WW Part 3
Chapters 9, 11, 12

Picking up where I left off at the last post, it is important to note here as well the importance the women played in the nomadic lifestyles of the pastoral societies. The book mentions, more times then one, how both men and women played very equal parts in every day life. How women could ride horses, tend to animals, take care of home life just as well as men and what stuck out to me was the quote from Han Kuan, a Chinese Confucian, " made no distinction between men and women."
Something that stood out to me as well was the differences in the pastoral peoples and the agricultural people. While at first glance you may think that there is many similarities, it is not the case. Nomadic peoples often relied on agricultural societies for a variety of foods. Furthermore they also needed manufactured goods and "luxury items". Pastoral communities also tended to be smaller and lack the surplus of the agricultural societies. Pastoral societies began to turn into nomadic states through there impressive horseback riding and hunting skills. These "warrior like" skills allowed them to take over through " raiding, trading, or extortion through agricultural civilizations such as China, Persia, and Byzantium."
Nomadic civilizations were able to master the environment completely, inhabiting hostile desert and arid grasslands. They also invented such things as complex horse harnesses, amor, new types of swords, and saddles with iron stirrups just to name a few.