The second Homo sapiens colonisation of southern Africa

Contents

The essay

Years

Availability of data

References

Other notes

The essay

Life on earth got under way around ⦿260,000,000. Humans became reasonably distinct ⦿4,498,000,000.

A present consensus has defined the 'recent African origin of modern humans', with Homo sapiens forming: ⦿4,499,700,000-800,000, in the areas of the Horn of Africa to the great Rift Valley. 'Mitochondrial Eve' is the defining ancestor. The most recent and persistent exodus from Africa, of haplogroup L3 Homo sapiens, was around ⦿932,000, providing part of the base for this essay.

Within Africa, the first lineage to branch off (⦿742,000-872,000) was the bearers of haplogroup L0, found in high proportions in the ancestors of the San and Khoe of Southern Africa and the Sandawo and Mbute in eastern Africa. These groups were fairly isolated genetically most time since then, with a slight admixture of genes from earlier human formats within Africa. The L0 migration into southern Africa was order of ⦿872,000-912,000. The L0 ancestors of the Bushmen who constituted this first sapient colonisation of southern Africa occupied the sub-continent for 120,000 years. See the essay on this first sapient colonisation of southern Africa at http://dyait.net/day/firstcolonisation.html. Probable L0 migrations from south to north east are mapped by Rito et al in the previous essay.

In the same order of time frame, L1 and then L2 haplogroup populations reached the Cameroon highlands, populated west Africa and providing another part of the base for this essay. The social diversity was brought home on a drive from Gaborone to Ramotswa (25km) when a fellow-examiner remarked that in south Cameroon, there might well be five societies with mutually incomprehensible languages within that distance. The long-term resident African populations are the most genetically diverse as compared to those who migrated out. Pickrell et al indicate sapients 'of west eurasian ancestry' entering from west Asia possibly near Bab el Mandeb, around ⦿999,000. I use 'west Asian' for their term, as direct linkage with Europe for these traces seems unlikely. They relate this to the non-zero proportions of west Asian genetic ancestry identified in the longer term southern African populations.

Pastoralism made the L0 first wave of the second colonisation

Food cultivation in west Asia started around ⦿990,500, Wasse states. Early pastoralism was noted in west Asia from ⦿992,000 (goats ⦿992,000 around Lebanon, cattle followed by pigs ⦿992,500, sheep ⦿993,000 around the Zagros mountains), and was found on the fringes of the early agricultural societies there. Sheep fairly rapidly became dominant in herds relative to goats.

In Africa

The Sahara has undergone major changes in climate, in the past being savannah with considerable animal populations which have left traces in the Ténéré of present Niger, where Smith notes 'charred wood of a savannah vegetation 400km north of its present distribution', from about ⦿995,000. A wet phase of ⦿992,000-994,000 affected north and east Africa. Rock paintings of Tassili n'Ajjer and Jebel Uweinat indicate wild animals and cattle in what are now stark desert areas.

After ⦿994,000 sheet and goat remains begin appearing at Nabta pan and Fayum, Smith notes. The only African wild sheep (north west Africa) are not ancestral to African domesticates and it is likely these came in from west Asia, with indications of human movements in the coastal area of Gaza around this time. Cattle were also found in the east Saharan sites.

Domesticated sheep have been identified at Fayum around ⦿995,600. A fairly general pastoralism has left traces around this time up to the then 500mm rainfall line which defines the northern limit of the tsetse fly. As the Sahara climate dried, the line and the pastoralists moved south. The drying stepped up around ⦿997,500 when Saharan climate conditions became similar to today. Pastoralists in the Sahel moved close to the Niger river. In the east, pastoralists moved into the area between upper White Nile and Kenya from ⦿996,000. A tsetse-free corridor along the foothills of the Abyssynian highlands would have allowed herders into east Africa as well as the highlands. Smith notes that with the drying up of the Sahara about ⦿997,500, pressure was put on herding people to adapt both their strategies and territories. Southward movement into the West African Sahel at Karkarichinkat (Smith 1979) and East Africa at Dongodien (Barthelme 1985; Marshall 2000) is documented for the first time around ⦿998,000. The subsequent spread of the animals throughout East Africa is interesting, as it took a thousand years for the southern part of Kenya to be occupied by herders.

