A New Look at the Later Prehistory of the Kalahari

Dados Bibliográficos

ID5846255
AutoresJames Denbow (0000-0003-2260-0421, autor correspondente)
Ano1986
Volume27
Fascículo1
Páginas3-28
Data de publicação1986-03-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe Journal of African History (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0021-8537 • E-ISSN: 1469-5138
EditoraCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0021853700029170
OpenAlexW2094180753
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas77
Referências citadas60

Until recently, the later prehistory of the Kalahari has remained almost unknown and, in consequence, the long and complex past of the peoples of this region has often been condensed into an ahistorical and timeless caricature when compared with events in neighbouring countries. The summary presented here attempts to rectify this situation by drawing upon data from over four hundred surveyed sites and information from detailed excavations carried out since 1975 at twenty-two selected localities in Botswana. Three important topics in southern African prehistory are addressed from the perspective of these investigations. The first topic is the introduction of sheep and cattle to the sub-continent between 2,000 and 2,500 years ago. The second is the origins and social dynamics of pastoralism during the Early Iron Age, and relates these developments to the formation of stratified socio-political systems around the fringes of the Kalahari towards the end of the first millennium A.D. The third topic is the relevance to current information on the later prehistory of the Kalahari of ethnographic accounts of herding and foraging societies gathered in this same region during the twentieth century

Pastoralism · Rock art · Archaeology and Rock Art Studies · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology · Rangeland Management and Livestock Ecology