This ‘timeline’ follows from ‘1500s-1600s’

Notes 
1. Places marked on the online map accompanying this historical sequence of references are coloured in green in the text below. They can be found on the google map by searching on their name.

2. Follow these links for full references and a list of abbreviations.

3. A double-asterix [**] is a marker for myself that there is something to be checked or added at this point in the text.

4. An introduction to this chronological sequence of references is here.  

5. Information and/or connections are welcome! Please email futurepastscontact@gmail.com

1700s

‘[I]n the eighteenth century the slave trade from Luanda decreased due to the establishment of other centres and the Portuguese losing their monopoly’^[1].

18th century environmental deterioration?^[2] 

Copper is mined in central and southern Namibia, including at the later Matchless mine, ‘by alleged Dama smiths’^[3] and ‘production of copper beads in the |Khomas area of the upper !Khuiseb was at its most intense’ during this century^[4], perhaps stimulated by intrusion of glass beads at coast and with metal-smiths ‘paid for their work in goats’^[5].

In 1907 German Settlement Commissioner Paul Rohrbach observes that ‘the Hereros’ had ‘held at least the areas south of the Waterberg for little more than a century but had previously been in the Kaokofeld for a long time and had gradually moved from the north-west into the country [‘Hereroland’] now called after them’^[6].

1700

The French geographer Guillaume Delisle publishes his map ‘L’Afrique’ which includes both ‘R. de Mataman’ (in Angola) and ‘Climbebi’, ‘on the seaboard between Cape Negro and the tropic of Capricorn^[7].

Nonidas on the Swakop River is reportedly mentioned around 1700 ‘as a watering place for the mountain Dama coming from the north’^[8].

1704

Johannes Starrenburg, landdrost of Stellenbosch, is sent by W.A. van der Stel (son of Simon Van der Stel and second governor of the Dutch Cape Colony^[9]) northwards on a cattle trading journey ‘to the upper reaches of the Oliphants River beyond Klaver’ [Klawer], accompanied by Corporal Willem Brentgens^[10] and the gardener Jan Hartogh and following the route beyond the Piquetbergen taken by Olof Bergh 23 years previously^[11].

At the Langevlei Riv. Starrenburg finds,

the kraal of Captain Hannibal upon its banks. While out collecting bulbs with Jan Hartogh they saw the sea and determined to trace the river to see if it joined the Quaecoma. A drive of two hours brought them to a barren beach and a boisterous sea with dreadful breakers and dangerous rocks. On looking around they came to the conclusion that the Tythouw discharged itself into a large salt pan and finally lost itself amongst the sand dunes. Large numbers of flamingoes, wild geese and ducks were seen and many were shot for food.^[12] 

At ‘Bergfontein’ Starrenburg states that ‘at the foot of a mountain lies the Spring of Olof’ and ‘adds that the Hottentot name for the mountain was Thokoe (Tho’s Mt.) after a chief named Tho who was killed here by a lion some years before’^[13]. He describes encountering a Kraal in the Hol River, near its meeting with the Oliphant’s River where he had to point his firelock at one of the surprised and alarmed Hottentots who had fitted an arrow to his bow and was aiming it at him when he was prevented from shooting by Starrenburg's Hottentot guide^[14]. That night the sentry was carried off from before the tent and partly eaten by a lion, and so they called the spot the Hole of Misfortune^[15].

On his return journey he correctly describes the source and course of the Sand/Verloren Vlei river ‘when marching south along the eastern slopes of the Piquetbergen’, reporting that

[o]n this side (i.e. east side) of the Piquet-berg are many cattle posts; the soil would produce good wheat if manured, it is mostly a light clay. The mountains have many kloofs, from each of which runs a small brook wending towards the plain where they unite to form the source of the river .... It flows around the northern end of the mountain receiving on the way water from some springs and forms the large Quaecommas River, whose estuary we saw at the sea beach.^[16] 

He spends a night ‘at Groene Kraal (now Groene Valley, beyond Piquetberg) near a limpid brook where a rhinoceros visited them “and stood close to the tent examining the wagons attentively, but retired quietly when the fires were lit”^[17].  

1705

The Danish Society for Christian missionary activities is founded by Frederic IV, contributing missionaries for example to India^[18].

Peter Kolbe / Kolben is sent by the mayor of Amsterdam as the first official astronomer in South Africa, where he produces detailed accounts of day-to-day life at the Cape, and describes the geography, climate, flora and fauna, and peoples^[19].

Portrait of Simon van der Stel and his son Willem Adriaan in 1669. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4d/Portrait_of_Simon_van_der_Stel_and_his_son_Willem_Adriaan.jpg 220817 Jan Weenix [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

1708

A party of ‘Namacquas’ goes

to pay their respects to the newly appointed governor, Louis Van Assenberg. They took with them presents of bullocks and sheep, and received in return a variety of European articles, with which they were highly delighted. The Dutch peasantry, however, soon followed them even to the Khamies mountains, where they purchased cattle and many parts of the country, for beads, brandy, and tobacco. The harmless Namacquas considered the Dutch farmers as the most acceptable neighbours in the world; till most of their cattle, and many of their best fountains of water were wrested from them. Many then entered into a state of servitude with the farmers, and others fled to their more distant friends, beyond the Orange River.^[20]

Cape Governor Willem Adriaan van der Stel is recalled to Holland^[21].

A map published ‘by the senior geographer of the king of France, Guillaume Delisle, …. shows, for the first time, the Kunene river as “R. Cunene ou la Grande Rivière”’, ending nowhere but also depicting ‘two hills’ ‘[w]here we find Kaokoland today’^[22].

1710

On his map of Africa, geographer Moll places ‘Mataman’ and ‘Cimbeba’ slightly inland and south of Cape Negro^[23].

1712

Inscriptions of European names in the rock overhang (where there are also Bushman paintings) at Heerenlogement [the Gentleman’s Lodging] near Uitkomst (see below) are noted as appearing from this date^[24] (although in fact there are earlier inscriptions, see above), on the slopes of the Langeberg Mountains, approx. 20km north of Graafwater^[25]. A large expedition north is led by Capt. Kaje Jess Slotsbo with 99 European men of 181^[26], including Landdrost Muller of Stellenbosch, when investigating a reported invasion of the Sandveld by 5,000 Namaqua Hottentots (Resolution Book, vol. 8, October 11th, 1712, Cape Archives), arriving at Bergfontein and signing his name on the rock below that of Bergh^[27]. Former Cape Governor Simon Van der Stel dies^[28].

Some anthropologists assert that ‘[t]he migration of Ovaherero Bantu speakers from present day Angola and northern Namibia in to the central highland region of Namibia’ took place around this time, writing that:

[t]he social organisation of the Herero polity was fractured into many disparate chieftainships based on extended families and households. Raiding also formed an important part of the Herero economy and mitigated against the creation of fixed wealth disparities and differ­entiation. Pastoral land-use practices included seasonal transhu­mance and fire management that helped maintain grasslands, Prior to the introduction of firearms, large herds of wild herbivores also im­acted the vegetation at a landscape scale.^[29]

1713

Peter Kolbe / Kolben (see 1705) leaves the Cape^[30]. Smallpox in the Cape devastates Khoi and San peoples further afield^[31].

1714

On his map of Africa, geographer Moll again places ‘Mataman’ and ‘Cimbebas’ slightly inland and south of Cape Negro^[32].

1719

Peter Kolb (see 1705) publishes in Germany his observations of ‘Hottentots’ in South Africa^[33]. He describes ‘[n]omadic herders … driving their animals through a smoking fire to give them a scent repellent to predators’^[34].

1721

Senex records ‘Chimbelles pop.’ in the area between Cape Negro and Cape Frio^[35].

Ensign Johannes Tobias Rhenius (born in Berlin, arrives Cape Town in 1708 and married to Engela Bergh on 7 March 1717^[36]) makes first journey north^[37] and scratches his name at Heerenlogement below Olof Bergh’s^[38].

1722

Geographer Delisle’s updated map (see 1700) shows Cimbebas as coastal region south of Cape Negro to C. de Sierra§^[39], and records the tribe Jaggas / Gagas to be living in this area^[40].

1724

Ensign Johannes Tobias Rhenius journeys northwards ‘by order of the Hon. Commander Heer Jan de la Fontaine and the Hon. Council of Policy’ on a trading journey stimulated because ‘the Company’s draught oxen had seriously diminished and were exhausted by the heavy work required of them’^[41], leaving the Fort of Good Hope on 15 September^[42]. He is instructed that

[s]laves guilty only of flight were to be taken under his protection and would be lightly judged and possibly graciously pardoned. Murderers, thieves, incendiaries, highway robbers and other malicious malefactors – unforgivable according to law – he must, if opportunity offered, seize and bring back as prisoners.^[43]

He writes:

[w]e were 47 strong, including an ensign, a sergeant, 3 corporals, a drummer, an undersurgeon, 30 soldiers, 2 slaves and 8 wagon drivers with 4 baggage-wagons each provided with 21 draught oxen making a count of 84 oxen in all.^[44]   

On 18th September from the Company’s Post at Groenekloof the Company’s wagon takes additional goods on to Piketberg^[45]. Arriving (21 Sept.) near the Piketberg via the Berg River (which runs from the south to the east of the mountain) they stop opposite ‘the farm of the farmer Gerrit van Wijk’ who had been granted ‘the loan-farm “Rietfontein below Picquetberg”’ at the southern end of Piketberg and south of Piketberg village, i.e. it appears that ‘Rhenius forded the Berg River on Vondeling, now the site of the bridge to Piketberg’^[46]. Here the Company’s wagon returns to the Company’s Post, and van Wijk assists with a wagon and convoys the expedition to Sonquas Kloof – probably ‘Bosjeman’s Kloof’ leading to Goerap at the northern end of the Piketberg and ‘granted 20 years later to Jacobus Coetse with grazing rights granted to Olof Bergh’s widow (Anne de Connink) in 1730^[47].

From Sonquas Kloof Rhenius sends ‘a Hottentot to the cattle station of the Hon. Capt. Bergh situated over this Kloof’ to ask for assistance over the kloof which has high sides and steep slopes, after which they make it ‘over a toilsome sand hill to the Verloren Vlei’^[48] from where they proceed to and cross the Company’s Ford over the Oliphants Vallij, now Jakkalsrivier, just north of an isolated kopje called Wolweberg/Wolfberg^[49].

On 27th, they

[l]eft the vallij mentioned and advanced through a kloof up a steep and toilsome sandy height and we were here compelled to off-load part of our luggage because the draught oxen could draw the wagons. no farther. I left a Corporal and 10 men there to guard it and we proceeded along a heavy sand track to the Brakke Valley or otherwise the Oliphants Jagt [also named in Van der Stel’s journal, in 1947 called Langevlei River] where we arrived at four o'clock in the afternoon and here found good water and grazing.^[50]   

On 29th travelled past Wolfberg kopje to Oliphants Vallij (now Jakkalsrivier) and on 30th went ‘along a toilsome sand track up a steep height past the so-called Berghfontein’ where Olof Bergh scratched his name in 1682 – ‘Ensign J. T. Rhenius, on a cattle buying expedition in 1721, approached the spring past the Wolweberg and he too added his name and the date September 29, 1721’^[51] - , also Hon. Capt. Slotsboo in 1712, and then onto Heerenlogement^[52].

On 1st October they proceed ‘up a very rocky height and then along a toilsome sandtrack and again over a high stony mountain which we descended at great peril’ down to the Oliphants River where on the south side they camp^[53]. On Monday 2nd they prepare to transport their baggage across the river’s estimated depth of 4,1/2 feet

where it flows in two arms a half-mile higher up stream than where the customary ford is always crossed by former travellers; for without rafts that could not be crossed. We crossed it that day with great difficulty but without damage, and remained on the far bank of the river where we found good grass for the cattle.^[54] 

From here he continues (east?, west?) along the Haver to the Baviansberg (?) ‘so-called by the former travellers because of the baboons which dwell in the caves there’^[55]. They proceed ‘over some hills’ till they come again to Oliphants River with they cross at a ford they name Vogelstruis Drift^[56] and travel N.W. into the Moedverloren (Lost Courage) Hills, finding ‘brackish and stinking water’ in the Muddy Pools also mentioned in journal of van der Stel’s journey^[57].  

On 8th October they proceed ‘over 3 high mountains’ to Meerhof’s Casteel (see 1661) [about 17 kms S-W of Bitterfontein]

a mountain of white rock with a great cave therein, gate-wise and formed by nature. It bears the name of a traveller who also passed this way and a muddy pool close before the cave is also found here, supplied with water like the two previous ones, and with fire-wood and grazing as mentioned above. We rested here making our camp near it. The name of the Hon. Mr. van der Stel of the year 1685 is found carved here.^[58]   

From Meerhof’s Casteel on 9th October they pass

through a kloof between two rocky mountains, then over many hills and dales to the Third Muddy Pool which on our [135] first journey we named Patryssen Fontain because very many of the so-called Namaqua Partridges were seen there. We rested there and to-day it chanced that some of our Hottentots who accompanied us were out in the veld to search for edibles for themselves. They saw four strange Hottentots who, when they spied these our Hottentots, would have taken to flight, but at the call of our’s, ‘We mean you no harm,’ stood still. They brought these Hottentots into our camp at 3 o’clock in the afternoon. I questioned them whence came they and whither going, whereat one of them, who had served as a guide to us in the year 1721[!! – so not so ‘strange’], gave answer that they came from the craals of the Amaquas and were going to the Dutch at, the Picquetbergen, relating further that among the Amaquas there was a sickness to which they gave the name of (small) pocks. Of this many had died, it was brought to them by a Hottentot who had visited some friends among the Briquas and all the kraals had been smitten with this sickness except the one to which he belonged. He, the speaker, in order to escape it, had set out to the Dutch with the companions who accompanied him.

I believed that statement and treated him to a tot of arack and a pipe of tobacco and questioned him further if there were many cattle. I received for answer that there were few, they had much dwindled owing to the internal warfare among themselves, and that in all the kraals hardly five ‘gisjes’^[59] sheep were to be found, that is to say fifty in number. This was confirmed by one of the Grigriqua Hottentots who said that he had seen 100 sheep and even 20 oxen consumed as by wild dogs in a single day. I further caused these four lads to be kept in camp telling them in a friendly manner that they must turn back with us to give me directions where lay their kraals, to which, so it seemed, they had little inclination.^[60]

Travelling further northwards they push on to the Groene River finding good water and grazing here., where Rhenius causes

the 4 Amaqua Hottentots [clearly travelling now with his party] to come to me to find out where lay their kraals. They pointed out to me that they lay dispersed here and there among high mountains and that it was not possible to arrive there with the wagons. I spoke to them in a very friendly manner and promised to give them fine presents if they gave me proper directions and thereon treated them to arack, tobacco and dagga^[61] so that they waxed somewhat merry. One of them, through a Grigriqua Hottentot who spoke Dutch, asked to speak to me alone, since I was so worthy a Master he had something to tell me. In the presence of the Sergeant as well as the said Gregriqua Hottentot I permitted him to come into the tent with me.  