Lake Turkana has traces of sheep and goats around this time. The Loita-Mara area further south offers indications of pastoralism about the same time. Climate changes appear to have favoured specialised pastoralism by allowing higher milk yields in the Kenya area. Smith (2008) states that by ⦿999,000 cattle and sheep were well established throughout eastern Africa. Sites, such as Ngamuriak, Sambo Ngige and Maasai Gorge (Marshall 1990), are said to show the antecedents of modern pastoral adaptation in the region to two rainy periods each year, with almost all the fauna being domestic.

The transition to southern Africa is next. At Salumano site in present Zambia, dated to ⦿999,600, traces of domestic cattle and sheep have been identified. At Bambata site in present Zimbabwe, domestic sheep of likely pastoralists were identified at ⦿999,900. Smith records that the northern Kalahari had better rainfalls in the period ⦿999,500 to year zero, when rainfall reverted to present levels. The earliest sheep-herder site near the west coast is dated to around ⦿999,550 as mapped below. The next discovered sites in north current Namibia and the northern Cape coast are also dated to around ⦿999,550.

The Ju|’hoan North have traces of west Asian ancestry acquired about year 700 (⦿4,500,000,700). The Tshwa, Shua, Hai‖om, ǂHoan, Naro, and Taa North reflect mixing of around year 800. The !Xuun, Taa West, Taa East, Nama, Khwe, G‖ana, and Ju|’hoan-South had indications of two waves of population mixing. A Nama second mixing appears to relate to the post-third-wave time of the current colonisation. The Khoe–Kwadi speakers, including the Nama, have up to 14% west Asian genetic ancestry. The Khwe, Shua, and Hai‖om have ~5%. Pickrell et al note an apparent correlation between language group and west Asian ancestry. The east African proportions of mixing are higher (Ethiopia rises to 45-50%) and earlier (⦿998,700-999,600) than those for southern Africa. Overall conclusion is that east Africans with west Asian ancestry moved into southern Africa between 200-1100, and are the source of the west Asian component in the longer term southern African populations. Pickrell et al also quote Guldeman and consider as plausible the hypothesis that the ancestor of the Khoe–Kwadi languages in southern Africa was brought to the region by immigrating pastoralists from eastern Africa.

Smith has noted that Cooke (1965) had, on the basis of sheep in rock art from Zimbabwe, produced a model of movement of these animals into southern Africa, which saw the animals moving south from the Great Lakes region of East Africa, entering southern Africa and moving across the sub-continent to the Atlantic coast then turning south towards the Cape. He further notes that in 1979, Schweitzer pushed the dating of sheep from Die Kelders at the Cape back to about year 8 (⦿4,500,000,008). Since then many more sites on the west and south Cape coasts have produced dates for sheep between ⦿999,900 and 140. All the sites have included pottery finds.

Macholdt et al in synopsis note that a lactase persistence allele of eastern African origin occurs in southern African populations, most notably at 50% in the Nama (for the −14010^∗C allele, 36%). They consider that this allele reflects a migration of pastoralists to southern Africa ,supporting the hypothesis of a migration of eastern African pastoralists that was primarily associated with Khoe speakers, and recording another hypothesis that the origins of one of the three southern African Khoe and San language families, namely Khoe-Kwadi, traces to this pastoralist migration They further note that there is a signal of ongoing selection for this allele in some populations here. These findings overlap with the threads above and below. Also recall the indications of north-east L0 movements during the millennia of the first Homo sapiens colonisation in https://dyait.net/day/firstcolonisation.html.

Map 1 below by Lander and Russell notes a record of domestic sheep at the Leopard’s Cave site near the west coast and Cunene. The Lander and Russell map 2 indicates a further site with domestic sheep near the west coast, and a further west coast site south of the Orange river, around ⦿999,750.

