CHAPTER XV

EARLY PASTURAGE PROBLEMS

The pasturage privileges of migrants in Mediterranean countries. Pasturage cus-
toms of mediaeval Castile. Commons. Enclosures. Deforestation. Sheep-walks.
Pastoral industry not a menace to agriculture and enclosures in the Middle Ages.

It will be recalled that wherever the migratory pastoral industry
appeared in the various regions about the Mediterranean, the
causes of its origin and continued development were almost
always certain topographic and climatic conditions which made
necessary the semiannual changes of pasturage.¹ It is significant
that the areas in which this industry became most conspicuous
and best organized, namely southern Italy and Castile, were
regions where large parts of the country were sparsely populated.
The presence of these unoccupied lands has been sometimes taken
as the explanation for the origin and long continued existence of
sheep migrations. Although the Punic wars in Italy, and the
conquests of the Moors and the devastations of the Black Death
in Spain laid waste extensive tracts which were soon occupied by
roving flocks,² the continued scarcity of population was as fre-
quently an effect as it was a cause of the migratory sheep industry.
The persistence of this form of pastoral life among the North
African tribes is explained, in part, by the presence of ample
unoccupied land and by the nomadic tribal customs; but equally
important in the encouragement of flock migrations has been the
character of Mussulman property law, which, unlike the Roman
law, gives,precedence to the possession and actual use of the
land over any claims by title.³ Large tracts of vacant land ad-
joining the camps and villages were not in constant use and
therefore reverted to the tribal government as commons, which
were utilized by herdsmen and husbandmen in turn on the basis
either of formal agreements or of mutual convenience.⁴

ɪ See above, p. 8.

* Antonio Ponz, Viage de Espana (2d ed., Madrid, 1784), viii, pp. 190 ff.

^, Augustin Bernard and N. Lacroix, Nomadisme en Alglrie, pp. 31 S.

⁴ Ibid., p. 52.

‘97

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