Thereupon he told me that they, the 4 Amaquas, were not going to the Dutch living at the Picquetberg but had been sent by their kraal folk to see if Company’s folk were approaching, for they understood from a Bushman that a musket-shot had been heard but knew not if it were a shot or a thunder clap. If they saw us they were to hide and at the first opportunity return to the kraal to warn them, when they would drive their cattle into the high mountain range and come with their fighting men to see if by night they could surprise and kill us, making themselves master of our goods. He added that for two successive years we had cleared them out of all their cattle; that they were no more inclined to trade with the Company and if all their cattle were gone from them then [139] they would come and fetch cattle from the Dutch. I believed this statement so far as it went but nevertheless I gave strict orders, doubled the night watch and requested the said Hottentots to keep quiet about it, promising them I would give them handsome presents. I sent to-day four of the Hottentots we had with us to the nearest kraals with Greeting gifts^[62] consisting of 5 spans of Tobacco, so many pipes, a vessel with dagga and a can of arack, sending a great Greeting to the people of the kraal, asking them to come and barter with us and saying I would give them handsome payments in all kinds of fine goods which I had brought with me.^[63]   

He waits two days for their return, at which they bring

a headman with his servants, wives and daughters besides 3 head of cattle as a Greeting Gift. These included a yearling calf and 2 old cows. They further told us that they had found most of the kraal folk sick and with no other cattle except a few milch cows. In all the kraals they had not found 10 sheep or goats which on my former journey were in great numbers. They said also that not one of the other headmen would accept Greeting Gifts because they had not the least cattle to barter. I paid the headman who came with them for the 3 Tabeties cattle and stood him a great treat with a request at the same time to him that he persuade his other kraal people to barter. He agreed to do so, but said there were few cattle and that I ought to send some of my people to see it for themselves, and on this he took his leave and went off. To-day I sent also 4 more Hottentots to the other kraals which had sent the 4 spies to us, letting them too take Greeting [141] Goods with a request to come and barter with me and feigning that I knew nought of their designs. These kraals lay 2 days’ journey away in the mountains.  

Saturday 14th. Sent a Sergeant, a Corporal and 12 men to the first kraal to see if cattle could not yet be obtained, ordering him, the Sergeant, to picket above wind from the kraal and allow none to enter so they might not be infected by the sickness. The said Sergeant returned at 7 o’clock to-night to our camp bringing 4 old cows in poor condition, an old bull and 2 meagre calves, relating further that it took them some time to trade even these 7 poor animals and confirming that in greater part the people were smitten by a foul stinking sickness very like the Lazaretto sickness and some were dying daily, also that considering the size of the kraal they had few cattle and of goats and sheep not 25 were to be seen.

Sunday 15th. Our 4 Hottentots sent to the 2nd kraal returned bringing 3 lean cows with a calf, in company with them were 3 men and 4 women from the said kraal. These said that the Bushmen had carried off one of their cattle-kraals and therefore they were now in no condition to trade with us. I held this statement to be an invented tale and quietly questioned one of our Hottentots if it was true. The said Hottentot confirmed that Bushmen had really taken off some of their cattle but said the people of this kraal, as soon as they were aware of our coming, had taken the best of their cattle afar in the mountains and were disinclined to barter with us, and the headmen of this kraal were very angry with the Hottentots they had sent out because they had not better carried out their orders.  

Monday 16th. Again sent 3 of our Hottentots to a different kraal with Goods of Greeting. It was said of this kraal that [143] most of the people had died.^[64]     

On 18th October they move camp on the Groen River (dominated by Acacia karroo) because of reduced grazing, to what Mossop describes as ‘probably below Garies and above the Groen and Klein of Swartdoorn [dominated by black thorn**] River junction’^[65]. Again awaiting return of Hottentots to local Nama kraals – at which he wonders ‘for the kraal is only a day’s journey from us’ – on 20th October he writes,

The Hottentots sent out returned again. Accompanying them were 3 Amaquas women of the headmen of the kraal whose husbands had died of the raging sickness. They too brought tidings that a large portion of their cattle had been captured by Bushmen and that they were wholly impoverished and in no condition to barter with the Company, having none other than a few milch cows to nourish themselves and their children. Nevertheless they brought 3 head of cattle as Greetings Goods, these were 2 old cows and a yearling calf and they could send no more.  

I asked one of our Hottentots who spoke Dutch well, if this were true. He confirmed that he found the women’s assertion to be true, adding that a year ago a Bushman had come to the Amaquas who told them that the Dutch people would come and take all their cattle and on that rumour they had slaughtered and eaten from time to time all their best oxen and sheep, saying it was better to eat them than that they should be booty for others. This agreed with a statement made to me on the 9th of this month by a Grigriqua Hottentot that on a single day they had slaughtered and eaten [145] as though wild dogs up to 10 ‘gisjes’ sheep (which according to their reckoning amounts to one hundred) and 2 ‘gissies oxen.

Seeing that no bartering could be done with these people I resolved to go in some other direction and summoned the sergeant, 3 corporals and the under-surgeon representing to them nothing could be got here and did they not think it well that we search for some other route so as to reach another nation. They unanimously said ‘Yes’, judging it a good thing to do. I then summoned to me the Amaqua Hottentot named Scheele Klaas, the 3 Gregriqua Hottentots Hans, Gerrit Blauw and Scheele Jantje (the 3 latter able to speak reasonably broken Dutch) in order to question these people concerning the way to the Great Namacquas and Briquas lying beyond the River.^[66] In the year 1722 after my [first] journey these same had been thither to obtain cattle from the above named nation. I asked them first if we must pass the Koperberg, to this they answered ‘Yes’. Secondly. How far was the Koperberg from the place we presently were? They talked this over among themselves and, counting on the fingers, gave answer that for a Hottentot it was a 5 days’ journey and in this time not more than a single spring of water was to be found along the way. I looked at the map I had with me, and also consulted the Day Journal of the Hon. Mr. van der Stel and found they agreed with the information of these (Hottentots).  

Thirdly. How far away beyond the Koperberg was the River? After the said Hottentots had first counted on their fingers, I got the reply that for a Hottentot it was a journey of 10 days, over high peaks and very rocky mountains impossible for wagons, and that for 4 or 5 days no drinking water for human beings would be found, for themselves they took drinking water in leathern bags on their pack-oxen.

Fourthly. How far beyond the River were the Great Namaquas and Briquas living? They replied it was also a 10 day journey over a high rocky mountain range likewise unpassable [147] to wagons and with no water, as on the former route. Said the Amaqua Hottentot in his own tongue (which was translated into Dutch by the Gregriqua Hans) ‘Master, you must not go there, for you, your men and your cattle will die.’ They also said that on their journey they had been compelled to slaughter all their draught oxen because firstly their hooves had been trodden to pieces on the sharp stones and then burned in the hot sand; later they had taken as much as 3 kraals of cattle from the nation above named [i.e. were raiding them!], yet of these had brought back only less than a third part. The remainder on account of the great heat and lack of water had remained prostrate along the road.^[67]       

= Themes – there are Nama living and herding in the hills north of Meerhoff’s Kasteel, who have already had contact with settlers.

Pressures exhibited by conflict with and raiding each other = observed declines in livestock and impoverished, plus badly affected by smallpox, also stealing of livestock by ‘Bushmen’.

They are reluctant (indicated in part by leaving Rhenius waiting) to show Rhenius where their kraals and livestock are having already been ‘cleared out’ of their cattle through barter with the Company, to the extent that they are hiding their cattle further in the hills as well as eating large amounts of their own livestock to prevent its capture by the Company.

Opportunistically seeks to find another nation who can supply livestock = pushng back of frontier.

Exchange of non-productive goods/gifts for productive goods i.e. livestock (cf. Kinahan 1991).

On 21 and 22 October they fill their empty casks with water and begin the return journey back via Meerhoff’s Casteel and on 28 October not far north of Heerenlogement (reached on 29 October) ‘two of the Hottentots whom we took with us developed the sickness which raged among the Amaquas’ so he ‘made them stay, therefore, a musket shot away from our encampment so that we too might not be infected’^[68]. On 2nd November one of these Hottentots died at the Veloren Vallij and ‘was buried after their manner by his companions’^[69].

1725

The farm Modderfontein is the first farm established in the Oliphant’s River valley by the Dutch East India Co., granted to Jurgen Hanekom who begins to farm cattle for to supply meat to the Company^[70].

1725-1740

Moritz writes:

[t]he Swartboois originally belonged to the Red Nation (GaiǁKhaun). The separation of the Swartbooi tribe from the main tribe occurred during the reign of Chief ǁKhaub gaib ǁKhomab, who is estimated to have been in power between 1725 and 1740^[71].

1726

François Valentjin, a clergyman for the VOC, publishes a version of Van der Stel’s journal of his 1685-86 journey to the Copperberg, apparently previously acquired from Simon’s son Willem Adriaan Van der Stel^[72].

1727

The French geographer Jean Baptiste Bourguignon d’Anville places between Cape Negro and Cape Frio on his map ‘Ethiopie Orientale’ the words Cimbebas dont le sovereign est appellé Mataman, or ‘Cimbebas of which the sovereign is Mataman’^[73].

1730s

Violence in the Cape precipitates northwards movements of various Khoekhoe and mixed race slaves and servants who speak Cape Dutch, possess firearms, wagons and horses and adopt Christianity = emergence of Oorlam Nama identity and raiding commando economy^[74], to become ‘dynamic militarised, hybridised black groups who lived out the idiom of the ‘boer’ commando’^[75]. As Lau describes:

‘Oorlam’ was a term adopted to indicate the dispossessed and enslaved but resourceful descendants of the Cape Khoisan population, who by the 18th century were largely growing up on Boer farms and in the emerging towns. Some of the Oorlam rejected the subordinate roles forced on them as the Cape economy and the Trekboer movement expanded; they collected a following, forged independent supply routes to the Cape for such goods as clothes, horses, guns and ammunition, and became rulers of independent polities. The Koranna, the Griqua and the Namibian Oorlam groups emerged in this period of history.^[76]   

Dutch and Huguenot settlers begin to encounter Bantu peoples in the vicinity of the Fish River, 600 miles north-east of the Cape^[77].  

1731

Peter Kolben describes ‘the manufacture of conical pots by Khoi herders’^[78].

1733

The French frigate La Venus, under command of Lieutenant Bart, visits Angra Pequeña (as confirmed in 1786, see below), and presumably provides the information included in the French map claimed (unverifiably) by Vedder to have been drawn by the French count Maurepas^[79].

1735

The Swedish zoologist-botanist Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) publishes Systema Naturae, outlining ‘a classification system that is still applicable for animals and plants’^[80].

1737

The Moravians send George Schmidt to the Caledon District east of the Brede River, where, to the objection of the Dutch Reformed Church, he baptises ‘Hottentots’ before being compelled to leave^[81].

1738 
In this year ‘a party of burghers [of ‘the less desirable sort’], most of them from farms around the Piquet bergen’ go north ‘secretly with ten wagons laden with powder, lead, iron, copper beads, tobacco and knives’, trading ‘for cattle first at a kraal of the Little Namaquas’ whose chief guides them to the Great Namaquas at the so-called Great River, where they remained a month^[82]. Here they meet ‘Pieter de Bruyn who was elephant-hunting, and was without trading goods. He was there legitimately, having received permission’ and since the Great Namaquas ‘lived beyond the Orange, it is probable the river was crossed by many Europeans on that occasion’ although there is no documentation of the route they followed^[83]. One Willem van Wyk, Arysz, ‘married a Hottentot woman according to Hottentot custom and adopted their mode of dress and living’^[84]. It is reported that

[w]hen the Europeans, returning homeward, had travelled one schoft from the kraal, their Hottentot servants, with or without their masters’ permission, returned armed, and robbed the Great Namaquas, killing seven of them. It is this incident which made the illegal trading expedition known to the authorities, for the injured Namaquas complained and arrests and interrogations followed. For such illegal trading journeys as became known there were probably others of which no record was made, and long reaches of the course of the Orange River and at least some of the country beyond may have been known to burghers, but not disclosed by them, long before the elephant-hunt of Jacobus Coetse’ [in 1760].^[85]     

Wallace writes that

a trading expedition of Boers and their Khoekhoe and San servants from the Cape Colony crossed the Gariep into Great Namaqualand. This journey culminated in a surprise attack on the homestead of a chief or kaptein called Gal, killing seven people and stealing more than a thousand cattle. The chief’s son, Captain Gaaren, travelled to Cape Town to complain; the episode fuelled more general unrest…^[86]

1739

Following violence in Great Namaqualand (see above) ‘open warfare’ erupts south of the Gariep, ending ‘in crushing defeat for Khoekhoe and San’^[87]. The Great River, i.e. the Orange, is ‘discovered’ by colonists, who speak of large game herds in the vicinity of the river, drawing hunters northwards^[88].

Johan Philipp Giebler writes his name at Heerenlogement on 24 September when stationed at the Simonsberg mine in Namaqualand(**), and was married to Anna Marguerita Hop, the daughter of Hendrik Hop (see 1761)^[89].

1741

Peter Kolb’s observations of the Cape and its inhabitants (see 1705, 1719) are published in France^[90].

Mid-1700s

Coastal peoples on Skeleton coast probably start trading with Europeans^[91] with ‘new commerce incorporated into pre-existing networks’^[92]. By this time the Cape colony had fewer than 2,000 white settlers / ‘Pilgrim Fathers’ or ‘Afrikaners’, mainly Dutch Calvinists and some German Protestants and Huguenot refugees, outnumbered by coloured servants and imported slaves^[93].

On the surface at Big Elephant Shelter in the Erongo Mountains ‘[t]hree glass beads, ten iron and two copper beads’ plus ‘the remains of two smoking pipes’ date to ‘probably not greater than about 200 years’, although despite being at a location associated with Dama ‘cannot necessarily be ascribed to their workmanship’^[94]. Metal objects are also recovered from the surface at various sites in southern Namibia including Austerlitz (Karas Region), Messum Crater, the Twyfelfontein area, Pockenbank (south of Aus), Tiras (north-east of Aus).

1747

The botanist Jan Andries Auge arrives in the Cape and is appointed assistant gardener in the Company's Garden^[95].

1750

In around 1750 some of the Herero thought to have settled in southern Angola and Kaokoveld are thought to have gradually moved into the north-central and central areas of the country^[96]. Thus it is only in ‘the second half of the 18th century that groups of Herero began to push southwards, a movement that was eventually checked by the Oorlam Afrikaners under Jonker’^[97].

ca. 1750-1870

Movement northwards of ‘Oorlam’ Nama^[98].

1751

Rijk Tulbagh becomes Governor and appoints botanist Auge as Superintendent of the Company’s Garden, as which Auge led the Garden in a more botanical direction, undertaking ‘many expeditions in search of indigenous plant material and it is generally agreed that some of the oldest indigenous trees in the Garden were planted by him’^[99].

Jacobus Coetse (see 1760), fourth son and sixth child of Johannes Coetse and Elisabeth Paling and grandson of Dirk Coetse / Coetzee ‘who arrived at the Cape in 1679, [and] was granted Coetsenberg in 1682 by Simon van der Stel, is ‘fined 2 guldens and costs for arrears in tax payment on his stock and on “Lion and Tiger Money” … a tax for the extermination in earlier days of lions, leopards, jackals and other vermin’, indicating a route through which these animals were reduced in the Cape^[100].

‘[L]oan farms were being registered along the Orange River from this year onwards’^[101].

1753

Jacobus Coetse (see 1760) is ‘granted the grazing-occupational rights of Bosjesman’s Kloof at the southern end of the Piketberg Mountain’^[102].

1755

A fire following an earthquake in Lisbon burns down the castle São Jorge destroying the original documents relating to the journeys of Diago Cão and Batholemew Dias along the west African coast^[103].

Smallpox epidemic in the Cape with which northwards migration is associated, e.g. of Katse Korana^[104], is known to reach Nama peoples to the north the Orange (see below)^[105].

1757

By this year, and illustrating how wealth could be built up on the Cape frontier, Jacobus Coetse (see 1760) and his wife ‘possessed a daughter, two horses, ninety head of cattle and a hundred sheep, with musket, pistol and sword’ and in this year he was also ‘a mounted infantryman in the Company of which Hop was First Lieutenant, the first occasion on which contact between these two burghers, the one wealthy and of commissioned rank, the other poor and in the ranks, has been traced’^[106].  

