SAN: THE BUSHMEN OF KALAHARI

Source of images in GIF

Kalahari Desert a “thirstland” described by early European settlers, although it receives too much rainfall annually but due to its vast expanses of sand leaves nothing on the ground. Kalahari is derived from the Tswana word Kgala, meaning "the great thirst", or Kgalagadi, meaning "a waterless place”. The Kalahari Desert stretched around 360000 aquare miles across Namibia, Botswana, and SouthAfrica.

Animals living there have adapted either to survive many days without water, or to obtain water from plants, so as humans. In this extremely dry condition, San a diverse group of tribes also known as Bushmen of Kalahari living there since 20,000 years.

San are the oldest inhabitants of South Africa they were first introduced to world by by South African author Laurens van der Post in 1950s, their ancestors are considered to be first peoples to live in what now called Botswana and South Africa.

THE EARLY HISTORY OF SAN

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San are descendants of Early Stone Age ancestors who live in small groups who follow seasonal migration from mountains to coastline. Their ancestors were lived in cave made under stones or mountains as they keep migrating from time to time, they don’t row crops or domesticate animals however they have good knowledge about flora and fauna.
At the early beginning of Christianity era people starts deviding some who owned few animals like goats and sheep mainly moved towards western and southern part of the South Africa. This migrated group is called Hottentot or Khoikhoi they lived by gathering wild plants and animals. At the same time another migration occurred in the eastern part of the country where the group of people who speak “BaNta” moved to south to grow crops and settle village, thus in the middle of 17th century the whole country was devided into three communities.

Modern san people are still as their ancestors as a set of tools discovered at border cave in Kwazulu-Natal in 2002 shows the tools found which was dating to 44,000BCE is similar to tools used by the modern san peoples.

SAN SOCIETY

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San people believed in equality for all although they had a hereditary chief but every decision is taken by long discussions among themselves, here women’s were given equal value and hence treated same.
San people follow name and age rule, new born children were named after their ancestors mainly after their grandparents and for resolving any disputes they follow age rule as the elder ones will given more priorities over the younger’s.

SAN LIFE

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Life of san peoples are very hard as the temperature of Kalahari fluctuates a lot, in summer the day temperature reaches to 45 degrees Celsius while in the cold nights of winter the temperature drops to -15 degrees Celsius. As they were remained on their ancestral living style so its quite hard to live in such harsh environment. In hot summer when days are extremely hot then no surface water left, the drought may last for many months but san people have adapted in such conditions due to their deep knowledge of wild herbs. They mainly use bibulb plant to extract water in summer or they make deep hole where sand is in shed and use hollow grass stem as straw to suck water, mostly empty egg shells of ostrich egg were used as a water container.

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CHILDHOOD

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There are no restrictions or duties given to childrens, they mostly spent their time in playing, group discussion, music and their sacred dance.

LIFESTYLE OF SAN WOMEN

Womens in the san society were given higher status and were greatly respected and sometimes considered as the leader of their own family. They collect berries, fruits firewood, digging sticks and other herbs for their family while men go for hunt. Thus being an old traditional living tries san people has good values for womens.

HUNTING METHODS OF SAN

San peoples are good hunters they mostly hunt in team, they used different techniques to hunt different animals depends on the animal size and the environment.

To hunt small animas like guinea fowls, duikers or hares they make traps by twisting small plant and a thread is tied to one end of the plant and a loose knot is made at other end and held on the ground with help of small twig.
They also make deep conical pitfalls near rivers or other water sources and neatly cover them by branches and leaves, a sharp stake is inserted in the bottom center of the hole, thus if ny animal steps on the hole then it falls o the take.

To hunt large animals they mainly use bow and arrow, the bow and arrow were used were small as it is not meant to kill animal its the deadly poison on the tip of the arrow which can kill nearly anyone. The poison was made by mixing a caterpillar (known as “Ka” or ‘Ngwa”) is mixed with wild roots thus a poisonous paste is made, though poison takes time to kill depends on animal size, once the arrow hits the animal, the san hunters patiently tracks animal for few hours until it dies.

SAN BELIEF

San people believe in one superior God who have created everything while the presence of lesser gods have also seen in their worship, they have strong believes in spirits and one spiritual being called “/kaggen”, the trickster-deity appeared in many forms and can be observed in many myths and in some spiritual worships.

ROCK ART

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Many san rock paintings can be in the rocky areas of Kwazulu-Natal their paintings mostly contains strange human figures and animals mainly Eland.

Their believe in painting Eland is not just to give respect but also show essence and they believed that by giving them respect they will open portal of spiritual world for them.
Their paintings were mostly of red, orange, white, brown and black in colour, they never used green or blue colour. These colours were made of different stones like charcoal or manganese oxide for black, sometimes blood of Eland and other religious significant were mixed to make colour.

DANCE

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As every tribe is famous for their own dance so as san they give prime importance to their ritual dance.
They often dance in many occasions as in marriage ceremony or for healing illness and rain dance for rain.

LIFE OF SAN TODAY

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Currently san people are suffering with very hard times, as some diamonds reserve are found in their land in early 1980, so government told the bushmen to leave their land as they found diamonds there so they’re planning to make diamond mines.
Later in 1997, 2002 and 2005 with three big clearances nearly every bushmen were forced to live out as their homes were destroyed and trucked away from their land.

In 2006 court have given back their right to go back to their land, but government tried every step to stop it they even cemented their water holes and banned to dig more. Many san peoples were died with dehydration and starvation.

Those who have agreed with government and shifted from the Kalahari central reserve were given few cattles by the government but san people have never domesticated any animal so its hard for them to live in their new life.
Today small group of san are living on their ancestral place, they have retained many ancient ancestral practices but compromised in certain fields and now adapted strategies for social, political and economic survival.
But unfortunately these simple traditional san people soon be extinct and then you can only find their culture, beliefs and their traditions in historical books, journals and in documentaries.

Good thing is there are global organisations like “SURVIVAL” who were helping tribes to get their human rights, their lands and their humble life as they deserve and should be respected as contemporary society.

You can also join the global moment to protect tribal communities. There are many ways you can contribute in it and you don’t have to be a millionaire to make a difference their donations re started from just 5USD so don’t hesitate.

click here to redirect to SURVIVAL page to donate

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