The most ancient civilization in South Africa are the Bushmen,the Khoi/San. The Khoi/San are always exclusively described as Western Cape dwellers and often pictured as beachcomers (Strand lopers) because of their connection with the seaboard. However this is patently incorrect as every anthropologist will agree that the Khoi/San resided all over Southern Africa, namely; Zimbabwe, Namibia, Botswana, and South Africa. The Khoi/San left their indelible mark in various locations. For example, they were connected to areas such as Steenbokfontein, Cederburg Mountains, Kouebokeveldt, Gamkaberg, Kammanassieberge, Mount Liddle, Stormburg, Witteberg, Drakensburg, Rooiberg, Krokodilspoortberge in the Eastern Transvaal, and the Makgabeng Plateau, to name but a few. (see “Rock Paintings of South Africa by Stephen Townley Basset).
Unlike the black tribes that emigrated here from Central Africa, the Khoi/San left behind their address, marked in stone art, centuries before the Xhosa settlers arrived. Their early life biographies are painted on cave walls, and they are also buried all over Southern Africa. In the Drakensburg there are many Bushmen paintings, some depicting recent history, while in the Cape they painted sailing ships, signs of the first European Seafarers.
Khoi San paintings show European sailing ships
see “Rock Paintings of South Africa by Stephen Townley Basset Page17)
The Khoi/San disappear by and large after the arrival of Xhosa Settlers and other Central African tribes such as the Zulu’s, this at a date almost approximating the advent of European Settlers in the same region. That the Khoi/San were the first indigenous people of what later became known as South Africa is indisputable.
Interestingly, the way I understand it, the Botswana Government blocked a court case in which the Bushmen were claiming a huge tract of land as their ancestral inheritance. From a black man’s perspective you would not want to open a case in which the Bushmen win as the true indigenous owners, this would result in claims being made over the whole of Southern Africa , some way would have to be found to make these claims go away.
Africans trash Khoi San paintings recently
see “Rock Paintings of South Africa by Stephen Townley Basset Page140)
The tribal skirmishes which were taking place under the leadership of Shaka to the north of Port Elizabeth, forced the Xhosa and Pondo tribes to move ever southward to safer areas, not good news for the Khoi/San. However with this trek of black tribes, it forced their displacement, and the uncalled for assimilation of the Khoi/San people into the Xhosa tribe. The remaining pockets of Khoi/San which survived the black Settlers, were forced into the arid areas of the Karoo and small land parcels, with the remainder in the Western Cape. Yet despite this shocking history, blacks have not sought forgiveness or restoration for their negative impact on Khoi/San life!
The arrival of the 1820 Settlers in Port Elizabeth and Natal was a short but welcome reprieve for the Xhosa as the Zulu’s had their hands full in trying to stem the tide of new European arrivals, “what goes around comes around”. Furthermore it was not only the remenants of the Khoi/San who were taken as Slaves in the Eastern Cape, but white women, survivors of shipwrecks who’s plight were documented by European seafarers. All over Africa slavery was usually the outcome of defeated tribes.
The whole history of the Eastern Cape has remained obscure because of the absence of the written word. Oral traditions by tribesmen are sketchy and unreliable for obvious reasons, but the recent “Genome Project” has already made headway in allowing scientists to document the DNA of people in other parts of this continent. It will also unravel the history of the residents of this area in a decade or so. Yet, besides the tools of modern science and the documentation compiled by European Settlers, the Khoi/San have left remarkable evidence that they were the original owners of South Africa.
Now, one recorded event in the history of the Xhosa tribe was a planned mass suicide, at their own hand. All through history there have been these stupid events and one such example was the suicide of Jim Jones and his misled followers. In every one of these cases there has been a satanic influence, because in the Old Testament GOD instructs us to choose Life. We can however choose Death which is another option, but Christians will always choose life in a literal and Spiritual sense. Only the stupid will murder their own children.
It is said that hate can never be concealed for long, so the sole purpose of the “great cattle killing” was to drive the Settlers into the sea. However GOD made this continent and indeed the world big enough for everyone to enjoy, so it was a really pathetic “vision” for these people to have followed. One is inclined to ask the question, what has really changed? Especially when confronted by the “mandela verses”, or when perusing the website www.censorbugbear-reports.blogspot.com
If you would like to know more about the mass suicide of the Xhosa then read this shortened version of the original article below. The full article can be accessed on www.christianaction.org.za
Quote:
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death." Proverbs 14:12
One of history's strangest socio-economic disasters was the case of the "cattle killing" in 1856 in the Transkei - now the Eastern Cape of South Africa. In the space of twelve months the population of Xhosaland fell by 80 per cent, mostly through starvation. What was most bizarre was how the Xhosa embraced their fate and even welcomed it. Through a form of mass hysteria the Xhosa convinced themselves of the need to kill all their cattle, destroy all their food and sow no crops for the future. It was a mass national suicide by starvation.
In April 1856 two young Xhosa girls were sent to chase birds from cornfields near the River Gxara. The elder girl, Nongqawuse, reported later that while they were drinking at the water's edge two mysterious figures materialised alongside them. They told the girls to take a message back to their kraal that a great resurrection was about to take place, and that all the people should kill all their cattle as these would no longer be needed. Once the great day came there would be no shortages of any kind, so they must tell their people that there must be no sowing or cultivation of crops and all stored grain must be thrown away. Once this had been carried out, the strangers told the girls, no further work must be done. And when all the Xhosa cattle had been killed the new people would come, sweeping all the whites into the sea.
Disaster
British officials who toured round Xhosaland trying to distribute food, found heart-breaking sights. In some places the people had climbed into their grain pits to see if they had been miraculously filled in their absence. But, too weak to climb out again, they had died there. Emaciated women with children clinging to their flattened breasts raked the hard ground for roots. Starvation drove others to boil and eat their ox-hide shields or their leather skirts.
Those who reached the soup kitchens provided by the British were no more than walking skeletons and many died of exhaustion only yards from safety. A missionary wrote, "Famine has effaced all human likeness. Young men of twenty lost their voices and chirruped like birds. Children were wrinkled and withered and gray. Men and women presented the appearance of baboons, and like baboons searched under stones for insects to devour." And as the vultures and wild dogs devoured the dead and half-dead Xhosa, the survivors turned to cannibalism in their last desperate urge to live, killing and eating their own children. Mhalakaza himself died of starvation along with his niece Nongqawuse.
"He who works his land will have abundant food, but the one who chases fantasies will have his fill of poverty." Proverbs 28:19
Close Quote.
(2004 - Vol 2 THE NATIONAL SUICIDE OF THE XHOSA)
Article Source
http://www.christianaction.org.za/articles_ca/2004-2-THE_NATIONAL_SUICIDE_XHOSA.htm
Copyright
2010