1758

Jacobus Coetse (see 1760) acquires grazing-occupational rights [‘the rights of occupation, grazing and sickle’^[107]] to ‘Klipfontein at the corner of the Picquet Berg’, vacated by his uncle Camelis Coetse, and ‘to-day the site of the pleasant village of Aurora, on the western or seaward slope of the mountain’ where Olaf Bergh camped in 1682^[108].

Carel Frederik Brink from Berlin, a surveyor who later draws the first map of ‘Namaland’, arrives on the Amsterveen^[109]. 

1760

Carel Frederik Brink becomes Assistant Surveyor and Map Maker (on 20 guldens per month) and then Chief Surveyor two years later^[110].

The ‘farmer and elephant hunter’ Jakobus Coetzé (also Coetsé, Coetsee)^[111] journeys on 14 July ‘with 2 wagons and accompanied by 12 Hottentots of the Gerigriquas Nation’^[112] from his home at Aurora [previously Klipfontein/ Coele Klipfontein^[113]] on the west side of the Piquetberg to the Gariep and beyond, with a permit from the Cape Governor, Ryk Tulbagh (‘Councillor Extraordinary of Dutch India and Governor of the Cape of Good Hope and Dependencies thereof’^[114]), to shoot elephant beyond the Orange^[115], claiming during his lifetime ‘to be the first European to have penetrated far beyond the Great (Orange) River’^[116]. His journey is ‘[r]elated thus to the Political Secretariat, In the Castle of good hope, the 18th November 1760’^[117].

Apparently able to understand and speak Nama^[118], he is accompanied by a ‘number of Hottentots’ including ‘a Bastard, named Klaas Barends, who, owing both to his character and to his knowledge of languages, was especially qualified to be foreman of the Hottentots’^[119]. At the Coperbergen he reports that he is unable 'to obtain more than 2 elephants between the river of that name and the aforesaid Groene River'^[120]. After a further 12 days travel north he reaches the Great [Orange] River ‘which, to the knowledge of the narrator, has never before been crossed by [a member of] any European Nation’, at the Gū-daos drift, now ‘Goodhouse’ ‘where there is a fairly broad sand-shoal’^[121], overgrown on both sides with the reed ‘Vaderlands Riet’ / Phragmites communis, now australis, and 'a large number of hippopotami have their abode there', plus ‘the banks of this river were covered with a fine yellow and glittering kind of dust or sand’ a little of which was collected and brought back ‘on account of its beauty’^[122].

Following the Leeuwen or Lion River north for four days, so-called ‘in consequence of the many lions found hereabouts’ and known by Nama as the ǁHoum^[123], Coetsee emerges on the 5th day ‘from the |Goaǂnus mountains which line its banks as far as Alurisfontein’ [the Vogelfontein of Hop’s 1761 journey and a place for watering cattle and with some huts of the Bondelswarts cattle-herds at the time of Mossop’s volume]:

upon a level and very grassy district [a plain extending from Alurisfontein north beyond Warmbad and Kanus where the flat-topped Karas mountains are visible], really the beginning of the Land of the Great Amacquas who previously used to live on this side of the Great River, but who about 20 years ago betook themselves across the River, deeper inland [i.e. so appears that these people were already in retreat northwards from the Cape Colony]. Having thus arrived here amongst the Great Amacquas the narrator soon noticed that his arrival was viewed not without astonishment, for they appeared by thousands from all directions. For this reason he deemed it advisable to send one of the Hottentots he had with him to the nearest of these Amacquas with the request that he should come to him, the narrator, at the place where he had out-spanned his wagons. Whereupon, by degrees some of them came in small groups to him, and they did not hesitate to tell him frankly that his arrival there pleased them little and that his person was not free from danger amongst them [i.e. so Europeans were already unwelcome]. The narrator, however, having then made it known to them that he had come by permission of the [283] Honourable the Governor without any other intention than to shoot elephants, they became amenable and allowed him to pursue his journey still further Northwards through their Land. … Having trekked onwards from here for two days, and having on the first day made his rest-place beside a warm spring welling out of the ground [understood as the earliest known reference to Warmbad, about 100 paces from the east back of the ǁHoum^[124]], [he arrives] … at a fairly high mountain which, being composed almost entirely of black rock, was named by him the Swarteberg [in 1935 the Bunsenberg on the western bank of the ǁHoum River between Warmbad and Dabi-gnabis]. Here also a great body of Amacquas came to him^[125]; they appeared rather more gentle-natured and in some measure differed in speech from those whom he had first encountered. By these people he was told that about ten days journey to the North of the aforesaid Swarteberg a kind of people would be found, whom they called Damroquas, having a tawny or yellow appearance, long hair, and clothed in linen^[126] [an observation that led to Hop’s expedition in 1761].^[127] 
[285] Further concerning the aforesaid Great Amacquas who, as said before, at the present time occupy the country from the other side of the Great River to the Swarteberg, they are, according to the narrator’s account, unusually populous and are provided in abundance with horned cattle and sheep. These, by reason of the grassy veld and the many flowing rivers, were in very good condition. The narrator found this nation, particularly those members living deepest inland, of a friendly disposition. This was evident from the fact that after being assured that his arrival was not associated with any evil intention, they allowed him to journey through their country without any trouble, and to return in like fashion. In regard to the huts, manner of living, food, clothing and weapons of these people they differ but very little from other Hottentots, except that in place of sheep skins they clothe themselves with the hides of jackals and do not smear themselves with fat. For the rest they are much set upon obtaining beads, but are fondest of iron. Wherefore the narrator, on his return journey, having been presented in a friendly manner with a few young oxen for provision on the road, in return made them a present of some links from the trek-chain of his wagon, with which they were highly pleased. But the narrator, not being provided with any other trifles, was therefore unable to find out what else is desired most amongst them. The narrator, moreover, when he was travelling slightly to the East of these Great Amacquas on a certain occasion, met another nation named Enequas^[128]. who likewise were very populous and possessed [287] much stock, including a sort of goat the size of an indigenous heavy hartebeest. The narrator also found that these Enequas live in continuous enmity with the Amacquas. Furthermore there is found in this land of the Great Amacquas a multitude of lions and rhinoceroses as also another animal still totally unknown here [i.e. at the Cape], which although not as bulky as the elephant, is considerably taller of body; the narrator supposes both because of this and the long neck, the humped back and long legs, that it is, if not the real camel, at least a kind of camel. In gait these animals are very slow and cumbrous so that the narrator, being on horseback on a certain occasion, and having given chase, caught up to two of them with little difficulty and shot them. Both were females, one of which was with a calf which the narrator took with rum and kept alive for about 14 days on bran soaked in water. But the same having died from lack of milk or other good food, the narrator brought its hide hither. But the appearance of the adult animals cannot really be pictured from this skin, because the young one is spotted and without a hump on the back; the full-grown animal on the contrary is without spots, is ruddy in colour and has massive humps. On the head of the young animal two horn-like growths are found which are really only short knobs on the adult. The flesh of these animals, and especially of the young ones, is an exceptional delicacy to the Amacquas.
The narrator also told of having found, in addition to other strange vegetation in the said land of the great [289] Amacquas, large trees, the heart or innermost wood of which was of an unusually beautiful bright red colour, the branches having large clover-like leaves and yellow flowers, and also pods^[129]. Furthermore he, the narrator, in addition to [finding] several other still unknown Copper Mountains, encountered, about 4 days journey from the Great River, a mountain covered generally with a yellow glittering ore, of which a few small pieces were knocked off by him and brought hither.  

Having thus journeyed from his aforesaid farm at the Picquetbergen, at a guess quite 50 days inland, as far as the Swarteberg^[130], and having in all this time seen no more elephants than the two above-mentioned that were shot by him, but having seen their tracks several times, the narrator on that account travelled back along the way he had taken on the outward journey, without being troubled in the slightest by the aforesaid Amacquas on his return journey and without meeting the Little Amacquas who five years ago trekked from the Groene River to across the Cous River.

The narrator furthermore has brought with him one of the above-mentioned Great Amacquas who desired to travel hither with him.^[131]   

He kills two elephant on his journey, finding giraffe, i.e. ‘camelleopard’, here and naming the edible camelthorn after them[?**] … This journey was ‘more distant … than any other European had been’ but he ‘however had no one with him except the hottentots he had taken with him and on that account had not ventured to penetrate farther into the Country’^[132].  

1760-1771

‘The scribe Manoel Coelho Monteiro listed a total of 73 ships with 22 268 slaves which passed through the harbour of Principe between 1760 and 1771. All but one of the ships were from Bahia. Taxes on slaves were levied by the Portuguese crown and could be paid at Bahia, Sao Thomé or Principe; the latter harbour was preferred.’^[133]

1760s

Josaphat Hahn, son of missionary Carl Hugo Hahn, writes in 1869 that ‘about one hundred years [i.e. 1769] ago a mighty and beautiful Negro people, rich in measureless herds of cattle and small stock, came from the North and occupied the ... present land of the Ovaherero’^[134].

1761

On return to the Cape Colony, Coetzé / Coetsee reported news of pastoralists and their many cattle, impressing Hendrik Hop, Captain of the Burgher Forces at Stellenbosch who, with authorization by the Council of Policy on 30 June, under the Governor Ryk Tulbaugh, ‘Councillor Extraordinary of Netherlands India, Governor of Cabo d Goede Hoop’^[135], and accompanied by 16 Europeans (volunteers with names including Coetsee, Roos, Joubert, Heyns, Kruger, Marais, Badenhorst, Greeff and Van Niekerk^[136]), including a land surveyor (Carel Frederik Brink) ‘who drew the oldest known map of Namaland’^[137], a botanist/gardener (Johan Andries Auge (also Ook^[138]) ‘for collecting all strange seeds and plants hitherto unknown here’^[139], and a doctor and mineralogist (Dr Carel Christoffel Rykfoot) and an interpreter (Marais), plus 68 ‘Hottentots’ (or ‘half-breeds’^[140]) and 15 ox-wagons (each drawn by a span of 10 oxen^[141]), led a (largely self-provisoned^[142]) expedition to ‘Damaraland’ with the intention of establishing trade relations and bringing cattle back to Cape Town, although drought meant that he only made it as far as Swartmodder (now Keetmanshoop)^[143]. The expedition, also described as a ‘scientific expedition to explore the country north of the Orange River’^[144], with Jacobus Coetse (see above) as guide and hunter, leaves Cape Town on 16 July and crosses the Gariep at Ramans Drift to arrive at Warmbad on 5 October^[145]. The Council of Policy granted permission since it was,

a matter of no little concern that the interior of the Country northward of here be closely examined inland for the purpose of proving [4] if and what advantages might thereby be gained for both our Ruling Masters and this Colony. Moreover, considering that among other matters it is stated in the Narrative of the journey made by the aforesaid Coetzee, that about sixteen days’ journey on the far side of the Great River was to be found a certain Nation who, according to the description given to him, are tawny in appearance, with long hair on their heads and are clad in linen, and who it must be supposed are a civilized People, - Now, therefore it is agreed and resolved to authorise an Inland Expedition by the Inhabitants who have volunteered therefore, under command of the above mentioned Capt. Hendrik Hop. It is also resolved to send with him the Surveyor Carel Frederik Brink to chart a proper map of the still unknown country, and to take daily notes during the journey of anything noteworthy. For the purpose of collecting all strange plants and shrubs one of the gardeners from the Company’s Garden shall also be attached to the said travellers. Furthermore, it is understood that for the purpose of the said Expedition and on the Company’s account the following goods, unavoidably necessitated, be supplied to the said Capt. Hop.^[146]     

Two months previously ‘grazing on “Uitkomst below Cammiesberg”’ had been ‘granted to the son of that Hendrik Beuke(r)s whose father in 1742 had laid information against Jan Hop…, and a few years later young Beukes was occupying Wolvepoort, the Aloekloof of Brink’s Journal’^[147].

The plan was to meet with expedition volunteers at Koekenaap on Oliphants River on 16 August. Hop left the Cape on 16 July with

three of the Hon. Company’s wagons, each with ten oxen, inspanned and laden with a boat, 900 lbs. of powder and 2010 lbs. of lead, besides various necessary implements and some trifling presents supplied to serve the purpose of this Company’s Expedition. Accompanying these wagons was the undersigned surveyor Carel Frederik Brink, for the purpose of both making a suitable map of the undiscovered unknown country and of keeping a journal of daily occurrences.^[148]   

En route they camp at Heerenlogement after leaving Ratel-klip, when their oxen were very weak due to heat and poor pasturage^[149]. On 2-6 July, at Vredendal farm on Oliphants River, granted to Pieter van Zijl in 1748 - his son was a dragonder (mounted infantryman) in Capt. Hop’s militia co. Hop/Brink expedition stayed here - their trek-oxen exhausted^[150]. Moved to the other side of the Oliphants River and onto Hol River (Nama = Koengaap or turn about river) (for early settlers = Agterom R.)^[151] They also stay at Vleermuisklip (Bat Rock, also Salpeeterklip) before arriving at Koekenaap (also Bakoven) where ‘we found here the remainder of our company with their wagons, some having sooner, others later having joined on the way’^[152]. Koekenaap is most often where explorers ‘left the safety of the river to strike north into the arid Hardveld’^[153] or ‘Hardeveldt’, described later as ‘a marked contrast to the sandy country, on the Southern side of the Oliphant’s River, for here the roads are good and hard, and hence the name of Hardeveldt’^[154].  

The company consisted of:

17 Europeans - Hendrik Hop, Commander of the Expedition; Carel Frederik Brink, Land Surveyor; Johan Andries Auge, Gardener; Carel Christoffel Rykvoet, Burgher Surgeon; and the burghers Abraham Russouw, Jacobus Coetsee, Jansz., Hendrik Cruger, Andries Greef, Jan Nieuwkerk, Thieleman Roos, Pieter Marais, Caspar Batenhorst, Jan Batenhorst,  Josua Joubert, Coenraad Scheffer, Jurgen Coetsee, Ockert Heyns, [17] + 68 ‘half-breeds’.^[155]

The district from the Oliphants River to the junction of the Groene and Swarte Doorn Rivers, west to the sea and east to the Bokkeveld, is ‘commonly called the Amacquas Land’ and is described as

everywhere a dry sandy country covered towards the west by elevated ridges and towards the East are high rocky mountains. There are no flowing rivers but only a few springs after heavy rainfalls. Small water-courses fashion themselves along the ranges, they soon flow away leaving behind them a little water in pools. In summer these soon dry or become brack. Furthermore one finds no wood for timber here, the dry river banks being lined only with thorn-trees and the flats covered only by small shrubs. The country also is but sparsely populated neither [21] does it contain much big game, except along the coast where a fair number of elephants still find subsistence.^[156]

31 Aug. ‘We resumed our journey as far as the Klipvalley at a Namaqua kraal’, then ‘left the resting place last mentioned, and camped beside a spring where the Namaquas, inhabiting several small kraals, came to us. They brought with them a few slaughter oxen and sheep for bartering’^[157]. 6th Aug. Camped in ‘Aloë Kloof’, now called Wolvepoort, where they found ‘very many aloe trees of different heights and thicknesses’, including one near the Sand River (i.e. the Buffels/Buffalo/Koussie/|Goasib – until 1804 part of the boundary of the Cape Colony^[158]), ‘the stem of which was about seven feet high and so thick that it could hardly be encompassed about by three men’ = Aloe dichotoma / Kokerboom / quivertree – the bark of which was used by Bushmen to make quivers for their arrows^[159]. Just further north they find ‘a spring named Tigerfontein’ on farm Koornhuis, marching on 12 Sept. to ‘a similar brooklet before the Kloof of the Kooperbergen’, arriving here on 13 Sept. and describing them as follows:

[w]e passed the Kloof of the Kooperbergen at the exit of which we found the Copper Mountains which were mined by the Hon. Simon van der Stel in the year 1685. Properly speaking these are six hills which stand out from the high range and show traces of verdigris in their surfaces. We saw several excavations which had been made in them, the deepest about a man's length. To the right of the way, the aforesaid year 1685 was hewn out on a rock^[160]. We continued our journey through an extensive flat, passing three more small copper mountains, and made our camp at the last of these^[161].