The Lander and Russell mapping below indicates a site with domestic cattle in the environs of lake Ngami around ⦿999,950 left, below, indicates a site with domestic cattle in the environs of lake Ngami around ⦿999,950. Additional sites with domestic sheep are indicated in the Brandberg-Erongo area, the low Orange river, much of the low west coast and around to the south coast. Map 4 indicates additional domestic cattle near Lake Ngami, more sites in the Brandberg-Erongo area and several more sites from the Orange river to the Cape.

Map 2.5 indicates a site of about 350 with domestic cattle near the Orange river mouth, map 2.6 (not shown here) has domestic cattle at the west coast south of the Orange river about 550 and by map 2.9 sites are noted where domestic cattle have been found at the Cape around 950. Remember that the people from the north east who had west Asian ancestral traces were entering the south from 200-1100, and likely were or were mingling with the cattle pastoralists.

Kinahan (1991) summarises aspects of these based on excavations of sites, though written before the genetic studies which have given more depth to the time estimates of the spread of the Khoe-speaking nomadic pastoralists, noting the traces of pottery and sheep remains showing a predominance of these people in the west side of southern Africa by 1500. He observes how the harsh environment and climate appear to have set up hunter, then pastoral communities in the west between Cunene and Orange.

The essence of the pastoral is trade-able ownership of the means of subsistence, their animals turning forage into meat and milk. Kinahan proposes that the nomadic pastoralists then developed autonomous households as the basic units of the herder economy.

In the quoted book, Kinahan first looks at the Hungorob ravine in the Brandberg. a small 1700 metre high mountain area about 100km east of the Atlantic and south of the Ugab river. The relief provides cooler temperatures and likely slightly higher precipitation than the surrounding plains, and holds water captured in pools and fissures, which is released in small springs, for up to three years without replenishment. The top is a ten hour hike from the plain below, so not suited to daily commuting. He has studied 120 sites in the ravine, of which 63 feature rock art. The Falls Rock Shelter was dated to initial occupation around ⦿997,500 pottery turning up around year 1, domestic animals 1000 and abandonment about 1500. At Falls Rock Shelter, a collection of trade-related valuables was found featuring an iron adze, string of heavy copper beads and some iron beads and Indian Ocean cowrie shells.

Kinahan has further investigated early settlements in the lower !Kuiseb between Walvis Bay and Sandwich Harbour, where the river flow west conflicts with the sand desert dunes being blown by south-south westerly winds, with the lowest 30km of the river featuring notable trees, reed beds and the endemic !nara melon. The delta has been occupied for much of the past two millennia, with shellfish (mainly mussels), fish and birds supporting a population which brought in domestic sheep about 500. Most of the middens has traces of early pottery superseded by more robust ware later in association with pastoralism, all within the first millennium. Bone knives for use with !nara melon accompanied the pastoral sturdy pottery.

Overall, Kinahan considers the hunter-gatherer people were well established by year 1. By about 1000, a transition to pastoralism had occurred, with the robust pottery and the use of pastures previously providing hunting now supporting flocks and later cattle as well. With the pastoralism, and the shift from mostly sharing to mostly owning, rock painting died out. He hypothesises that the shamanistic records in rock painting may have arisen from a long transition from hunting/sharing to herding/owning from 1-1000, and makes reference to a similar transition at the Cape.

Smith (2008) notes that the environmental evidence available from the northern Kalahari c. ⦿999,500-999 indicates that there was increased rainfall,with high water levels at Lake Ngami (Shaw et al. 2003). Thus the vegetation conditions would appear to have been very favourable for pastoral occupation in the hinterland away from rivers and lakes. By ⦿999,999, he states that conditions became much more arid, approaching those of the present. He thinks it can be assumed that this forced the herders to change their strategies, with some seeking better watered conditions further west and south. From Lake Ngami to the Orange River following watercourses west from Ngami then south along the Nossob and Molopo is a journey of about 800km, with numbers of pans near the route, which in summer should have been reasonably traversable. For calibration, consider that:

“In 1900 a drover named Coleman departed from Clermont in Australia with 5,000 sheep, the country was drought stricken and he had been instructed to keep the flock alive. Coleman wandered 8,000km through south-western Queensland finding feed as they went. When he eventually returned he brought back 9,000 sheep, had sold over 5,000, and consumed nearly 1,000.”

