Shepherd

== Origins ==
[[File:Paridera Cueva del Río Piedra.jpg|thumb|Middle Age livestock shelter or [[paridera]] in a natural cave in Piedra River in the monk's old path from the monastery to the roe deer salt ponds, Aragon, Spain]]

Shepherding is among the oldest occupations, beginning some 5,000 years ago in [[Asia Minor]]. Sheep were kept for their [[milk]], [[sheep meat|meat]] and especially their [[wool]]. Over the next thousand years, sheep and shepherding spread throughout [[Eurasia]]. [[Henri Fleisch]] tentatively suggested the [[Shepherd Neolithic]] [[industry (archaeology)|industry]] of [[Lebanon]] may date to the [[Epipaleolithic]] and that it may have been used by one of the first cultures of [[nomadic pastoralism|nomadic shepherds]] in the [[Beqaa Valley]].<ref name="CopelandWescombe1966">{{Cite book |last1=Copeland |first1=L. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qhPRQwAACAAJ |title=Inventory of Stone-Age Sites in Lebanon: North, South and East-Central Lebanon, p. 49 |last2=Wescombe |first2=P. |publisher=Impr. Catholique |year=1966 |access-date=29 August 2011}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Fleisch |first=Henri |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/27916138 |title=Notes de Préhistoire Libanaise : 1) Ard es Saoude. 2) La Bekaa Nord. 3) Un polissoir en plein air. BSPF |year=1966 |volume=63|jstor=27916138 }}</ref>

Some sheep were integrated in the family farm along with other animals such as [[chicken]]s and pigs. To maintain a large flock, the sheep must be able to move from pasture to another pasture.  This required the development of an occupation separate from that of the farmer. The duty of shepherds was to keep their flock intact, protect it from predators and guide it to market areas in time for [[Sheep shearing|shearing]]. In ancient times, shepherds also commonly milked their sheep, and made [[cheese]] from this milk; few shepherds still do this today.{{cn|date=September 2018}}

[[File:Iraqi Shepherd.tif|thumb|A [[Kurdish people|Kurdish]] shepherd, 1958]]
In many societies, shepherds were an important part of the economy. Unlike farmers, shepherds were often wage earners, being paid to watch the sheep of others. Shepherds also lived apart from society, being largely nomadic. It was mainly a job of solitary males without children, and new shepherds thus needed to be recruited externally.  Shepherds were most often the younger sons of farming peasants who did not inherit any land. In other societies, each family would have a family member to shepherd its flock, often a child, youth or an elder who couldn't help much with harder work; these shepherds were fully integrated in society.{{cn|date=September 2018}}

Shepherds would normally work in groups either looking after one large flock, or each bringing their own and merging their responsibilities. They would live in small cabins, often shared with their sheep, and would buy food from local communities. Less often shepherds lived in covered wagons that traveled with their flocks.{{cn|date=September 2018}}

Shepherding developed only in certain areas. In the lowlands and river valleys, it was far more efficient to grow grain and cereals than to allow sheep to graze, thus the raising of sheep was confined to rugged and mountainous areas. In pre-modern times shepherding was thus centered on regions such as the Middle East, Greece, the [[Pyrenees]], the [[Carpathian Mountains]], Scotland and Northern England.{{cn|date=September 2018}}