They travel quickly north from here, ‘across a sandy plain’ [‘the desolate san-valley of the Koa’ – meaning sand-dunes^[162]] with no water, arriving on 19th Sept. ‘before the high mountain range extending along the Great River’, to which they came that evening [at Ramon’s Drift^[163]], finding it ‘to be flowing swiftly between steep banks with high stony mountains on either side’ with ‘banks clothed in willows and thorntrees’, containing ‘carp like those in the Fatherland’ and maintaining ‘a large number of hippopotami’^[164]. Carel writes that ‘the inhabitants call it the Ein^[165], and also the Charies [i.e. !Garieb], ‘while on certain different [27] maps of this region, about this latitude, a river is marked with the name River Saint Anthony’^[166]. On 21 Sept. they prepare ‘to transfer our equipage from Little Namaqualand to the side in Great Namaqualand’^[167].

Here,

[t]he surveyor with the burgher Jacobus Coetsee [see 1760] resumed their journey in order to examine the curve of the river and the country extending there towards the mouth. They found that the high and precipitous mountains at certain places closed in on the river so closely that it was impossible to pass, we therefore sought a more suitable way behind the mountains and after advancing for two days through a difficult and rocky range without fresh water we found a narrow passage leading to the River. This had been a place of refuge for the Bosjesmans where certain indications shewed they had quite recently camped. We discovered also several small level places along the Riverside on which the hippos grazed and that the high ranges extended in rows parallel with the river. We were unable to see the end of them toward the west; and so, uncertain of finding drinking-water behind them, we had to abandon our further inspection of this district. Returning to camp on Saturday 26th, we were informed that the Commander had sent some of the Little Namaquas who had followed us, to the Great Namaquas on the 23rd, to inform them of our arrival. These men with fifteen Great Namaquas, two slaughter oxen and some wethers had returned. Moreover the Great River, which had fallen daily since our arrival here, had again risen ten inches on the 23rd although no rain had fallen here. The west wind raged strongly on the 25th and raised so many wavelets on the river that it was necessary to postpone hauling the wagons across it that day.

Here the land of the Little Namaquas is described as follows (i.e. contrast with previous description that affirms Little Namaquas extending north only as far as Groene River):

the land from the Groene R. to the Great River … properly speaking forms the Land of the Little Namaquas. It is bordered to the west by the sea, to the north by the Land of the Great Namaquas, to the East by Bushmanland^[168] and southward to the Little Namaquas … Throughout it is a dry and sandy country without any perennial rivers. The Swartedoorn R., the Groene R. and the great Sand R. [Buffels/Koussie R.] are the foremost and take origin North Easterly from the high mountain ranges and flow westward to the sea through high stony mountains, on which grows neither grass nor foliage, throughout their course. Of these, one is the famous Copper Mountain which the Hon. Simon van der Stel visited in the year 1685. No wood for timber is found in this land except tall thorn trees along the rivers and on the plain low-growing shrubs, for the most part a milk-bush. The aforesaid Little Namaquas who inhabit this land are of a nature most lazy and timorous. Owning few cattle, they live in great poverty, but notwithstanding this, are continually harassed by the Bosjesmans who rob them both of life and stock. In this way, this people becomes weaker and poorer from time to time. It is to be feared that in course of a few years they will at last be extirpated by the said robbers.^[169]   

On 29 Sept.

 [t]ogether we crossed the river without mishap with all our wagons and about one hundred Little Namaquas, men, women and children, who were accompanying us to visit their friends among the Great Namaquas. They seized the occasion because, fearing they would be murdered by the Bosjesmans, they would not otherwise have dared. Among these Little Namaquas who followed us was a Great Namaqua who accompanied the burgher Jacobus Coetse a year ago to Little Namaqualand. Yesterday, when crossing the river with his cattle, he [31] had the misfortune to fall into the stream and was drowned.^[170] 

They trek to a braak spring – the permanent spring of Klein Ga-obis, then marching on again amidst stony mountains as far as a kraal of Hottentots and there found a spring of water which tasted strongly of mud [= the permanent spring of Modderfontein?]. The Commander here gave orders concerning barter and night-guard; to wit - that each man according to the number of his draught oxen might barter not more than six head at a time and that two Europeans with some ‘half-breed Hottentots’ should always keep guard at night.

1st Oct.

[w]e left the above mentioned camp and proceeding among the mountains then arrived at the Leeuwen R. which arises up north from the Berghfontein and empties itself in the Great R. south easterly from here. It bears its name from the large number of lions which exist here. Along the banks of this river are Red-wood trees and Thorn-bush, we found it dry but along its banks saw signs that in the rainy season it could rise very high. We came today to a kraal of the Great Namaquas. The inhabitants, as soon as they were aware of our approach and seeing some of our company mounted on horseback, all took to flight. In the huts we found none but old men and women who were in great distress but became more cheerful when dagga and tobacco were given to them. When this was observed by the younger folk who had fled they came back stealthily to their huts one by one as though [33] at ease and later they shewed themselves boldly before us. We made our camp here beside a pool of water called the Valse drift^[171], camping subsequently at Vogelfontein [= Alurisfontein] before arriving at the Warmbath … [on 5th Oct^[172]] an ever flowing spring of water, temperately warm, and thus always suitable to bathe in [in 1947, supplying a garden and surrounded by a wall]. The spring lies about two hundred paces from the East bank of the river on a low and stony rise. It bubbles up like boiling water and has a somewhat briny taste, not however markedly strong so it is not unpleasant to drink. We found the soil here to be fallow and the salt beside the water lay dry for the depth of a finger. Here the first giraffes were observed by us; one of these, a female, was killed and the young one with it captured. Concerning the appearance of the one killed, we found the body to resemble most that of the cow, although head and neck were like that of the horse. The height from hoof to head was 17 feet, the proportion of body length to height was as one to two and a half. Moreover on account of this shortness of body in comparison with its other members, and because of its extraordinary movements, it is unthinkable that this animal can be employed for any [35] useful purpose. For the rest, it is white in colour along neck and fore parts of the body, with light-brown checkered patches and diamond-shaped though more darkly brown patches on its hinder parts. On the fore-head are two horns about a foot in length, these project forward and are encased in hairy hide. Food is mostly sought on the tall Red-wood trees yet they can graze on level ground, although on account of the tall forepart of the body they must then go on their knees.

10th Oct.  

‘We left the Warmbath and trekked again along the river as far as a brackish pool where we intended to stay the night but found almost no water there. It was thought best to go on through the night to the Rietfontein[= Dabi-gabis, named after the Khoekhoegowab name daweb for Tamarix usneoides]. This was done by the burghers but was not possible for the Hon. Company's wagons and the exhausted cattle, so they had to remain at the place first mentioned. Meanwhile the young giraffe which was captured by us died despite all efforts made to preserve its life…  The wagons of the Hon. Company followed the burghers to the Rietfontein. This is the place from which the burgher Jacobus Coetse commenced his return journey last year’ (see 1760).^[173] In the vicinity another giraffe is shot by the burgher Jan Badehorst and measured^[174].

Travelling north between the Great and Little Karras Mountains they camp on 22 October near a Nama settlement on the Lion River, where rhinos, giraffes, buffaloes, zebras, quaggas, kudus, elands, hartebeests and gnus ‘offered wonderful opportunities for hunting’^[175]. Coetse and Marais travelled ahead and reached the Fish River [ǁAub^[176]] where Nama people knew nothing about ‘longhaired black people in linen clothing’ claimed to live to the north, although did say that ‘people called Tamaquas (Hereros or Bergdamas) lived to the northward’ bearing scars of their chests and backs [presumably from medicinal tattoos], wearing skin karosses and living in wooden huts^[177]. They had also heard of other ‘races’:

- Sondamroquas (Gamdama, i.e. Seadama – ‘a tribe of the Bergdamas’

- Birinas (birin meaning goat, implying the Bechuanas(?) who got this Nama name from their goat farming)^[178]. The expedition discovers that the smallpox epidemic of 1755** ‘had been very bad in South West Africa’^[179]. The return journey commenced on 7 December having reached as far as Heinabis to the south of Keetmanshoop^[180].

Surveyor Brink’s map depicts four huts of a Bushman settlement in the south west corner of the Namib which Vedder describes as made of whale ribs, with a larger Nama reed mat settlement shown to the north with numbers of cattle and ‘a large number of people, of both sexes and all ages, are engaged in a reed dance to the accompaniment of reed flutes’^[181].

Hoernlé later writes that Hop’s expedition ‘far beyond the Orange River’ finds Namaqua ‘in an impoverished condition’ having been ‘robbed by the Bushmen of the greater part of their cattle[?], and it seemed as if they must eventually be utterly destroyed’^[182].

The Afrikaner family, who have important impact on Namibian history in 1800s, are first recorded in sources around this time^[183]: specifically in ‘an official complaint … by a civil servant of the Dutch East India Company, Adrian van Schoor, … about the behavior of the “Bosjemans Hottentotten Capitein Claas en Afrikaner” who is perhaps Klaas Afrikaner, the probable founder in the 1790s of the fortified settlement of ǁKhauxa!nas in the Great Karas mountains^[184]. It appears that Klaas Afrikaner’s brother and father (‘Oude Ram’) are banished for life to Robben Island (the brother dying there in 1777 and ‘Oude Ram’ perhaps dying before arriving)^[185].

1762

Hop’s expedition returns to Cape Town in April^[186] via Heerenlogement with one of the company (VOC) wagons on 12 April. It is followed by rapid settlement in the Kamiesberg^[187].

A ‘Teilman Roos and P. Marais’ see ‘Namaquas smelting copper’^[188] and mention ‘the tamacquas of dark colour and scarred face’ and ‘Taradidamacquas are also called "female people"’^[189].  

1763

Whaling grounds off west African Guinea coast opened around now^[190].

1770

Louis XV (1710-1774) of the royal household of Versailles. receives a rhinoceros from India which lives at the court for 23 years [see 1793]^[191].

American whalemen discover Walvis Bay whaling grounds^[192].

1770s

The Afrikaner family become ‘subject to a white settler, Pieter Pienaar, in the Cape Colony’, signaling beginning of a ‘collaboration phase’ between the Oorlam Afrikaners and white settlers^[193].

Increased American whaling off the Namibian coast, following decline of whaling grounds off New England, leads to a significant increase in trade [incl. ‘Virginian tobacco, pipes, rum, tinware, wire, cloth, sopa, muskets and gunpowder’^[194]] with coastal peoples on the Skeleton Coast^[195], especially around Woolwich (Walvis) Bay and Little Fish Bay and Cabinda in present-day Angola^[196].

James Chapman reports in 1855 that ‘Some of the oldest natives at the Lake [Ngami] had heard that the Damaras[Herero] were driven by a more powerful tribe from the east; they found their way to the Lake, whence some steered directly westward, while others went northwards to Lebebe's present territory [?where], remained there a number of years, then migrated south and west. Damara tradition corroborates their having come from the east about 70 or 80 years ago^[197].  

1772

An English edition of d’Anville’s map of 1727 places between Cape Negro and Cape Frio the note ‘“Km [Kingdom] of Climbeba or Mataman. Most Geographers place this Kingdom hereabouts but it is imaginary”’^[198].

Around 1770-1820

In possibly around these years (i.e. 7-9 generations from the mid-1990s assuming around 25 years per generation), oral history indicates that Herero-speaking peoples began moving westwards down the Kunene River from a hill in southern Angola called Okarundu Kambeti, moving also into hills on either side of the river^[199]. A mythical figure called Nihova is said to be buried here and ‘frequently mentioned in praise songs recited at commemoration rituals’ and movement from here by pastoralists with cattle, sheep and goats is said to have been stimulated by drought^[200]. Cattle and sheep amongst these people are said to have come from the north, goats from the south, and the pastoral economy included hunting, gathering, esp. Hyphaene palm fruits, Cyperus fulgens corms (ozoseu) and honey – the latter especially in the Baynes Mountains south of the Kunene River and west of the Omuhonga River, but did not include agriculture [14] until the end of the 19th century^[201].

Bollig states that ‘these early migrants did not enter an unpopulated area or an area only thinly populated by foragers (presumably of Khoisanid origin)’ but instead according to oral testimony ‘they met with other pastoralists … who were rich in livestock and culturally akin to themselves’ with no violence arising with them^[202]. This ‘pre-Kuena [see below] War society was dominated by ovahona (rich and powerful men) such as Kaoko (‘the giver of the name for the entire region’), Kaupanga and Mureti in northern and eastern Kaokoland, Tjikurundjimbi in the western parts’ (with western Himba [?this name came later?]) trading ‘with the Koroka^[203] at the mouth of the Koroka [Curoca] valley’) and Nokauua in the southern parts’ although there are ‘few ovahona’ and ‘many people had few livestock’^[204]. Occasional livestock raids by Owambo Ovahuahua ‘from the north’ are remembered as the “War of the Shields” because the Ovahuahua ‘warriors protected their bodies with shields against the arrows of the Herero’^[205].

In 1907 German Settlement Commissioner Paul Rohrbach observes that ‘the Hereros’ had ‘held at least the areas south of the Waterberg for little more than a century but had previously been in the Kaokofeld for a long time and had gradually moved from the north-west into the country [‘Hereroland’] now called after them’^[206].

1773

Colonel Robert James Gordon, a Dutchman of Scottish origins in service to the Dutch East India Company, latterly as Commander of the Company’s Garrison, first visits the Cape^[207].

Fourteen American whaling vessels return from African coast^[208].

1774

The Cape botanist J.A. Auge who makes many collecting trips north of Cape Town writes his name at Heerenlogement^[209].  

J. von Plettenberg observes Khoi (early Sanga-type) cattle to be distinguishable from the later Sanga-type cattle of Bantu speakers^[210].

Hendrik Jacob Wikar, a Gottenberg-born Swede who in 1778-79 writes an influential journal regarding his travels along the Orange River, takes service with the Dutch East India Co. and arrives in Cape Town as a soldier (soldaat)^[211]. Working primarily as a writer in the Company’s Hospital, he takes ‘to gambling and card playing’, becoming ‘indebted to various friends to the extent of one hundred Rixdollars’^[212].

1775

After being publicly humiliated by a creditor, Wikar [see 1773] deserts from the Company’s service on 4th April, fleeing beyond ‘the settled districts of the Kamiesberg’^[213].

ca. 1775-1785

Galton writes in the mid-1800s that ‘it was a constant complaint of the Damaras [Herero], that less rain falls now in their country than some twenty or thirty years back; and even their extensive migration from the Kaoko, [i.e. from the north-west into central Namibia referred to in the 1850s as ‘Damaraland’] … has been ascribed by the Damaras to the water failing them for their cattle’^[214]. Thus,

[a]bout 70 years ago (certainly between 65 and 75 years), and when, from uniform testimony, water was much more abundant [157] than it is now, the Damaras [Herero] lived in the Kaoko alone. The Ovampo were within their present frontier, but the Mationa [Bechuana] extended to Ovampantieru-land, certainly far to the westward of Otchombinde [Tunabis], and all between these and down to the Orange River, lived Hottentots of various tribes. The Nareneen lived by the sea, and the Ounip (called by the Dutch Toppners [i.e. ǂAonin]) about the parts of which we are now speaking, and south of these were the Keikouka [Kaiǁkhauan / Rooi Nasie / Red Nation], now represented by the red people, by Swartboy, the Kubabees [ǁHabowen / Veldschoendragers], and Blondel Swartz [!Kamiǂnûn / !Gamiǂnûn^[215]]. Near to the Orange River the tribes were more numerous and more civilized, from their neighbourhood to the Dutch. They had a few guns, sometimes waggons and so forth, and these were the ancestors of Jonker, Amirals, Jan Boys, and other smaller tribes, as Buchess’ and Fransman’s. There was also a certain admixture of bastard blood in these last, who came to be designated Oerlams (a term of half reproach) by the Dutch, and to be disavowed by the Keikouka [Kaiǁkhauan / Red Nation] as partly aliens. Hence a jealousy arose, and still exists, between the two great divisions of the more southern Hottentots, the Keikouka and the Oerlams, who together are usually called in the aggregate “Namaquas,” in contradistinction to the northerly tribes of Bushmen.