“Twenty thousand head of cattle were removed from Wave Hill Station and overlanded to Killarney Station, near Narrabri in New South Wales, in 1904. It took 18 months to complete. The straight-line distance was 2500km.”

“Braam de Graaf, 78, came to Ghanzi, Botswana after World War II and started up a ranch with 200 cattle. Every year he would take 10 Bushmen with him for the three-week, 650-kilometre cattle drive across the Kalahari to the stockade in Lobatse.”

So there would not have been undue difficulties for capable herders in moving flocks and herds to the Orange. From there to the Olifants River near the Cape was a further 300km of dry country. A sustainable sheep flock would have had to comprise at least 60 animals (Dahl & Hjort 1976), or perhaps even more in an environment with many predators, Smith reports. He says further that that it is likely the larger flocks were in the hands of shepherds who did not use caves or rock shelters, but open-air camps, none of which were repeatedly reoccupied (making them difficult to identify archaeologically). It was only later when the ‘sealing camp’ of Kasteelberg (open air site with occupation records found from 200-1200) was occupied, Smith notes, that accumulation of pastoral domestic debris over a period of time can be seen. When Kasteelberg stopped being occupied, pastoral visibility once more receded.

Deacon (1984) states that southern African population density over the past 3000 years was substantially higher than it was between 3000 and 6000 years ago. She also states (The holocene archaeology of the Karoo, 2014) that there was in the south-central Cape Karoo a fairly stable genetic population that was seemingly able to adapt to changing environmental and social circumstances. Population numbers in drier regions dropped in times of drought, and rose when rainfall increased. She considers that when the herders moved into that Karoo, they lived alongside the hunter-gatherers. Striking, she says, is the exponential increase in the number of that Karoo's hunter-gatherer sites in the period between ⦿998,000 and a few hundred years ago which is repeated in neighbouring regions. On rock engravings in the upper part of this Karoo and at the Kuruman river source, Deacon notes that while the precise associations and dates might be questionable, and the sample small, the fact that the majority are less than 3000 years old supports information from other sources that population density over the past 3000 years was substantially higher than it was between 3000 and 6000 years ago (Deacon 1984).

One might wonder whether substantial occupation of grazing land and water resources by the people of the second colonisation's first wave, which must have displaced the quantum of wildlife and physical space used by the people of the first colonisation, did not give rise to resistance and some conflict. The inland areas of southern Africa are generally subject to highly variable rainfall and seasonal variation of surface water, and a point to consider would be which populations 'dropped in times of drought'.

Andrew B Smith (The archaeology of the KhoeKoen 2014) notes that the first pastoral population at the Cape, were most likely to have been the antecedents of the people who became known as the Hottentots during early colonial times. He considers that the archaeology of these early pastoralists is typified by excavations done at Kasteelberg on the Vredenburg Peninsula (Smith 2006a). The first date of occupation at the Kasteelberg ‘A’ site (KBA) is c.140 on top of the hill. At the foot of the hill is site KBB which has dates between 700 and 1120.

He further considers that the distinction between hunters and herders in the Western Cape can be seen in the material culture: hunters made fine stone tools, small ostrich eggshell beads (<5mm outside diameter), and had very few potsherds on their sites. They also had high proportions of small antelope in the faunal record (Smith et al. 1991). The herders, by contrast, he states, seemed to use just stone flakes, had larger ostrich egg beads (>5mm outside diameter), had huge numbers of potsherd fragments, and large numbers of sheep.

He says that the original herders at the Cape were primarily shepherds, but they were no strangers to cattle, as a few fragments of bone have been found in the early part of the first millennium AD. Smith considers that around 1250 the number of cattle in the western Cape increased, which may be related to the second-phase Bantu farmers migrating with herds, moving down along the south east coast and meeting the Khoe who were spreading north east from the Cape..

