The Last Transhumance / Ultima Transhumanță

Dragos Lumpan

2023 / 90 minutes
Romania
Albanian, English, Italian, Romanian, Turkish with English Subtitles

Filmed across six countries over fifteen years, The Last Transhumance takes us into the world of shepherds who journey with their animals across great distances in search of pasture—an ancient way of life increasingly incompatible with the modern world. Around 10,000 years ago, in the Middle East, humans first domesticated sheep and took them “on the road.” That journey is what shepherds call transhumance. Their movement measures time and space with tools we have long forgotten. People and herds swing between plains and mountains, setting in motion a mechanism that has ticked for thousands of years, but now threatens to fall silent. The transhumance clock stops each time a family of shepherds chooses to remain behind. Yet it continues to tick through the persistence of those who still sleep among their sheep beneath the open sky—the few who continue to live under the stars. The Last Transhumance tells their story.