The Lifeboat News
[ Message Archive | The Lifeboat News ]

    pastoralism Archived Message

    Posted by Ian M on January 16, 2020, 3:09 pm, in reply to "Hope you've read this, K. Good stuff. Ta. NOM"

    Forget where I was reading it, but I heard an argument that key aspects of capitalism were already in place under pastoralism, especially the notion of mobile wealth. See the word 'cattle' for example, use of which goes back at least as far as ancient Rome:

    'cattle (n.)

    mid-13c., "property" of any kind, including money, land, income; from Anglo-French catel "property" (Old North French catel, Old French chatel), from Medieval Latin capitale "property, stock," noun use of neuter of Latin adjective capitalis "principal, chief," literally "of the head," from caput (genitive capitis) "head" (from PIE root *kaput- "head"). Compare sense development of fee, pecuniary.

    in later Middle English especially "movable property, livestock" (early 14c.), including horses, sheep, asses, etc.; it began to be limited to "cows and bulls" from late 16c.'     - https://www.etymonline.com/word/cattle#etymonline_v_5503

    'Cattle did not originate as the term for bovine animals. It was borrowed from Anglo-Norman catel, itself from medieval Latin capitale 'principal sum of money, capital', itself derived in turn from Latin caput 'head'. Cattle originally meant movable personal property, especially livestock of any kind, as opposed to real property (the land, which also included wild or small free-roaming animals such as chickens—they were sold as part of the land).[11] The word is a variant of chattel (a unit of personal property) and closely related to capital in the economic sense.[12] The term replaced earlier Old English feoh 'cattle, property', which survives today as fee (cf. German: Vieh, Dutch: vee, Gothic: faihu).

    The word "cow" came via Anglo-Saxon cū (plural cȳ, from Common Indo-European gʷōus (genitive gʷowés) = "a bovine animal", compare Persian: gâv, Sanskrit: go-, Welsh: buwch.[13] The plural cȳ became ki or kie in Middle English, and an additional plural ending was often added, giving kine, kien, but also kies, kuin and others. This is the origin of the now archaic English plural, "kine". The Scots language singular is coo or cou, and the plural is "kye".

    In older English sources such as the King James Version of the Bible, "cattle" refers to livestock, as opposed to "deer" which refers to wildlife. "Wild cattle" may refer to feral cattle or to undomesticated species of the genus Bos. Today, when used without any other qualifier, the modern meaning of "cattle" is usually restricted to domesticated bovines.[14] '     - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cattle#Etymology

    For earlier examples of 'capital-ism', ie: the use of technology to increase production and centralisation of surplus, probably all the innovations in arable farming or forestry (think ploughs, axes etc) would count under those definitions. This shit goes way back...

    cheers,
    I

    Message Thread: