatetic|peripatetic nomads]]".<ref>{{cite web|last= Teichmann|first= Michael|title= ROMBASE: Didactically edited information on Roma|url= http://romani.uni-graz.ac.at/rombase/cd/data/ethn/topics/data/nomadic.en.pdf|access-date=2014-04-20|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140421082300/http://romani.uni-graz.ac.at/rombase/cd/data/ethn/topics/data/nomadic.en.pdf|archive-date= 2014-04-21|url-status= dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last= Rao|first= Aparna|title= The concept of peripatetics: An introduction|date= 1987|publisher= Bohlau Verlag|location= Cologne|pages= 1–32|url= https://www.scribd.com/doc/209394957/Rao-1987-the-Concept-of-Peripatetics-an-Introduction|quote= [...] peripatetics, [...] endogamous nomads who are largely non-primary producers or extractors, and whose principal resources are constituted by other human populations [...].|access-date= 2017-09-10|archive-date= 2016-06-29|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160629141918/https://www.scribd.com/doc/209394957/Rao-1987-the-Concept-of-Peripatetics-an-Introduction|url-status= live}}</ref>