Patterns of Mobility in the Negev over the Long Term

In the long transition from hunting-gathering to nomadic pastoralism, patterns of mobility in the Negev evolved concomitantly. Although often implicitly perceived as a single-phase transformation, the development of mobile pastoralism was a millennia-long process effecting cumulative changes in desert societies across the full spectrum of social structures and functions. Patterns of mobility became increasingly complex, reflecting the diverse factors driving the social changes. If the baseline hunter-gatherer mobility systems of the early Neolithic derived primarily from ecological factors, that is, seasonal availability of resources in different areas, the integration of domestic flocks into the desert system required ecological and especially social adjustments, entailing changes in the factors behind, and the structures of, mobility. With the evolution of pastoral societies in the desert, other forms of mobility evolved as well, they too reflecting the richness of the historical record among so-called peripheral peoples.