San Tribe
The San Tribe, who are also called Bushmen, are from different Khoe, Tuu, or Kx’a-speaking native hunter-gatherer groups. They are the first people to live in Southern Africa and live in Botswana, Namibia, Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, and South Africa. In 2017, there were about 63,500 San people living in Botswana. That’s about 2.8% of the country’s population, making it the country with the most San people.
They have lived in southern Africa for at least 20,000 years, making them the oldest people who live there. They live in the Kalahari desert, which is very big. These people, called Bushmen, are the last of Africa’s oldest cultural groups. They are genetically the most similar to the original Homo sapiens “core,” from which the Negroid people of Africa evolved. People who live in the bush are usually short and have light yellow skin that wrinkles quickly.
Language Of The San Tribe
There are many different Bushman groups; they don’t have a single name, and the words “Bushman,” “San,” “Basarwa” (in Botswana), and others are used in different ways. Most of the ones that most people know are made up by outsiders and are meant to be insulting; for example, many people now use and agree with the word “Bushmen.”
Khoi, on the other hand, are likely from the same background, but they became herders before the Bantu group and white farmers came to Southern Africa. Most of the time, the word “Khoisan” is used to refer to all Southern African bushmen.
There are many languages that bushmen speak, and all of them use “click” sounds, which are written with marks like! or /. The distinctive clicks used in Khoisan languages have a wide variety of types and applications. Here is a very brief explanation of the most popular ones. Images that are well-known all over the world serve as their display.
The Life Of The San Tribe
Bushmen used to hunt and gather food, and about 70–80% of their diet was plant-based, like the berries, nuts, roots, and vegetables that were mostly picked by women. The last 20–30% was meat, mostly antelopes, which the men hunted with poisoned arrows and spears on hunts that could last for days. They made their own makeshift homes out of wood they found.
Their economy and social system had stayed mostly the same for tens of thousands of years, until very recently. It was based on hunting and gathering, a way of life that all humans had been practicing since the beginning of time until agriculture appeared. The Bushmen didn’t grow or raise animals because they didn’t know who owned the land or the animals.
Social Structure Of The San Tribe
Their social system is not tribal because they don’t have a strong leader, and family ties are not very tight. They have a culture that is like a close-knit family where choices are made by talking about them all and agreeing on them by consensus.
People naturally give their view more or less weight depending on how skilled and experienced they are in the topic at hand. Families in the same clan would speak the same language, but clans that are next to each other would usually speak a different language, though they would understand and be able to understand each other. A “name kinship” could also happen between people who share the same name, which is one of only about 35 names for each gender.
Usually, bushmen don’t stay in one place for long. They move around based on how close other families and groups are. Family land could be a 25-mile circle, but this is just a rough idea. Obviously, these areas can grow bigger if there aren’t any other clans or people living nearby. They can go as far as they need to in order to make sure they have enough food and drink.
The jobs of men and women were very different and rarely overlapped.
This is something that hunter-gatherers all over the world did. It was based on the need to survive and encouraged people to make the best use of the skills and tools they had. People often think of this society as being very sexist, but women are very important to the group, and their views often matter the most, especially when it comes to food.
Food And Health Of The San Tribe
In the past, bushman women would gather veldkost (wild plants) three to four days a week. They would often go out in groups to look for plants that could be eaten or used as medicine. Also, before trade with the Bantu or white people, everything was made from plants or animals, like tools, building materials, weapons, and clothes.
About 400 to 500 local plants and their uses were known to the bushmen, along with the places where they grew. These plants not only provided a balanced diet but also roots that kept water in during droughts. In ways similar to modern phytomedicine, plants were used to treat wounds and illnesses. Other plants were used in healing events, where a healer would burn them to make it rain, trance them to heal an illness, or cast a spell on them to make them fertile.