Smith also says it would appear that hunters and herders were different and retained a degree of separation up to what we are looking at as the third phase of the second Hono sapiens colonisation. Prior to the third phase, the west Cape seems to have had 'Strandlopers' who may well have been first-colonisation persons, 'Fishermen' who had a few cattle and no small stock, and the Khoe/Hottentots who raised cattle and small stock. Smith notes that archaeological remains are scarce in this time, and suggests it could be the result of increase numbers of cattle needing to be kept on the move to keep in areas of sufficient grazing and water, by season and circumstance. To the Khoe, land and its resources (grazing and water) were shared by Khoe and not bounded. The Khoe were transhumant and occupied their grazing lands on a seasonal basis.

The Bushmen/San in the west Cape appear to have been supplanted over the years 850 to 1650, some remaining as aides to the Khoe who carried out hunting on the mountains and possibly provided some herding resources. The traditional Bushman foragers had been obliged to move to drier parts where the pastoralists could not raise their flocks and herds.

The furthest note of Khoe eastwards was around the the Mngazi river where around 1650 lived

a group called the Gqunuqhwa. The Inqua kingdom around Kariega River was the biggest and most sophisticated Khoe political structure (later known to the Dutch), and was seemingly recognised as such by all other known Khoe political entities of its time, c.1650. It had independent Bushman/San neighbours with which it was 'in a state of perpetual war'. By then it traded with both the Xhosa to its east and the Tswana to its north.

Stow records Moffat as stating that 'genuine Hottentots, Koranas, and Namaquas meeting for the first time from their respective and distant tribes could converse with scarcely any difficulty'. They were a taller group that the people of the first colonisation.

The Korana legend of origin stated by Stow is that their forefathers migrated from tropical Central Africa to the western coast, and thence to the Cape. They were earlier known as Koraquas.

The basic village encampment of the pre-1650 Khoe was significantly larger than those of Bushman/San groups, incorporating well over 100 persons (some included several hundred). The basic housing structure was a matjieshuis made of a frame of saplings that was covered with reed mats. Each village encampment consisted primarily of members of the same patrilineal clan. Marriages were most commonly monogamous.

It seems there is much evidence that Khoe and Bushmen/San saw themselves as being different. In particular, the Khoe viewed people without stock as inferior and despised those hunters who stole their stock. A system of clientship developed whereby individual Bushman/San (commonly referred to as "Sonqua") were adopted as servants by the pastoralists.

From around 1500 the Khoe were dominant in the west and south of southern Africa in the areas where there was water and grazing for their flocks and herds. The Bushmen/San in these places had to make way or become clients as noted above. It is likely that the Khoe in southern Africa numbered about 200,000 in 1650.

Years

A footnote on year recalibration:

Take 1AD as ⦿4,500,000,001. Take earlier dates anywhere to the left ie ⦿10,004,500,000,001, and take the series from 1AD to 9999 as plain years without ⦿ unless it helps. Now is ⦿4,500,000,000 (10 digits with thousand separators) or ⦿002,018 (six digits with thousand separator) or 2018. Six digits are good for this essay.

Availability of data

A footnote on precision:

We lack data on the past. The % of potential data found is tiny so firm new finds can have startling effects on the overall specific picture.

References

Wikipedia: Recent African origin of modern humans, Haplogroup L0 (mtDNA), Khoisan, San people, Sandawe people, Tsodilo Hills, Blombos cave, Pastoralism, Bantu expansion, Droving

Pastoral Nomads of the Namib Desert John Kinahan 1991 Capital Press, Windhoek ISBN

99916-779-1-7

http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/economies/Africa/Botswana.html

https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/6248/bead6eac2d212df91dd1be36c8b2062ac8a8.pdf  

THE DEVELOPMENT OF GOAT AND SHEEP HERDING DURING THE LEVANTINE NEOLITHIC Volume 1 Alexander Michael Richard WASSE

https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1435/90d6d1fb1f86d95fd7b0b603f6b25ffc00c7.pdf

