Abstract
Abstract For Indigenous Soyot herder-hunters of the Eastern Sayan Mountains in western Buryatia, maintaining a sustainable multispecies encampment is a matter of pacing the individual rhythms of the species belonging to it. Domestication in this context is not a matter of human control but of attuning and influencing life rhythms in other beings. Formerly divided into yak and reindeer herding groups, contemporary Soyots no longer rely on reindeer today. Meanwhile, their Tofa neighbours continue to use trained reindeer in their hunting. This paper explores possible reasons for the gradual abandonment of Soyot reindeer herding in the mid nineteenth century, drawing on irreconcilable rhythms. Four regional strategies for coping with divergent species’ rhythms are explored: abandonment of a species in a rangifer-cattle context; alignment of yak and Mongolian cattle reproductive rhythms for hybrid production; juxtaposition of equine and rangifer rhythms; and inversion of cattle and fish migratory routes. The article concludes with a new theory to help address rhythmical multispecies togetherness in the Eastern Sayan Mountains.
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