Infections like malaria, tuberculosis, and syphilis were also treated, as were cuts like snake bites, colds, stomachaches, headaches, toothaches, and diarrhea. One bushman plant, Hoodia gordonii, gained international attention when a pharmaceutical company patented it as a diet aid because bushmen had traditionally used it to control their hunger and appetite. This led to a lawsuit against “bio piracy,” which was eventually settled by paying royalties to bushmen groups.
The food and laid-back lifestyle of bushmen have prevented stress-related diseases in the western world. The health of bushmen isn’t good in general, though: half of children die before they turn 15 years old, and 20% die in their first year, mostly from stomach illnesses. The average length of life for people is 45 to 50 years, and the main causes of death are respiratory infections and malaria. Only 10% of people live to be over 60 years old.
Birth, Death, Marriage And Initiation Of The San Tribe
For the Bushman or San Tribe, birth is not usually a big deal. They don’t get ready or go to the hospital like people do today. People say that when a Bushman woman is about to give birth, she will just hide behind a bush and “squeeze out” the baby. Some say that they make a drug from the devil’s claw (Harpagophytum spp.), have the baby, and within an hour are back to their normal lives. In fact, she’s most likely going to bring her mom or an older aunt with her to help and comfort her.
The author Willemien le Roux’s book “Shadow Bird” tells the story of a difficult birth in the Bush and the old woman who was called to help. Things don’t always go as planned.
When a Bushman baby is born, his parents, other people, and even older children will love and care for him a lot. One thing that stands out about Bushmen is how much they love children, both their own and other people’s.
People in the Bush aren’t very fertile, so if a child is born during a very bad drought, this might be done to stop it from happening. The mother will quietly end the life of the newborn baby to save it from terrible pain in the future. This is most likely to happen during hard times, like when she is still breastfeeding another child and can’t feed both of them. This is normal behavior that comes from having to do something, not out of spite or any other reason.
People do this because they live in difficult environments and know that the life of the child, in which a lot of care has already been given, could be put at risk by their feelings for a newborn who is already expected to die soon. This is not likely to end well.
The Bushmen don’t think much about death. If someone dies at a certain camp, the group will leave that area and never camp there again. When bushmen know that someone is buried there, they will never cross that area. If they have to go near a graveyard, they will whisper to the ghosts under their breath and throw a pebble on the grave to bring them luck. People never step on a grave because they think the spirit still lives there, and they don’t want to bother it.
For most Bushmen, the bridegroom and the bride are the only ones who are invited to the wedding. A guest is only asked very rarely, and there is no party or other ritual in the sense that we know it. Instead, there is a private “ceremony” or agreement between the two people involved.
The Bushmen don’t have rituals to welcome new members. Right after a maiden bleeds for the first time, there is a celebration with dancing and cleansing. Before a boy is called a man, he has to kill his first big, dangerous animal. After that, they are treated like full members of the group or clan.
Religion And Folklore Of The San Tribe
A lot of Kalahari Bushmen think that there is a “greater” and a “lesser” God or Supreme Being. They are not the only mysterious beings out there. The dead’s spirits are another type.
First, the “God” or great being made himself. Then he made the land and its food, the air, and the water.
He is a good power that keeps people healthy and teaches them how to get along with others. He can send bad luck, though, when he is angry. Different groups of people give the greater god different names based on how he shows up. The same people call him different names at different times.
People think of the smaller god as bad or evil, a black magician, someone who destroys instead of builds, and someone who brings sickness and bad luck. He is called many things, just like the “supreme being.” Because they want to bring the living to the same place as the dead, they think that the dead cause sickness and bad luck. Like black people in South Africa, the Bushman are sure that ancient spirits have a big part in the lives of living people. However, they don’t do the same ceremonies to make the spirits happy.
The Bushmen called their god Cagn. The first scholars translated it as “Mantis,” which may not have been the best choice. This god was nothing more than the presence of nature and everything around them that they couldn’t see. They prayed to the moon and the stars as well, but they never said why they did this. Cagn was thought to look like a person and had special abilities and charms.
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