An Optimal Foraging-Based Model of Hunter-Gatherer Population Dynamics: Gary L Belovsky, 1988

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4445560/

The genetic prehistory of domesticated cattle from their origin to the spread across Europe:

Amelie Scheu,  Adam Powell, Ruth Bollongino, Jean-Denis Vigne, Anne Tresset, Canan Çakırlar,Norbert Benecke, and Joachim Burger, 2015

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960982214003194 Tracing Pastoralist Migrations to Southern Africa with Lactase Persistence Alleles: Enrico Macholdt, Vera Lede^, Chiara Barbieri, Sununguko, W.Mpoloka, Hua Chen Montgomery Slatkin, Brigitte Pakendorf, Mark Stoneking, 2014

http://www.pnas.org/content/111/7/2632 Ancient west Eurasian ancestry in southern and eastern Africa: Joseph K. Pickrell, Nick Patterson, Po-Ru Loh, Mark Lipson, Bonnie Berger, Mark Stoneking, Brigitte Pakendorf, and David Reich, 2014

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0080031

The First Modern Human Dispersals across Africa: Teresa Rito, Martin B. Richards, Verónica Fernandes, Farida Alshamali, Viktor Cerny, Luísa Pereira, Pedro Soares, 2013

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Cameroon#/media/File:Nigeria_Benin_Cameroon_languages.png

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/234147678_Origins_and_Spread_of_Pastoralism_in_Africa?enrichId=rgreq-4fbdae4e415290a5917dc53e5d5ad518-XXX&enrichSource=Y292ZXJQYWdlOzIzNDE0NzY3ODtBUzozNTk1MjAzNjM2NjMzNjBAMTQ2MjcyNzc0MjMxNg%3D%3D&el=1_x_3&_esc=publicationCoverPdf Origins_and_Spread_of_Pastoralism_in_Africa Andrew B Smith 2003

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.836.9003&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Pastoral origins at the Cape, South Africa: influences and arguments: Andrew B Smith 2008

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0198941

The archaeological evidence for the appearance of pastoralism and farming in southern Africa: Lander and Russell, 2018

http://articles.latimes.com/1988-01-10/news/mn-34581_1_kalahari-arms

https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/file%20uploads%20/precolonial_catalytic_book_with_cover.pdf 2014 J Deacon AB Smith J Peires

https://www.encyclopedia.com/places/asia/iranian-political-geography/khoi

http://www0.sun.ac.za/taalsentrum/assets/files/Hulpbronne%20vir%20Taalpraktisyns/SaPlaceNamesDictionary(1987).pdf

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Samuel_Daniell

https://www.pletthistory.org/talks/francois-le-vaillant-journey-into-the-interior-of-africa/

Other notes

Southern Africa areas:

Botswana 600,000 km²

Lesotho 30,000 km²

Namibia 826,000 km²

Swaziland 17,000 km²

South Africa 1,221,000 km²

Allele: An allele is a variant form of a given gene. Sometimes, different alleles can result in different observable phenotypic traits, such as different pigmentation. <wikipedia>

Lactase persistence is the continued activity of the lactase enzyme in adulthood. Since lactase's only function is the digestion of lactose in milk, in most mammal species, the activity of the enzyme is dramatically reduced after weaning.[1] In some human populations, though, lactase persistence has recently evolved[2] as an adaptation to the consumption of nonhuman milk and dairy products beyond infancy. <wikipedia>

Metric inch: 25mm, symbol “

Metric foot: 300mm, symbol '

'Recent' for the time covered in the essay above is the last three thousand years.

'First people' in the essay are the Homo sapiens of the first colonisation of southern Africa, whom we meet in most detail as the recent Bushmen/San.

'Second people' are the Homo sapiens of the second colonisation of southern Africa, whom we meet as the first wave Hottentot/Khoe, the second wave Bantu, the third wave diaspora returnees mostly from Europe and the fourth wave of in-migrants 1990+ mostly from Africa.

David Young

5no18