   Interspersed among the Hottentots from the north to the south were the Ghou Damup [ǂNūkhoen], who were invariably considered as slaves and a good deal ill-used; they lived, when in communities, in the hills, or table-mountains, of which there are many, such as Omuvereoom [Waterberg / !Hos], Konati [today’s Okonjima], Ketjo [Mount Etjo], Erongo [!Oeǂgā], and many others, of which I have often heard, more to the south and west. Two movements now began to take place; first the Damaras [Herero], pressed for room or for some other cause, made an irruption to the eastwards, and spread over the country as far as Otchombinde [Tunabis], almost exterminating the Hottentots in their way and driving back the Mationa [Bechuana], while the Ghou Damup were pretty safe in their mountain fortresses and received but little harm. The Toppners [ǂAonin], however, not being at that time accustomed to the mountain-passes with which the Ghou Damup were familiar, were, as I said, greatly cut off [i.e. westwards towards the coast]. And it is curious, that within very late times (about eight years ago), exactly the same thing occurred to the Nareneen living west of the Kaoko.

   The more northerly Toppners [ǂAonin] were thus quite cut off from all communication with those about Walfisch Bay, and remain so to the present time. There exists, however, the greatest fondness for traditional stories among these people, and I found the liveliest interest expressed on my return from the north relative to the well-being of those Hottentots whom I met among the Ovampo, and of whom scanty information only had been received from time to time [i.e. so Red Nation ‘Nama’ in the north were connected with those in the south, from whom they were ‘cut off’ by Herero movement and expansion in ‘Damaraland’ in the middle]. In Sir James Alexander’s work mention will be found of the Navees, or Nabees[**?check], as he spells it, on information [158] received among the Hottentots. These are the Ovampo; Navees being the Hottentot name for them.

   We have seen thus how the Damaras [Herero] drove the Toppners [ǂAonin] to the same places as the Ghou Damup [ǂNūkhoen].^[216]

1776

On 4th January, Wikar and 29 other deserters are summoned to appear before the Council of Justice and banished a month later from the Cape and its dependencies^[217].

Early in the year, on the journey east of Cape Town by Swedish naturalist Anders Sparrman with assistant Daniel Immelman, two ‘Hottentots’ in their party – known as Adonis and Ocha – ‘… turned up one day with their faces painted white. This was because they were about to pass a holy place. Ocha spoke of cave paintings, but they paid him little attention’^[218]. Sparrman also writes of ‘[t]he capture of slaves from the Boshies-men’ as ‘effected in the following manner’ [cf. ‘Bushmen commandos’]:

[s]everal farmers, that are in want of servants, join together, and take a journey to that part of the country where the Boshies-men live. The farmers will venture on a dark night to set upon them with six or eight people, which they contrive to do by previously stationing themselves at some distance round about the kraal. They then give the alarm by firing a gun or two. By this means there is such a consternation spread over the whole body of these savages, that it is only the most bold and intelligent among them, who have the courage to break through the circle and steal off. These the captors are glad enough to get rid of at so easy a rate; those that are stupid, timorous, and struck with amazement, and who, in consequence of this stupor, allow themserves to be taken and carried into bondage, answering their purpose much better.  

They are, however, at first, treated by gentle methods; that is, the victors intermix the fairest promises with their threats, and endeavour, if possible, to shoot some of the larger kinds of game for their prisoners. Such agreeable baits, together with a little tobacco, soon induce them to go with a tolerable degree of cheerfulness to the colonist’s place of abode. There these luxurious feasts of meat and fat are exchanged for more moderate portions of buttermilk, frumenty** and hasty-pudding**.  

When one of these poor devils runs away from his service, or, more properly, bondage, he never takes with him anything that does not belong to him. This is an instance of moderation in the savages towards their tyrants, which is praised and admired by the colonists themselves. Free from many wants and desires, that torment the rest of mankind, they are little addicted to thieving, if we except brandy, victuals and tobacco.  

The slave business, that violent outrage against the natural rights of mankind, which is always in itself a crime, and leads to all manner of misdemeanours and wickedness, is exercised by the colonists with a cruelty towards the nation of Boshies-men, which merits the abhorrence of everyone. [179]      

Not only is the capture of the Hottentots [??so, San or Nama?] considered by them merely as a party of pleasure, but in cold blood they destroy the bands which Nature has knit between husband and wife, and between parents and their children. Not content with having torn an unhappy woman from the embraces of her husband, her only protection and comfort, they endeavour all they can, and that chiefly at night, to deprive her likewise of her infants; for it has been observed that the mothers can seldom persuade themselves to flee from their tender offspring.  

At Apies River I saw an old Boshies-man with his wife, who, I was informed by farmer P. Vereira, had, a few months before, reigned over above a hundred Boshies-men; but they were now translated by the farmer from this royal or rather patriarchal dignity to that of being shepherds to a few hundreds of sheep. It is possible that this ancient couple, in consequence of their good sense and experience in life, might actually find a greater and more substantial bliss in being placed at the head of a flock of sheep than when they were on their throne surrounded by their subjects. Yet still it is a deed that cries to Heaven for vengeance, to bereave a whole community of its head and governor for the sake of some advantage and utility accruing thereby to a flock of sheep.  

About noon we went to pay a visit to the community of Hottentots [?seems to use ‘Boshies-men and Hottentots interchangeably?] assembled on this spot, who received us very friendly, and invited us to drink some of their sack-milk; which, I believe, nobody could have tasted that had not been as thirsty and at the same time as curious as we. We saw then our greasy (though possibly happy) hostess open a leathern bag that would hold about six gallons, and which was made of an undressed calf’s-skin taken off entire, with the hairy side turned inwards, and at the same time lade some milk out of it with a wooden ladle, which the dirtiest kitchen wench in Sweden would have been perfectly ashamed of. The taste of it resembled that of a syllabub. By way of acknowledgement we gave our hosts a roll of tobacco about six inches long, which they seemed to consider as a very magnificent present.^[219]

He goes on to discount the fantastical stories abounding at the time regarding the genitalia of Hottentot women and of reported practices of testicular castration of men^[220]. He refers to ‘Gonaquas’ living in the eastern Cape, and talks in vivid detail of witnessing the ‘peculiar slow lingering’ methods of flogging and execution meted out by colonists on their slaves^[221]. By the time of his journey, ‘Khoikhoi had begun slaughtering their cattle so that the animals would not fall into the white man’s hands, and themselves fled to less rainy regions’ and,

‘[a] Khoikhoi chief confided to Sparrman that they were forced to flee on an almost daily basis from Europeans who wanted their pasture. They put up resistance, stealing their cattle back and acquiring stocks of guns and ammunition. They could not comprehend the Boers’ desire for expansion. Everyone was allocated a space on Earth by a higher power. There was no need for anyone to be hounded through forest and veldt, but these white men were sweeping them away like so many leaves.  

In Sparrman's eyes the Khoikhoi lived a satisfying life. As soon as they had brought their herds in they milked them to the accompaniment of singing and dancing.  

“We seldom saw such happiness and contentment as seemed to be indicated by this festive custom in a handful of people totally uncultivated, and subsisting in their original savage state in the midst of a perfect desert. We were received by them with a friendly simplicity and homely freedom, which, however, by no means lessened them in our thoughts as men”.^[222] 

Sparrman brought back to Sweden,

all kinds of vessels, as well as bows and arrows. Their bows were fashioned from the grevia [sic] bush and could shoot arrows a hundred yards or more. Among the Bushmen he found iron arrowheads, which remained stuck fast in their quarry while the shaft fell off. The animal could not dislodge the arrowhead by rubbing against a tree, nor pull it out with its teeth. The feather-light tip was dipped in a poison from the larva of a beetle whose sting could kill a kudu or a giraffe, animals that weighed hundreds of pounds.^[223]   

1776-77

Three grazing grants are made ‘to stock-owning tenants on the south bank of the Orange River’^[224], thus cattle stations had been granted to burgers along the Groote River [later Orange] before Wikar’s journeys in 1778-79, and before the Colony boundary was moved northwards even to the Buffels River / Koussie^[225].

1777

The brother of the probable founder (i.e. Klaas Afrikaner) of ǁKhauxa!nas, the Oorlam Nama hill-fort in the Great Karas mountains, dies on Robben Island, ‘having been banished to lifelong imprisonment’ [16] in 1761, his father ‘Oude Ram’ also suffering ‘lifelong’ banishment but perhaps dying before arriving at Robben Island^[226].

William Paterson arrives in May in Table Bay on the Houghton, sent to the Cape Colony ‘by the wealthy and eccentric Countess of Strathmore to collect plants’^[227]. Colonel Gordon returns to the Cape^[228]. By this year ‘[t]he burgher Coenraad Hendrik Feijt … was grazing cattle at “de Cammas Fonteijn situated on the Great River”, the present site of Pella, and “Uitkomst between the Kousse (sic) and Groene Rivier”, with several other farms of the Kamiesberg, was held from 1771 to 1786 by that Hermanus Engelbrecht whose home-farm (geweesene plaats) was the Roodeheuvel near Koekenaap’^[229].

Paterson’s first journey:
Leaves Cape Town on 5 October, north via False Bay to Hottentot’s Holland area, ** ^[230].

1777-78

Colonel Gordon, initially with botanist and collector William Paterson who turned back after illness (but makes four trips ‘into the interior’ between May 1777 and March 1780 when he leaves the Cape^[231]), reaches the southern bank of the Gariep River having passed through and sketched Nama and European dwellings at places such as the Kamiesberg^[232].

‘Ellenboogfontein (farm of Hermanus Engelbregt) near present-day Kamieskroon - a haven to Gordon and many other travellers’, note the Nama reed huts to the left of the image. Source: Cullinan 1992, p. 75, uploaded to http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kamiesberge00.jpg

accessed 13 April 2006.

1778

The first issue of the Methodist Magazine (formerly the Arminian Magazine) founded by Wesley appears on 1st January, being in 1966 ‘the oldest magazine in the world still being published’^[233], although publication ceased in 1969^[234].

Governor von Plettenberg is written to have reported that ‘all of the independent Khoikhoi villages in Cape Colony had been eradicated’ and ‘[t]he Hottentots who had not managed to flee inland had become servants or slaves’^[235].

Paterson’s second journey:

William Paterson reaches the southern bank of the Gariep River^[236], having set out in May with a Dutchman, Mr Van Reenen, a:

member of a family^[237] which owned several farms in the interior, and which subsequently showed considerable enterprise in the way of exploration. The two travellers experienced some difficulty from the snow-covering of the mountains, but by making a circuit to the east across the Karroo reached the Roggeveld, and then went somewhat west of north till they struck the Orange in its lower course, after experiencing a trying time in crossing the sandy desert south of it. They crossed the river by swimming, and Paterson, besides engaging in his usual botanical researches, secured a number of beautiful birds, while Mr Van Reenen shot a giraffe. The return was in a generally southward direction through the copper district already well known to the Dutch, Cape Town being reached on November 20.^[238] 

In May 1778 Paterson thus sets out accompanied by a young gentleman (Mr van Renan^[239]) who ‘was possessed of several farms in the interior’, journeying first to the south-east (Hottentot Holland’s Kloof) and eventually turning to travel westwards across ‘the Great Karo’, despite being warned (in July) of the dangers of crossing here due ‘not only to its being a desart country, but also from parties of the Bushman Hottentots, who were at war with the Dutch’^[240]. One morning soon after they observe ‘a fire about a half a mile from us, which we imagined had been lighted by a party of wild Hottentots’ but in fact were ‘the servants of a Dutchman, who lived near the Cape’ with ‘a large flock of sheep under their guard’ and ‘so well acquainted with the country’ that Paterson hires one as a guide^[241]. On 27 July they visit

two of the boors who reside in the Karo during the time when the snow lies upon the Rogge Veld Mountains. This [transhumance] practice is not, however, general, several of them remain in their habitations, exposed to all the inclemencies of the weather. The principle cause of the migrations from the mountains to the Karo, is a want of firewood, which is very scarce on these heights. … Most of the inhabtitants live in huts similar to those of the Hottentots; some dwell in the tent that covers their wagon; and, even in this situation, the boors have the appearance of being the [48] happiest of all human beings.^[242] **

Moving north they see ‘several huts, which we supposed to belong to Hottentots; but they proved such as I before described, the winter residence of Dutch boors’, and in one resided a European woman ‘who had been wounded in the arm with a poisoned arrow’ that kept flaring up with inflammation^[243]. At a place called ‘Olive Bush’ the man to whom the place belonged

was the only one, of a whole family, who escaped from a party of the Boshman Hottentots. Those savages had attacked them a few years before, and put to death the mother, father, and sister of this person^[244].

North of here they stay at a farm called ‘Rhinoceros Bosch’, ‘from its having been frequented by these animals some years ago; though very few are now found in this part of the country’^[245]. They continue their journey south and west of the Roggeveld. **

On 11 August at ‘a Hottentot’s Kraal’ to west of Roggeveld he hires ‘one of the Hottentots, who spoke Dutch, as an interpreter’ since he ‘proposed travelling over the Small Nimiqua Land^[246].

On 12 August they descend the Bokkeveldberg to a farm belonging to Mr van Renan, proceeding the following day ‘to the northern extremity of the mountain’ where level land is described as ‘esteemed pasture’ for cattle although little water in dry season^[247]. Jacobus Ryke from here accompanies Paterson to the Great / Gariep River^[248].

Mentzel describes the manufacture of conical clay pots by Khoi herders^[249].

In September, Wikar [see 1775] reaches the Eyn / Gariep/!Garieb / Groote River and begins his journal at Goodhouse, i.e. Gū-daos [‘Goedous’] or ‘Sheep Path’^[250], which ‘was then remarkable only as the site of a ford or drift used by the Hottentots for entering Great Namaqualand’, approached from the south after crossing ‘the dead valley of Koa – [3] the name of which means sand dunes’^[251]. Here,

he found some Hottentots from Little Namaqualand ... waiting for the water to subside, before crossing the river on their way to the Great Namacquoas with whom they proposed to barter beads and tobacco.
But since the water rose instead of subsiding, the Hottentots informed me that they had resolved to go towards the rising sun, that is to say, in an easterly direction to the Eynikkoa [the ‘River-Folk’ after Eyn = !Garieb] land.

The company of Hottentots consisted of eight men, [23] five women and two children. Among them were three men and one woman who understood Dutch. The head of the party was the Hottentot, Claas Barend, a Goeyeman Hottentot from the neighbourhood of the Cape^[252], who had previously been on an expedition with Jacobus Coetsé/Koetzee [see 1760] to the Great Namacquoas and was now living here.  

