Microsoft Word - PhD Thesis Final.pdf - University of Limpopo ...

Early occupation.
Archaeological evidence indicates that the earliest South African inhabitants
were people who fell in two broad divisions – those who lived by hunting
and gathering, and those who had herds of domesticated cattle and sheep
and some pottery. The hunter/gatherers who had probably been here for at
least ten thousand years were the “ancestors” of the San or Bushmen of
today, while the herders who had probably arrived much later were the
“ancestors” of the Khoikhoi 126 . During that earliest period, groups of people
practicing agriculture in addition to herding, filtered into South Africa from
the north. These people also worked metal and archaeological evidence
indicates that these were the forerunners of the later waves of people who
were called Bantu-speakers or Blacks. In the subsequent paragraphs the
identity formation among the earliest occupants of the Makgabeng – the
San, the Khoikhoi and the Bantu-speakers – will be traced.
The San.
The San “can be regarded as the first real inhabitants of South Africa” 127 . In
the Makgabeng area, the San began to settle in about AD 700 128 . Rock art
and archaeological evidence in the Makgabeng area indicate that the San
126 H. C. Woodhouse, Rock Art, p. 2.
127 H. J. Van Aswegen, History of South Africa to 1854, p. 16.
128 E. B. Eastwood, et al., “Archaeological and rock art survey, p. 1.
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