Who are the San of South Africa?

The San are the aboriginal people of South Africa. Their distinct hunter-gatherer culture stretches back over 20 000 years, and their genetic origins reach back over one million years. Recent research indicates that the San are the oldest genetic stock of contemporary humanity.

Today, the two largest San groups in South Africa are immigrants from Angola via Namibia. These are the !Xun and the Khwe, who were settled on their land Platfontein at the end of 2004, approximately 15 km outside the Northern Cape provincial capital, Kimberley. There are 3 500 !Xun and 1 100 Khwe. Both groups claim an indigenous identity on the basis of their languages and cultures.

The next largest group is the San population of the southern Kalahari. Today, most San in this area (Lower Orange District) describe themselves as the ‡Khomani. The group is descended from several original San groups, including the ||Ng!u (close relatives of the !Xam who lived south of the !Gariep River), the ‡Khomani who spoke the same language as the ||Ng!u but had distinct lineage, the |’Auni, the Khatea, the Njamani and probably others whose names are now lost to us. Most San of this bloodline now speak Khoekhoegowap and /or Afrikaans as primary language. There are 7 speakers of the original 23 confirmed speakers of the ancient N|u language remaining. They constitute some of the few surviving aboriginal South African San. Approximately 1 500 adults are spread over an area of more than 1 000 km in the Northern Cape Province. Most people live in the northern reaches of Gordonia, at Witdraai, Askham, Welkom, Rietfontein and surrounding villages. Others live in and around Upington and Olifantshoek.

A small pocket of aboriginal South African ||Xegwi San lives on farms in Mpumalanga Province near Lakes Banager and Chrissie and around the towns of Lothair and Carolina. Their numbers are not known, though estimates run between 30 and 100 adults. These ||Xegwi San are descendants of a displaced group of Drakensberg San, famous for the rock paintings made by their ancestors up until the middle of the last century. Their original language is extinct.

There is a group of about 70 adult !Kung San living across the border from South Africa at Masetleng and Ngwaatle Pans in Botswana. These people originally lived next to the ‡Khomani in what became the Kalahari Gemsbok National Park (KGNP). They were displaced by the KGNP and driven into Botswana. They have lodged a land claim in South Africa though they have yet to resolve the issue of their citizenship. !Kung is a Northern San language.

There are thousands of people in the Northern Cape who are to some degree aware that they are direct descendants of the largest South African San population of the 18th and 19th centuries, the !Xam. In the area of Prieska there are semi-nomadic farm labourers known as Karretjiemense (Cart People). These people know they are of San descent and may have spoken San languages in the previous century. In recent years the Khoisan Representative Council attempted to claim responsibility for !Xam representation. It is unclear at this stage if there are any coherent community structures that have maintained a !Xam identity or whether this is a form of revisionism.

SASI works with those populations that are recognised by the Working Group of Indigenous Minorities of Southern Africa (WIMSA) and have coherent community structure.
www.sanculture.org.za