I gave forth that I was born in this country [?he was born in Gothenberg] and said that I should like to accompany their party to look out for a farm for myself higher up along the Great River. Their leader welcomed this, knowing that if I accompanied him he would be better protected against robbers [since Wikar had riding horse and gun]; so we journeyed from Goedous to the company's ford [Ramans Drift / ǁHaraxas (‘Korhaan’) ford] in half a day.  

Here some of them abandoned their plan of proceeding up along the river, saying that the river was fordable and could be crossed; moreover their friends were in the Great or Kay [‘Gei’ = ‘great’] Nomakkoa, and so it would suit them better to go there than among the Eynikkoas.  

I allowed them to persuade me, reflecting that the Namaquoas were rich in cattle and kindly disposed, as I had been told. On the other hand, according to my information, the Eynikkoas were as yet unknown and unfriendly, which is also true of their own people or the Hottentots, as I learnt later; but they treated me well and were even distressed lest any misadventure should befall me, for which they might be blamed; and [25] they feared that if I should come to grief while with them, it would be laid at their door and my people (or the Christians) would take vengeance on them. But it was as if the Lord God had ordained that I should have to journey eastwards along the river, for in the morning the river was once again in full spate. So on the 4th September we set out for Claas Bastaard’s kraal, called Kakais [ǂĀ-ǁxeis / Breësand] where we remained for three days. During this time the bastard Claas returned, having been to trade among the Great Namaquoas, with the Chabobe [ǁHaboben / Veldskoendraers north of the Karas Mountains] and the Keykao [Kai-ǁKhauan of Hoachanas]. His glowing account of the country caused us once more to change the plans we had made of proceeding along the river.  

We now began getting a raft ready to cross, but when the raft was completed the swimmers would not entrust themselves with the task of taking us across, saying that the current was still too strong.  

Claas Barend alleged that he had seen at the Keykao [Kai-ǁKhauan] or Captain Kandelaar’s kraal two men with two women and children of the Damracquoa tribe who were as black as the natives of Terra de Natal and all of them pock marked^[253].  

Later I ascertained that this tribe living below the Blicquoas^[254] [Briqua / BaThlaping / Birina] on the banks of the other great river [the Kuisib / Claw River or Swakop / Tsoaxoub River, p.26] which [27] flows northwards are smaller in growth and stature than the Blicquoas and have incisions on their faces.  

These Damracquoas, who are held to be powerful magicians and claim that they are able to change even the wind and the weather, are well fed and well cared for by the Namaqua chiefs, because they fear them^[255].  

In the territory of the above-mentioned Keykao chief are eight more kraals, which also have their chiefs, including even the nearest Namacquoa from here, called the Kamingou, who live at the warm bath^[256] and sometimes along the bank on the farther side of the Great River.  

This chief is almost an idol among the Namaquas, for no one may speak disparagingly of him. To keep up his state he makes them pay tribute. When he becomes impoverished each chief under his authority has to give him four heifers and an ox, and if his soldiers have bartered anything they first bring to him for inspection what they have received in exchange and then he takes from each a short piece of tobacco.  

He also makes laws and exacts obedience. Before his time among the Namaquoas cousins had never been allowed to marry, for that was considered tantamount to incest among them. In their eyes cousins were regarded as brother and sister, and the close kinship between them respected as such. …^[257]           

Polygamy with up to six wives is permitted by chief Kandelaar, the availability of wives being due ‘to the greed for cattle, that is to say, each year the Namacqua men murder so many of their fellows for the sake of their cattle’ [i.e. raiding economy..]^[258]. The Kaiǁkhauan [‘Keykoa’] ‘chief with those under him is constantly waging war with the Zambdama [‘Bergdamaras living near the sea’ - (also Sondamas, Samdamas, and Sambdamas)] and the Hottentots who dwell along the Fish River and towards the coast’^[259].

On evening of 9th Sept.,

a party of Bushmen Hottentots came from the Zandveldskraal or Sam[30]gomomkoa. They have cattle, but only a few, and yet they do not steal, but, because they support themselves by shooting game and by what they find in the veld, they are called Chaboup or Bushmen by the Namacquoas.  

For the most part these Samgomomkoa are on friendly terms with the Eynikkoa, whither we were bound. They had already heard of our coming and even offered their services to accompany us to the Eynikkoa and show us the way.  

They stated that the lower Eynikkoa, named the Namnykoa or Karos-bearers, had been at war with the upper Eynikkoa, the Gyzikoa or Twin Kraal^[260], and had taken a large number of cattle from the latter, who had fled to the Blicquoas. Half of the Gyzikoa live along the other large river and they themselves are bastard Blicquoas.  

This story was only partly correct, for later on when we came to the Namnykoa we were given to understand that this (had happened, but that the Gyzikoa had in turn taken a still greater number of cattle from the Namnykoa than had been taken from them, and that they were still living in their own country, but the chief and some others of the Gyzikoa had been killed in fight.   We now set out on our journey in company with the [33] above-mentioned Samgomomkoa or the Zandvelt folk and went as far as Koungama [i.e. !Goû-ǁgama or cross-over water, ,") where we shot a hartebeest that had been wounded by an arrow.   On the r r th we stayed over for the day to dry the   meat, and on the r ath we moved on to Gouns;") where the kraal of the Zandvelt folk-the Samgomomkoawas. The camp had been split up so that there were only 13 huts here. The rest of the kraal had trekked to the grass plains because it was now the season for the ostrich eggs. The names of the chiefs were Gounzaap and Ouga. The latter became my travelling companion find brother. On the 13th of September they killed an ox, part of which they gave me and my companion. Their way of living is remarkable. Before undertaking a journey … they do their slaughtering at home and eat until there is nothing left; then, with their bellies full, they set out on foot, living for a whole month only on what they find in the veld.23)     

Wikar observes that the Sandamas (Bergdamas) (also Sondamas, Samdamas, and Sambdamas) (and those) who live close to the sea (‘gam’) do not acknowledge allegiance to the chief of the Nama Kaiǁkhaun and who even make war on him and raid his livestock^[261].

Wikar writes that:

Some old men amongst my travelling companions told me today that they [the ‘Samdamas’] were, as they reckoned it, still 16 days’ journey further north than the place which Captain Hop’s expedition had reached. They showed me some beads ... these were of different colours, but the prettiest of them were bright green and like beaten copper ore. When I broke them to pieces, I discovered that they were nothing more than common glass. They said that they got these mostly from the Zountamas, who must live close to the sea and further to the north, like the Sambdamas. Regarding them, no further particulars are known to me, except that the Zountamas and the Sambdamas are, according to the statements of my fellow travellers, of a darker complexion than the Namacquas (Namas), but not so marked in the face as the Damracquas (Hereros), and that they are Blip or Blicquas (Bechuanas)^[262]. Since the Sambdamas live nearer to the Namacquas than the Zountamas, they come to work for the Namacquas. They forge large and small beads of iron and copper .... For tools they employ bellows made out of a knapsack, out of which they force wind, and large stones, sharpened like axes at the upper end, which take the place of anvil and hammer. To get the forged metal smooth they rub it on stones or beat it into shape with a small axe. They say that these Zambdama smiths receive a goat from the Namacquas as a daily wage, and that they are very fond of goat [Owambo] meat for they are themselves very poorly supplied with it. [Wikar writes that: [t]hese Zambdama dwelling nearer to the Namaquas than the Zountama come to work with the Namaquas. From iron and copper they beat out beads, both fine and coarse … The daily wage of these Samdama smiths among the Namaquas is one she-goat.^[263]] My travelling companions told me, too, that they had heard from some of their own people, who were married to Zountama women, that “the Zountamas journey every year to the Kaweps and the Blicquas [Bechuana], where they receive generous payment in beads for the cattle that they take with them, and out of these again they make a large profit by trading them for other cattle with the Namacquas. They say that the aforementioned northern tribes (the Kaweps) were very much inclined to come personally to the Namacquas in order to trade, but they were deterred by the Zountamas, who feared that that would put an end to their profits. They, therefore, represented to these tribes that the Namacquas were a very bloodthirsty people and they told them that the road was very long and that there was no water to be found on it, so that, if they dared to attempt the journey, their skulls would become like the shells of ostrich eggs, i.e. that they would die of thirst, and that their bare, dried-up, skulls would be found lying about the veld like ostrich egg shells”^[264] 

Vedder writes further that

Wikar’s Sambdamas are the Gamdamas, i.e. the Bergdamas, who lived near the sea (gam = water, sea). They inhabited the region of the lower Kuiseb and Swakop [i.e. Tsoaxau Dama]; some members of this tribe still live to-day in the [28] Namib near the Brandberg and farther northwards. The Zountamas are the Chou-damas, that is the Dirty Damas, or Bergdamas, who had their settlements in the Auas Mountains, in the more northerly situated mountains of Hereroland, and in Erongo. Wikar tries to represent the sound Ch, which in Nama originates from the depths of the throat, by means of a letter and, for that purpose, he chooses the letter Z.

        It is well known that the Bergdamas were the first smiths amongst the Hereros and the Namas. They did not merely make iron beads and trade in glass beads, which they had got through the Ovambos from their place of origin, Angola, but they fashioned arrow-heads, arm and leg rings, assegais, and knives. They traded the iron from the Ovambos. Wikar knew, too, that the Namas called iron noengais (nu-eis = black ore) and copper avangais (ava-eis = red ore). Many of the Bergdamas had acquired their skill as blacksmiths from the Ovambos. Indeed, it is probable that there lived amongst the Bergdamas Ovambo men, who understood the blacksmith's art. Amongst the Ovambo tribes there were many smiths, who, at certain definite times of the year, fetched their supplies of ore from southern Angola and carried on their trade in closely guarded huts. They were regarded as great magicians by the people. Upon occasion, when they had been charged with witchcraft and had been declared to be guilty of causing the death of an Ovambo, they used to come, until recent times to Hereroland in order to escape certain death. Wikar states that smiths were likewise regarded in Namaland as magicians^[265].   

Wikar also observes a layer/class of people he calls ‘Thaboek’ who are

people who are poor, who lived in the bush and roamed about in all directions. There are some of these people who live amongst the Hottentots and are employed by them in various capacities, more especially as mercenaries in war, and these usually remain connected with the tribe to which they had attached themselves. If there is no war in progress, they receive remuneration in the shape of meat and other food, but in war-time they receive a share of the booty which is taken, and thus they acquire some cattle of their own. Their principal means of subsistence is, however, provided through hunting the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus, and other game, and catching fish in the rivers, and partly, too, through the theft of stock from Hottentots, other than those amongst whom they are living. Others of this race, who have no fixed abode among the Hottentots, are frightened of their fellow men and are of a murderous disposition. They are to be found chiefly in the mountains, the forests, and the deserts, where they subsist on snakes, hedgehogs, mice, and other queer foodstuffs, which other Tkaboeks (another spelling of the name!) refrain from doing. Amongst this race, which is of very small stature and rather lighter than others, many of the women and children have red cheeks. Still, because of the terrible poverty which they have to endure, they often become emaciated…^[266]

Vedder says that:

This mysterious race, which lived partly in bondage with the Nama and partly roamed the desert as freebooters, calls to mind the tame and wild Saan Bushmen of the Cape. They were known as the Hawu(n) [ǁUbun?], which means the wanderers. The people so indicated are the Saan of the Namib Desert, who were oppressed by the Namas, but yet inhabited the Namib and the areas adjacent to it in considerable numbers. Today there are only a few miserable survivors of that race; they speak the Nama language, and they have preserved the old ideas and customs of the Namas, which the latter have abandoned and forgotten long ago. To some extent they have intermarried with the Namas but, as an independent tribe, they were almost [27] entirely exterminated by the Namas in Bethanie, and other neighbours, during the previous century.^[267] 

Wikar writes that Nama along the Orange were rich in cattle and sheep but elsewhere were rich in cattle but badly off for goats^[268]. Of the Dama, he writes:

[t]hese Zambdama [‘in the valleys of the Kuiseb and Swakop rivers’^[269]] dwelling nearer to the Namaquas than the Zountama come to work with the Namaquas [‘Namancquoas’^[270]]. From iron and copper they beat out beads, both fine and coarse … The daily wage of these Samdama smiths among the Namaquas is one she-goat.^[271]

Wikar mentions that:

… those of our Namacquoas who were married to Zountama [Dama] take cattle to the Kawep[?] and the Blip[Bechuana], and in exchange for cattle, they get a large supply of beads (glass) from the tribes just mentioned: but when they come to our Namacquoas they gave very few beads in exchange for an animal^[272].

For Wadley this means that ‘the Dama acted as middlemen, trading iron and copper for cattle, between the agriculturalist Wambo in the north of South West Africa, the Bechuanas in the east and the Nama in the south’^[273].

The Blip/Bechuana [‘Bliquoa’ – ‘probably Tswana’^[274]] are observed to be metal-workers, thus:

[t]he Blip come each year to the tribes living along this river [the Orange] to trade, bringing with them tobacco, ivory, spoons, bracelets, copper and iron beads, glass beads, copper earrings and bracelets, knives, barbed assegais and also smooth axes and awls^[275].

Wikar is also told ‘that the Wambo desired trade with the Nama of the south and hoped to dispense with the services of Dama as middlemen, but the Dama (probably fearing loss of their own profits) painted a picture of the Nama being extremely hostile and the journey long and waterless’, a situation which Wadley suggests indicates that ‘the Dama continued acting as middlemen between the northern and southern ethnic groups’^[276].

**Check Wikar 1778 = writes the Gei ǁKhauan as Keykao, Thaykoa and Thaykao, and describes the tribe as having grazing-grounds and living in Hatsamas and Hoachanas, some 17 or 18 days journey from the Company’s Ford (Ramansdrift, where Hop crossed the Orange). Wikar claims that this tribe is ‘the leading Nama tribe’, with only the Sandamas (Bergdamas) (also Sondamas, Samdamas, and Sambdamas) (and those) who live close to the sea (‘gam’) who do not acknowledge allegiance to the chief of the Kaiǁkhaun[??] and who even make war on him and raid his livestock^[277].

1779

White settlers on the Fish River fight with Xhosas in the first of many border skirmishes^[278].

1779[?]

Towards the end of June, Paterson sets out due north again with Sebastiaan Van Reenen, and later Sebastiaan’s brother Jacobus^[279], and, from the banks of the Green River, near the Kamisberg, Colonel Gordon as well^[280].

Both Gordon and Patterson paint the farm of field cornet Hermanus Engelbregt near the Kamiesberg.

Cattle farm belonging to field cornet Hermanus Engelbregt, near the Kamiesberg, drawn by Gordon, R.J. (shown in bottom right), 1779. Source: http://www.atlasofmutualheritage.nl/en/Cattle-farm-belonging-Hermanus-Engelbregt-close-Kamiesberg-South-Africa.5974, accessed 10 May 2014, last accessed 18 April 2020.

Top painting by William Patterson is of the farm of field cornet Hermanus Engelbregt in 1779 (as also painted on the same journey by Gordon, see above). The bottom image is a 2004 photograph of the same site, by M. Timm Hoffmann and Rick Rohde. In 2004 the wheat fields which remain more-or-less the same size and shape as those painted in the late 1700s.

Farm Engelbregt in 2017. Photo: Sian Sullivan, 9 September 2017.

