آیا سبک زندگی ییلاق-قشلاق یک ابداع ایرانی است؟

یکی از موضوعاتی که جالب است و جای تحقیق بیشتر دارد، روش زندگی ییلاق-قشلاق ایرانیان است، که نه تنها در مردمان کوچگرد سرزمینمان مشاهده می‌شود، بلکه مردمان روستانشین و شهری نیز، تا زمان حاضر از این سبک جابجایی در اقامت بهره‌مند می‌شوند.
کم نیستند ایرانیانی که در هر شهری که زندگی می‌کنند، خانه یا مکانی در جای دیگر (مثلا در کوهستان یا ساحل دریا) دارند و به تناوب در آن اقامت می‌کنند.
از تاریخ چنین می‌دانیم که این از عادات شاهان و درباریان هخامنشی بوده است، تا جایی‌ که برخی یونانیان از آن نوشته‌اند یا حتی از این روش تقلید کرده‌اند.
نمی‌دانم، ولی شاید بتوان ابداع این سبک از زندگی (اقامت) را به ایرانیان نسبت داد.
«آتنائوس» (Athenaeus of Naucratis) (قرن سوم میلادی) می‌نویسد: نخستین مردمی که در تاریخ به دلیل زندگی پرتجمل بدنام شدند پارسیان بودند، که شاهانشان زمستان را در شوش و تابستان را در اکباتان سپری می‌کردند.

به متن زیر از کتاب On Animals نوشته شده توسط Claudius Aelianus در ابتدای قرن سوم میلادی، توجه فرمایید تا ببینید نویسنده چطور مهاجرت پرنده‌ای به نام Crane (درنا) را با سفرهای رفت و برگشتی شاه هخامنشی در مسیر شوش-اکباتان مقایسه می‌کند.

§ ۳.۱۳  Cranes have their birthplace in Thrace, which is the most wintry and the coldest region that I know of. Well, they love the country of their birth, but they love themselves too; so they devote part of their time to their ancestral haunts and part to their own preservation. In summer they remain in their country, but in mid-autumn they leave for Egypt, Libya, and Ethiopia, appearing to know the map of the earth, the disposition of the winds, and the variations of the seasons. And after spending a winter like spring, when again conditions are becoming tolerably settled and the sky is calm, . they return. To lead their flight they appoint those that have already had experience of the journey; these would naturally be the older birds, and they select others of the same age to bring up the rear, while the young ones are ranged in their midst. Having waited for a fair and favouring wind from behind, and using it as an escort to speed them forward, they then form their order of flight into an acute-angled triangle, in order that as they encounter the air they may cleave it with the least difficulty, and so hold on their way. This then is how Cranes spend their summer and winter. (But mankind regards as marvellous the Persian king’s comprehension of temperature, and harps on Susa and Ecbatana and the repeated stories of the Persian‘s journeyings to and fro.) When however the Cranes observe an eagle bearing down upon them, they form a circle and in a bellying mass threaten him with attack; and he retires. Resting their bills upon each other’s tail-feathers they form in a sense a continuous chain of flight, and sweeten their labour as they repose gently one upon another. And in some distant land . . . when they light upon some water-spring they rest for the night and sleep, while three or four mount guard for all the others; and in order to avoid falling asleep during their watch they stand on one leg, but with the other held up they clutch a stone firmly and securely in their claws. Their object is that, if they should inadvertently drop off to sleep, the stone should fall and wake them with the sound.
Now the stone which a Crane swallows to give itself ballast is a touchstone for gold when regurgitated by the Crane after it has, so to say, come to anchor and reached land.