The Lie of 1652. Patric Tariq Mellet
the Jebel Irhoud site in Morocco. For me, the answer to these sites lies in the migratory spirit in Homo sapiens linked to following waterways or coastal routes.
In six southern African countries, strong showings of the L0-d, L0-d1 and L0-k mtDNA markers are among surviving San communities who trace back to the East African ancestor L-0. Evidence of the strongest, but not the only, descendants of L-0 today are the Hadza and Sandawe peoples of present-day Tanzania, and some of the following communities: Cape Khoe, Korana, Griqua, Nama and ‘Coloured’, alternatively referred to as Camissa African communities as a term of self-identification by some. The latter concept will be explained in further chapters.
All these communities also have mtDNA markers of other ‘L-1 – L-6’ sub-Saharan African mtDNA markers, as well as mtDNA markers from Asia, Eurasia and Europe. All other of the ten officially classified ‘African’ communities in South Africa also have some degree of L0-d, L0-d1 and L0-k Southern African haplogroup markers that are carried by the San and Khoe social groups mentioned. Mellet38 notes that, according to one study by Himla Soodyall, 17per cent of those self-identifying as sub-Saharan Africans had southern African mtDNA markers along with sub-Saharan Y-DNA markers (male lineage). There are no ‘pure’ lineages; over 194 000 years of the purity of any people would be impossible. Genetic studies have demolished the ‘race’ and ‘ethnographic’ constructs as a means of identifying humanity.
Variants of the same L-0 mtDNA can also be found among some white South Africans and also among diverse peoples across the globe. But having mtDNA of a particular type does not make them San people or Khoe people today, as there is a huge difference between DNA markers in humans and notions of identity.
The ancestors of one of the three main branches of San in southern Africa migrated to Namibia and surrounding Botswana around 140 000 years ago. The ancestors of the San in the northeastern parts of South Africa migrated there by 45 000 years ago, and other ancestors migrated to the southern reaches of the Cape by 30 000 years ago and 22 000 years ago.39
Again, in terms of the multiregional theory of human origins in Africa, this does not preclude the existence of other, extinct Homo sapiens in the same areas at early periods of time. What is clear, however, is that all humans in Africa today are descendants of humans who were migrants at some point in history; that all modern humans in the south and east of Africa are in ancient terms genetically related to San communities; and that all share a common root. Another way of seeing this is that, if all have an ancient ancestral connection with the ancestors of the San, and all share the fact that the San communities of at least 3 000 years ago to the present are our foundation people, then it is imperative that the San are put at the centre of our society and duly honoured. It is my perspective that the surviving San are a core connection of the African soul.
The prehistory period: Linguistic, cultural and faith perspectives
Broadly speaking, there are two overarching families of languages in Africa: Bantu languages and non-Bantu languages. Among the latter, the oldest of these are most often referenced as ‘Khoisan’ languages, but more accurately they are the Namib-Kgalagadi-Gariep (NKG) and Kwadi regional families of different languages with different roots, if we use the protocol of geo-terms rather than ethnographic labels. Looking at the linguistic arena through a non-ethnographic lens may assist us to better examine this important part of African social history and its ancient roots.
Jones40 shows us that there are four broad families of languages in Africa: 1 436 Niger-Congo (Bantu) languages; 371 Afro-Asiatic (formerly called Hamito-Semitic or Semito-Hamitic languages); 196 Nilo-Saharan languages; and 35 ‘Khoisan’ (NKG as well as Kwadi) languages. In all these languages there has been borrowing from each other, which attests to the fact that there are no absolute, solid walls that have separated peoples over vast expanses of time. Linguistics, like genetics, reveals the migratory spirit in the history of Homo sapiens and dispels the notion of the ‘natural separation’ of so-called ‘races’.
Güldemann41 has explored the inter-relationships between the three other African language families and the NKG family of languages and Kwadi, and provides argument and evidence to suggest that they are genealogically related. In his mapping of languages, he links the Khoe languages to Kwadi and the East African Sandawe language. Güldemann notes five different ‘Khoisan’ (NKG) languages that are still spoken in South Africa today, four of which have dictionaries and one (Xiri) only wordlists. He references 2 000 speakers of these languages in South Africa. In the case of Xiri, there are only three surviving people who still speak it.
The story of modern human development extends back over many thousands of years, where human proto-social groups lived and died out and left some tracer-markers that help us to understand past societies. Much, however, has not been left or has not survived dramatic natural events, or indeed is yet to be discovered. Languages, dialects or elements of these frequently change, or are adopted, kept or discarded. Language is also porous and not rigid. It defies the tendency for people today to want to box languages into conserved ‘tribal’, nationalist, ethno-nationalist or ‘race’ silos.
The same applies to religions, all of which have as many convergent beliefs as they have divergent or unique elements. Religious beliefs are a key cultural element of humanity and also hold the secrets of the migratory spirit of humans. Much of southern Africa below the equator is home to the Ngoma faith.42 This traditional faith, roughly translated as ‘the way of the drum’ (ngoma, also creolised to ‘ghoema’) is facilitated by the sangomas, who are diviners, and the faith has more than 3 000 years of history that is closely tied to the circular migratory drifts in the region. In the Cape it also influenced the faith and subculture colloquially known as ‘Doekum’ that derived from the Southeast Asian Dukun and Lewsi practices, and similar influences from Madagascar, as a result of slavery. The presence of Masbieker enslaved people taken from across southern Africa to the Cape resulted in the Ngoma faith rapidly mixing with other faith cultures in the City of Cape Town. Old tenets of San and Khoe faiths also came into the mix, as did European and other Asian faiths.
In other parts of the world along the slave routes one finds similar faith traditions in the form of Voudoun and Santeria. All these incorporate ancestral veneration, communication with the ancestral and spirit world, and physical and emotional healing. The outer form in devotions involves drumming, chanting, dancing and engagement with spirits and ancestors. Spirituality in the tradition of the indigenous African Ngoma faith is also about the union between ancestors and the land, health and good fortune. Spirituality is intricately aligned to language and thus must be considered as key to linguistic interpretation, most especially in that European scholars tend to approach language rigidly through written text. In Africa, from the art in burial places in ancient Kemet down to the southern Cape rock art, artistic expressions can be seen to be as important a part of language, and it brings faith and communication together.
Understanding the relationship of people to their belief system is vital to an understanding of social history. Coming to an understanding of African social history cannot leave out the study of belief systems and practices, nor omit the exploration of storytelling traditions. I would argue that linguistics in Africa cannot be dealt with in a silo divorced from the broader world of artistic expression and expressions of faith.
Güldemann’s43 linguistic work supports the work done by archaeologists, geneticists, rock art experts, anthropologists and other social scientists in showing that, within the Thõathõa Triangle, there are linkages between herder-hunter languages in East Africa and with peoples speaking Niger-Congo languages, Afro-Asiatic languages and Nilo-Saharan languages.44
By focusing on the !Xun and Khwedam languages, Jones45 uses the experience of speakers in contemporary times to demonstrate how languages change or become extinct. She says that ‘traditional language settings’ build and nurture language but when these become ‘vulnerable language settings’ and ‘new language settings’, language changes or it dies out, and this alters culture too. Creolisation of language creates a circular effect that results in a continuum of change in language. For small and micro vulnerable communities, it results in extinction often not only of the language but also of the cultural community of people. In southern Africa, genocide, dispossession of land and means of sustenance, de-Africanisation through assimilation into the ‘Coloured’ construct,