From Gordon’s diary for 27 July 1779, having reached ‘Engelbregt’s’:

Before the wagons left I went to Chief Wiltschut’s village with the captain. The village was situated a quarter of an hour out of our way. It consisted of nine straw or rather mat huts, and of about fifty men, women and children. I observed that the majority who had children had four at least, and each man only one wife. I saw two women from Great Namaqualand, [editor’s footnote, ‘[t]hey were Great Namaqua, from along the Orange River to the N.’] married here, who had each had the first joint of the little finger of the right hand amputated. They said their parents had done this when they were still young for cosmetic [253] reasons, but an animal had been slaughtered, so there had been a ceremony. They said not everyone did this. Some said it was done when they were ill, for bloodletting. …

[29 July 1779] From here the sea can be seen, closest in the SW, near the so­called ‘Spoeg River’ [editor’s note: “‘Khoi name Kanoep’”] at a distance of six miles … This region contains many high ridges, and the same round rocks and no strata; all bushveld and mixed soil. No river flows into the sea except in the rainy season, with exception of the Oliphants River. I made enquiries after the Amaquas but ascertained that the Little Namaquas and the Amaquas were one and the same, that besides Wiltschut there are four more chiefs, and that this entire nation consisted of about four hundred men and women, as well as children. None of these people has a testicle removed, nor the joint of a finger. However, I heard from a Great Namaqua that some of them do, sometimes as a result of illness; another said, to be able to run faster. These Namaquas make long tubes out of reeds or the bark of thorn-trees, blocking one side so that it produces one note when it is blown in, at the top. Each has a longer or shorter one, thus a different note. They then sit in a circle, and each blows his note in turn, like threshers or smiths, which sounds very strange. They keep a sort of melody while dancing, or rather stamping their feet and turning bending down low, which is their way of dancing to the rhythm, while the others, … jump round singing and clapping their hands. They pour milk into their flutes for the moisture and to keep them tight. They [play their flutes] mostly in short thirds, toned in very much with crotchets without much variation. I also saw a goura which was as tall as l and instead of the quill of a feather, as among the other Hottentots, had on it an ox­horn which had been scraped thin. On this they made a sound, though softer, of someone who gets the second note on the French horn, repeating a full chord of eight, five, three, alter each other, each one occasionally adding the half-tone of the lower octave.^[281]

“Khoi dancers and musicians”. Source: Plate 56, Raper and Boucher / Gordon 1988, p. 289, https://www.greatbigcanvas.com/view/group-of-the-khoi-with-dancers-and-musicians-by-robert-jacob-gordon-1777-86,2442102/ 27 September 2021.

After a difficult journey they reach the Gariep River on 17 August, and gives this the name ‘Orange’ after the Netherlands House of Orange^[282]. Colonel Gordon, having brought a boat, launches this the evening they arrive at the river's mouth, hoisting Dutch colours in honour of the Prince of Orange and giving the river the name it has since borne amongst Europeans^[283].

A ‘Bushman’ family in the lower Orange valley is depicted from this journey living in whalebone huts and with large quantities of ostrich egg containers for water – see below.

Family living in front of whale bone huts, lower Orange River. Source: original – Gordon Atlas, Rijksprentenkabinet, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, reproduced in Eichhorn and Vogelsang 2007: 153.

Gordon also observes the Bondelswarts Nama living in 10 small kraals with a ‘chief’ without much power called ‘Owbeep’ in the vicinity of Warmbad, along the Löwen River^[284].  

Excursions were made in the neighbourhood, and on the 25th the party set out eastwards, ascending the valley of the Orange for some distance through a barren hilly country. On the 29th they left the river, returning southward to recruit at a Dutch homestead, but again going north to examine a part of the river above that previously visited. Paterson and Gordon soon separated, the latter going east, while Paterson and Van Reenen crossed the Orange and went north-east (several days’ north of Warmbad^[285]), through a country still barren and hilly, in which a specimen of the giraffe was secured[Heawood**].

By this year (1779) the Oorlam Afrikaners and Pieter Pienaar were both in the Orange River area, ‘serving as guides to occasional travelers due to their thorough knowledge of the northern frontier region’, thus accompanying William Paterson and Robert Gordon on their journey in this year to the Orange River, with Paterson in his journal mentioning ‘Pienaar and his Nama’ and Gordon mentioning an ‘Afrikaander’ who could be Klaas^[286].

On October 21 they (Paterson and Gordon) re-cross the river, and Paterson made the homeward journey in leisurely fashion, investigating the botany of the country. On returning from north on his 4th journey, and on same day as he arrives at Heerenlogement (06.12.1779), Paterson mentions being convoyed through the Elephants River, which he expects to be impassable, by two sons of his Hospital friend, Niuwe Houdsa, en route through the sandy plain to the house of Mrs Louw in the long valley^[287]. He was back at Cape Town on December 21.

Source: http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks13/1305581h-images/Image58.jpg, accessed 20 June 2016.

Sparrman’s 1779 map of the Cape, showing coastal knowledge but little mapping of the interior. Source: http://2015imcosmaps.orgfree.com/images/8_1.jpg, accessed 10 January 2022.

On 1st April, Wikar sets out on his second journey along the Orange, not long after sending a petition (smeekbrief) to Governor van Plettenberg via ‘some Hottentots to give to the nearest European farmer’, in which, ‘he asked humbly for pardon and forgiveness for his desertion’ and asserting that in the governor’s service, ‘"he had made a collection of natural objects and rarities," and that during his wanderings he had kept a journal which contained notes of the ceremonies, customs and beliefs of three hitherto unknown tribes’ - the Eynicquas ‘who lived on the islands of the Great River and who have now disappeared or become absorbed’, the Koranna Hottentots, and the Briqua (BaThlaping) who are of Bantu origin^[288].  

In June Wikar returns to his house ‘downriver’ and receives ‘the Governor’s permit or pass authorizing his return to the Cape’, to which he sets out on 11th July, arriving [4] September 18th and being pardoned a week later^[289]. Although he had been residing beyond the Colony boundary, his pardon states that ‘he had not been out of the territory of the Honourable Company’^[290].

Late 1700s

Charcoal from one of the larger huts in the lower Hungorob hut circle settlement that Kinahan calls !Nâu-aib (meaning ‘a bare, sun-scorched hillside’) is dated to the late 18th century, pre-dating the stone pipes of the mid-late 1800s made with metal tools considered to derive from European contact^[291]. In the lower reaches of the Hungorob ‘more than 400 stone huts and related features’ have been found in ‘discrete clusters of between twenty and one hundred features’ and associated with stockposts, modified bees’ nests (e.g. marked with stones or ladders) and cairns^[292]. The huts consist of low stone walls, often in a semi-circle, sometimes with ‘marked “coops”’ with high soil phosphate content indicating ‘kid-kraals’, or perhaps used as storage areas for pots^[293]. Stone pestles, assumed to be used for the grinding of grass seeds^[294], tended to be found with what Kinahan refers to as ‘simple huts’ and not with hut complexes he interprets as some indication of social and/or gendered stratification^[295]. The encampments are considered to be sites of aggregation surrounded by smaller sites higher up the ravine interpreted as stockposts^[296] for small-stock – no cattle remains have been associated with the Hungorob sites^[297]. At a rock shelter to the west of the Hungorob at around 900m a.s.l. ‘a shallow wooden tray’ (i.e. ǂgôub) is found, similar to the fragments found in association with the Pastoral phase at Falls Rock Shelter in the Upper Hungorob (see pre-history documentation), this time in association with ‘a battered oryx horn, possibly used to excavate the seed caches of harvester ants, to judge from the damage to its tip’^[298]. In a second shelter lower at the entrance to the Hungorob ‘[a] stone coop points to the use of the shelter by pastoralists, as did, indirectly, smeared ochre on the lower parts of the walls’ which might ‘have been caused by pastoralists sitting against the walls of the shelter’^[299]. Seven bees nests are also found in the vicinity of the pastoral settlement in the lower Hungorob: in a honey cave approached with ‘[a] rough scaffolding of Acacia montis-usti poles’^[300]; in a hive in a A. montis-usti tree that has been damaged with an axe, near which were ‘sherds of a large clay pot’; [64] and in the fleshy trunks of Moringa ovalifolia trees in which modifications including hardwood pegs for access and the closing off of the hive with a stone^[301].  

At Jakalswater on the Swakop River a ceramic pot with axially-pierced lugs found here contains ‘a large cache of glass beads, including the distinctive opaque blue cylinder beads introduced at ǂKhîsa-ǁgubus’ and suggests late 18th century date, ‘although the accumulation evidently continued over a long time and more modern beads were added’^[302]. Pots with axially-pierced lugs found at Onanis, Jakalswater, Kaltenhausen§, Wilsonfontein, and Wêreldsend (south of !Khuiseb) are argued to indicate pastoral connections with ǂKhisa-ǁgubus on the coast and other sites (e.g. Jakalswater on Swakop) as well as the Namib plains and escarpment, facilitating ease of circulation of livestock^[303].

The archives of the Rhenish Mission, as read by Köhler (1969: 105), report missionary Baumann (with RMS at Rooibank 1878-1883) writing that ‘[a]ccording to the ancients [i.e. his eldest informants], the Topnaars came from the north towards the end of the eighteenth century, who had immigrated from Cape Rock and Cape Frio’ (cf. Hoernlé’s informants reported above): ‘[a]t the beginning of the 19th century the Topnaar are said to have reached the mouth of the Swakop (tsoa-xou-b)’, their migration perhaps ‘related to the advance of the Herero into the Kaokoveld’^[304].

1780

Colonel Gordon succeeds Colonal Hendrik von Prehn’s command of the Dutch garrison at the Cape^[305]. Cape Governor Gordon’s map of this year includes a village of whale bone huts at the mouth of the Orange^[306].

1780s

Population of the northern frontiers is ‘coming under intense pressure from settler expansion’^[307].

1781

The French traveller Le Vaillant arrives in the Cape of Good Hope on 29th March.

Another traveller from Europe—the French naturalist Le Vaillant—visited the Cape the year after the journey just described, and travelled extensively in the interior. He made a first journey in 1780-82, visiting the borders of the Kafir country and returning from the Sneeuwberg across the Great Karroo; and a second in 1783-85, during which he went north across the Lower Orange. His graphic narratives are perhaps the best known of all the similar works on South Africa which appeared during the eighteenth century, but they have been generally regarded as not entirely trustworthy in matters of detail… [Heawood], although this view has been revised since…

1783

The Cape botanist J.A. Auge retires^[308]. The Swedish naturalist Anders Sparrman publishes his book A Voyage to the Cape of Good Hope, towards the Antarctic Polar Circle, and round the World: But Chiefly into the Country of the Hottetots and Caffres, from the year 1772 to 1776^[309].

American independence at conclusion of the American Revolution, in which ‘the French and Dutch had taken America’s side against Britain’, an effect of which is that Britain can ‘no longer send to America the great numbers of convicts sentenced to transportation’^[310], going instead to Australia which was second choice after coast of south-west Africa deemed unsuitable following exploration by the Nautilis in 1786^[311].

Francois le Vaillant travels northwards with ‘Hottentots and cattle’, finding turbid water and faint ‘inscriptions’ in July at Heerelogement near Uitkomst, where he stays for seven days, carving his name in an overhang with engravings (also visited in 1835 by Alexander, see below)^[312].

a. Sketch map of ‘Vaillant’s grotto’ at Heerelogement (‘Gentlemen’s Lodging’)^[313]; b. engraving of ‘Encampment at Heere logement’ – first picture of the mountain^[314]; c. Le Vaillant’s graffiti at the overhang at Heerelogement^[315]; d. View towards ‘Vaillant’s grotto’^[316].

He reaches the Gariep / Orange River^[317]. Here he mentions Pienaar but not the Oorlam Afrikaners^[318].

1784

Britain passes a new Transportation Act to permit transport of an accumulating prisoner population to emerging colonial territories, initially including south west Africa^[319].

1785

On 25 May the Beauchamp Committee of the British House of Commons meets to discuss the location of an alternative penal settlement to the lost American colonies, with Das Voltas at the mouth of the Orange River (based on the Hop/Brink map of 1761, but since they did not make it down the !Garieb to its mouth this was not accurate on this point^[320]) – promoted but not previously visited by Commodore Edward Thompson^[321] – the preferred proposal over Botany Bay in Australia^[322]. Edward Thompson’s September orders are ‘to inspect the West African forts and settlements’ whilst also secretly investigating Africa’s south-western coast^[323]. Amidst the precarious post-American conflict relationship between Britain, France and Holland, the expedition is particularly concerned to find a new location ‘for English convicts sentenced to transportation’, as well as ‘to serve as a naval station where British East Indiamen could refit’^[324]. On his flagship Grampus sail his adopted son Lieutenant Thomas Bolden Thompson and marine surveyor Lieutenant Home Riggs Popham, the 16-gun sloop Nautilus commanded by Captain George Tripp, with the Commodore to transfer to the latter ship for the more southerly investigation^[325]. But the Commodore contracts fever at Apollonnia on the current Ghana coast^[326].

A Guilliam Visagie becames the first “white” to settle in Namibia, establishing himself at Nu-goaes / Swartmodder – later Keetmanshoop^[327].

1786

The death of Commodore Thompson in January leads to Thomas Bolden Thompson taking command of Nautilus and the expedition ‘to investigate the west coast of Africa for a suitable place to found a penal colony’^[328] eventually produces a detailed report by Thompson including eight watercolour sketches depicting ‘curiousities of the voyage’, and corroborated by a separate report by Popham the Surveyor and charts of “Coast of Caffraria” and Angra Pequena^[329]. The Royal Navy men ‘had been instructed not to give any offence to the inhabitants they might encounter, but to make friendly overtures and to report in as much detail as possible their character and disposition’^[330].

After a passage of 52 days ‘in which time we had not seen a vessel’, in February they make the coast of Caffaria about six leagues north of Dassen Island§, then on to Saldanha and St. Helen’s Bay§, the latter of which on 25th Thompson dispatches Popham ‘to investigate’ and ‘ascertain the situation of the Berg River’, seeking freshwater^[331]. They learn form “a Dutch Fisherman” who they find on the beach “with 3 or 4 Hottentot Servants, drying & salting fish for the Dutch markets at the Cape of Good Hope, which he told us they did once or twice a year, & transported them over land in waggons”, also telling them that they “were the only ship or vessel that had anchored in that bay for the space of 30 years”^[332]. Freshwater is only available 50 or 60 miles inland, but Thompson is “relieved” of his “anxiety the next day by a visit from a Dutch Farmer, who was resident on the banks of the river, and who offered to supply us with water & bullocks”, from a spring near his house at least 30 miles away^[333]. Popham writes:

I went in the Boat about 30 Miles up this River to search for Fresh Water, where I was met by one Jacobus Laubschar who guided me to his House, he was the nearest Inhabitant and inform'd me that the River was equally salt, nearly as much higher up as I had already come, but from the Spring at his House, which was half a Mile from the landing Place, I might be supplied with some Water, for the Use of the Ship; tho' the getting it to the Boats, was not to be accornplish'd without the Assistance of his Waggons. he likewise sent others to the Sea Side for our empty Butts that no time might be lost in procuring (tho' with such difficulty so valuable an Article, This Farmer informed me that if we had been here during the Winter or rainy season, we should not only have watered with ease, but reaped the advantage of procuring whatever necessaries we wanted without going so great a distance from the Ship; as he then lives in the Houses situated on the Hill on the West Side of the Bav, where he continues till the return of the dry Weather; In going up the River I saw Flocks of Flamingos and Ostriches the latter I find is a part of the Trade of the Farmers about this part of the Country; where they abound; they kill them in the Season when their Plumage is the most perfect, which is  November and December. The Country is sandy throughout the places or parches (there being no enclosures) where the Corn was sown, seemed little better than the common Grounds. and the only diiference was the Manure from the Cattle of the Farm I saw no Trees, except a Plantation of Poplars near the House, but vast quantity of Heath, and large Bushes, which make excellent cover for the Deer and Game; the Country abounding with both, there are two sort of Partridges, the one the size of the Partridge on the North Coast of Africa; the other which they call Namaqua’s Partridge, is not larger than the Common Dove; their Pheasants and Hares are plentiful, and superior in size to the English ... The only that they are much troubled with Wolves, which travel in large Packs by Night, and sometimes carry off their Cattle from the Pens when they get near the Farm undiscovered.^[334] 

Lt. Popham and the ship’s botanist Mr Howe make “many excursions into the country … tolerably successful in finding some new plants, principally Bulbous roots”^[335]. They seine fish for “Mullet, Bream, Rays & a fish called in [34] these seas the Elephant Fish … a kind of Cat Fish” and look upon the bay “as the northenmost of the Dutch settlements from the cape of Good Hope” as shown “by a land mark, with the arms of the States, erected on the southpoint which forms the Berg River”^[336]. Here “[t]he inhabitants are very thinly scattered, there being none nearer the beach than 30 miles, and no neighbour within 4 or 5 of him”^[337]. On 2nd April they procure from the farmer with difficulty ‘four good oxen, a few sheep, goats, cabbages, & onions, and nine tons of water … brought to the beach two butts at a time, in waggons drawn by ten oxen each”, ‘paid for with four half barrels of gunpowder’^[338]. He hears that in the winter rains from April to September when the Berg River was fresh, hippopotami - “Sea Cows” and “River Horses” – are plenty^[339] - ‘killed by the Inhabitants from the Banks when they are feeding; for their flesh which is superior to that of Oxen; their teeth which are whiter; and are of a closer texture than the Ivory produced by the Elephants; and their Skin’^[340]. Fish too are ‘in vast abundance in Berg River to the Mouth of which the Dutch farmers come down (at least those whose farms are not sufficiently large to occupy their whole time) to cure fish for the Cape Markets’, and Popham also remarks that ‘[a]s the Bay during our being here, was never without a Whale’ he thinks ‘there could be no place more convenient for the South Fishery Men to touch at, they may with ease boil down the Blubber, on Shore, while the Ship is situate in the most plentiful Spot for the destruction of those Fish’^[341]. Overall Popham deems the Berg River ‘so well calculated for the purpose of a Colony wanting but Inhabitants to till its fertile Banks’^[342].

Further north the story is different. Their search for Das Voltas Bay at the latitude of Alexander Bay, where in April they observe a navigable river that must be the Orange^[343], elicits the description from Popham “[s]o inhospitable and so barren a Country is not to be equalled except in the Desarts of Arabia, at least from the appearance of the shore…”^[344].

On 11th April they arrive at “the bay of Pequena” [i.e. Luderitz], identifiable “by a small pedestal on a rocky point”, i.e. Dias Point, and here the damp weather “occasioned colds & sore throats to be general amongst the Ship’s company” with some “attacked with Rhewmatizms, & one or two with agues”^[345]. On the 12th Popham is dispatched by Thompson to examine the Cross which he finds is “a Pedestal of Marble fixed on the Eminence of a round Rock the most conspicuous as a mark to Seaward; On one of the Squares was engraven the Arms of Portugal, and on another some old Characters, but both defaced by the Injury of the Weather, and the length of Time it had probably been erected”^[346]. Popham also sees “several prints of human Feet (which did not exceed the size of those of a Boy of ten years old, and some of wild Beasts; their Track was across the Savannah, going to the eastward, but no sign of Hut, Habitation, Smoke, Wood, or Water. could be seen from the adjacent Hills”^[347]. In his further investigations on the 13th April Popham sees,

a Man with several Dogs attending him, he seemed not to alter his path, walking over the Hills to the southward; I landed and endeavoured to get an interview; which he as attentively avoided; tho’ [56] the Dogs came very near us; these I followed expecting they might lead to the Habitation of the Natives, but the craving of Nature got the better of their affection to their Master, and their fear of us, they all stop'd at the same place, which was their watering spot; this I had every reason to think from its appearance was a Spring; and elated with the Success of the Morning, I returned for a Cask to sink, and the Materials for sinking it; on passing thro the same Channel between the Islands, I saw on the Centre one flocks of Penguins - l landed and found the Island covered, with them, and numbers of young ones in the Nests, but few Eggs; the breeding season being I imagine just past - after delivering an Account of our Expedition to Captain Thompson; whom I found attending a party in the Bay, I hastened to the place where I flatterd myself I had found such a treasure and after two hours laborious Digging; our disappointments were renewed, it proved, but a reservoir which the Natives had made during the rainy Season for their Dogs, and probably themselves; it was in vain penetrating into the Country, we had been on the most elevated Spot of this part from whence there was no appearance of being rewarded for our trouble either with Wood. or Water; to the Eastward an extensive Savannah lower than the level of the Sea, to the Northward Hills of Sand, and to the southward a continued ridge of Rocky Mountains, I therefore embarked but had not rowed far before we discovered several Natives with Dogs approaching us, this was a temptation to return; in a little time there were 17 assembled, and 23 Dogs. I endeavoured by every gesture and act of friendship, to communicate with them, laying on the Ground Knives, Trinkets, Brandy Buiscuit &c. which thcv picked up, and seemed much pleased with, two of them advanced from the rest with an apparent Wish for me to lay down my Arms - this I did, and tho’ the only one, out of the Boat they woud not suffer me to touch them. but made signs for me to follow them - which I did as far as I thought it prudent - for if 17 men woud not trust me to approach near enough to communicate, I had a plausible right, not to trust myself to the power of those 17, without the reach of my party’s Assistance.

   I lost nearly two hours in fruitless Arguments with these savage Hunters (Excepting One) (who was the neadmost in advancing, with every cannibal low cunning) they were of low stature, of different casts as to their Complexion; but none quite so black as the Negroes, thick Lips flat Noses; and are the ugliest fellows I ever saw making themselves still more so by the addition of Grease, and Dirt, which they rub on their Skins, and plaister their platts of Hair with, each had a Hide of a Beast for his Garment, tied with thongs, besides a covering to the lower part of their Belly, & had for their defence a clubbed Stick, some Bows, others Spears, but I coud not get near enough to determine what they were pointed with; being satisfied with everything but their behaviour, I stood towards the Northernmost Island, which seemed covered with Seals  on drawing near their Noise resembled much, that of a Number of Calves. - but their sizes were superior to anything I could conceive, I believe some of the larger ones weighed near six Hundred Weight, the Island was covered from them from the water’s Edge to the summit; and so inactive and foolish were they on land, that with a Stick they suffered us to kill them with great Ease, they were literally speaking innumerable. This Isle (which was named Seal Island) forms a most excellent Bay to the Eastward having a channel of 31/2 fathoms, between it and the Centre one which Captain Thompson had also called Penguin Island.^[348] 

As Thompson iterates - as barren as the country is, the 2nd day after their arrival Mr Popham sees and converses with “a number of natives, who had with them a large pack of dogs” which he followed “to a place where they drank” to all appearance “a spring of fresh water” which on digging the following day revealed itself, to Thompson’s disappointment to be “only a reservoir formed by Nature, in which a small quantity of water had lodged”^[349]. “The natives came to near where the boat was lying, without the least signs of fear, but all the persuasions he [Popham] could make use of by presents of knives, beads &c could not induce them to come within reach” ^[350].

The next day (14th April), Thompson himself goes to the same spot and “they came as usual to the number of 20 down towards the boat, followed by 15 or 20 dogs” approaching “boldly ‘till within 10 or 15 yards” where they stopped and Thompson threw them a knife, “with which they seemed pleased, but would not approach us nearer, & when any of us [36] approached toward them, tho’ singly, they retreated”^[351]:

They indeed made the same signs to me as they had done to Mr. Popham the day before, to go with them & put off the boat, but this I did not think prudent to do, or to suffer anyone else.  

   They did not seem inclined to part with any thing in return for what we gave them, therefore after spending an hour in a fruitless interview I left them, & they wandered with their dogs over a chain of sandy mountains to the NE.  

   They were rather a small race of people with the smallest feet I ever saw; very active; of a dark copper colour, which they appeared to have darkened by a black dye, their cloathing was the skin of some animal hung over their shoulders, & another hung round their waist; with a number of thongs tied about their necks & middle; their hair appeared long but woolly, & twisted into rolls behind, which extended across the back of the neck from ear to ear, but they had nothing about them by which I could discover their having had any intercourse with Europeans.  

   From their arms, which were short club sticks, & small poles sharpened at one end like lances, they must have had communication with a country that produced wood, but as far as we could penetrate into the country, or discern from the tops of the highest hills, we did not discover the smallest appearance of vegetation; besides the sticks I have mentioned they carried each a smaller one, with the brush of some animal affixed to one end.  

   From the little I saw of these people they appeared to me to be cunning & savage [!!], & I conclude them to be a wandering party of the tribe of cannibals called Jaggas^[352] [!!], with which this country is said to be inhabited from the latitude of 27º S. to Angola.  

   The language they made use of was very disonant & harsh, & pronounced thro ' the nose; it consisted of monosyllables; all I could recollect was Koo, Kee, Koo, Ka, He ta.^[353]  

Popham iterates that “the following Day he [Thompson] went with a party to the place I had first seen these People anxious to find out their sources for fresh Water, they came to the Boat, received every Trinket he offered (which was done by leaving it on the Beach, and retreating with the Boat when they took it up) but woud not either part with any thing, or suffer him to hold an intercourse with them, altho' he made every sign of armity, and shewed them Knives Beads &c.”^[354] “This place afforded us little refreshment scarce any fish and no Flesh: The Ship's Cornpany eat the Penguins and reported them excellent, I wish my palate coud have agreed as theirs did, but I thought them much too, fishy to eat as fowl”^[355].  

“Man in Pequena Bay” ‘wearing a sealskin cape, and carrying an ostrich eggshell in one hand, and an oryx horn spear in the other’, beads noticeable adorning his hair^[356].

The expedition observes the Dias cross at Angra Pequeña^[357] where ‘a group of wary local people did not allow the seamen to come nearer than several hundred yards’^[358]. They also find here ‘an oak board dated 1733, commemorating the visit of the French frigate, La Venus, under the command of Lieutenant Bart’^[359].

Thompson observes a large quantity of whale bones “cast on shore” around the bay of Pequena (and many whales [38]), plus an abundance of seals and penguins on the bay’s islands, which they kill for skins and food respectively^[360]. They observe the “sandy hills” to be “covered with enumerable tracks of wild beasts”, but the botanist Howe’s ‘researches were attended with no success, the only plant growing here being a small Geranium”^[361]. On May 23rd Thompson finds their “stock of water much reduced” and they head north “to a bay named in the charts Walwich Bay” where they anchor on evening of the 27th April^[362] - Thompson apparently did not know of the springs at Sandwich Harbour [see 1875] and anchored in Walvis Bay, having reduced each man's allowance of water to one quart per day^[363].

28th April – Popham finds “[o]n the Savannah which back'd the Beach there were Tracks of large droves of Cattle. and the print of the natives feet, formed in a regular path to the Southward. I heard the blaying of a Calf, that was too distinct to be far off, and from the top of a sand Hummock we saw it; as this was a strong proof of Cattle being in the Country, I carried it on board [so he stole this calf??] When Captain Thompson got underweigh, and worked to a convenient situation in the head of the Bay, for the purpose of Wooding the Ship. In the evening a party of the Natives came to the Water Side, and suffered us to join them; saluting us according to the Custom of the Country by rubbing our faces with some rancid Fat, which they had in the horn of a Cow, and exclaiming at the same Time (Morassa or Barossa) they had each a stick in their Hands, some of them a Club of about 2 feet, and made of very heavy Wood; and the Tail of a Fox or Jackall fastened to a smaller stick; these they exchangedd with us for the Buttons of our Coats – and seemed to be partial both to Brandy, and Tobacco, and some had Ivory Rings on their Wrists, but from their appearance they must have been put on when they were Young; as they were cut out of the solid, and it was impossible to get them over their hands; On our parting with them to go on board, they made, they made signs by pointing inland, which we took to be an invitation to their Town – This Captain Thompson with a party attended to the following day …^[364] 

Thompson iterates that in the morning Lt Popham “proceeded up the bay” returning before noon “with an account that wood was here to be got, & that he had seen the tracks of natives and droves of cattle”; he set about surveying the bay with their other boats “constantly employed in bringing on board wood, & searching for fresh water”^[365], then:  

In the evening I went on shore with a party & was fortunate enough to attain an interview with four of the natives, which we found about a mile from where we landed; they sat down & received us courteously & without fear, & as a token of friendship rubbed each of us on the cheeks and breast with rancid, stinking grease, that they had in a cow's horn, exclaiming at the same time the words Borasso! Borasso!^[366] We then made them presents of beads and other trifles we happened to have about us; they invited us (as we understood) to their town, but night coming on we declined the expedition 'till next morning, & returned on board.  

   Next day the same party of us landed, in order to pay them the promised visit, & on our landing were met by the same four, & conducted by them over a chain of barren hills of loose sand, in which we were sometimes half Ieg deep, about 4 miles inland south from the ship, here we arrived at their village, which we found placed in a vale in the midst of some small stunted trees [daweb/dawib / Tamarix usneoides], the first we had yet seen in the country, the largest of which was not [40] thicker in the stem than a man's leg, & not above 20 feet high.  

   Their habitations are formed by the boughs of these shrubs stuck in the sand and meeting at the tops, where they are confined together, and resemble the halves of bee hives, with the backs next the wind, which is generally one way, & brings with it clouds of sand off the surrounding hills; the village consists of about 20 of these huts, each hut containing a family, but I found a great disproportion in the sexes, the whole village consisting of 8 women, 3 female children, 49 men, & 25 boys, under 10 years of age^[367].  

‘“Huts of Caffrarian Hottentot’s in Walwich Bay.” Watercolour sketch by T.B. Thompson, 1786. Reproduced by courtesy of Quentin Keynes’. Source: scanned from John Kinahan 2001[1991], p. 102, Fig. 4.9a; also in Jill Kinahan 1990, Fig. 11 p. 44, ‘[p]robably an idealized version of the eighteenth century village in the Walvis Bay dunefields’.

   The men were all active, & well made, but in general rather inclined to be small of stature, & of a dark copper colour; the women^[368] were small, & appeared in general old & wrinkled, amongst the whole I only saw two which I could suppose to be younger than 50, & yet the oldest had twin children at the breast.  

   Both sexes are very ugly, having thick lips, flat noses, low foreheads, bad teeth, small eyes, & high cheek bones, they have all short woolly hair, which they begrime with stinking grease, & decorate with beads & small shells, plastering the wool into small lumps, & powdering it with a dust, the colour of brick dust; they also rub their skins with grease and any filth they can find, & stink most intolerably & the dirtier they are, the more elegant they feel themselves.  

   The dress of the men & women are nearly alike, & very similar to that of the people we saw in Pequena Bay, being the dried skin of a seal, bullock, or any other animal, tied round the neck & hanging over the shoulders, covering them below the hips, with an apron of the same round the waist, which in the women is much longer than the men & more confined between the legs; both sexes keep the hairy side of these Skins outward all day, & shift them next their flesh in the evening: they also wear sandals made of dried hide, which I observed were put on only when they carne to a loose sand, where they answerd rhe purpose of mud pattens, which I have seen people make use of on the mud flats in England.  

   Their ornaments are beads, & shells made into necklaces & earrings, with bracelets of ivory round the wrists & arms: round the neck & waist they tye a number of thongs of raw hide to which they hang a knife, a bodkin & a small box (in which they keep beads & other trinkets) all made of ivory or bone; one or two I saw who wore each a cap made of dried skin, tied under the chin, with two goat or deer's horns sticking out on the forehead, & the man whom I supposed to be the cheif of the village had, among the beads & ornaments about his wool, the bladder of some animal blown up & fastened on one side of his head, with 2 or 3 others which were not blown up.^[369]   

Sketch of a man at Walvis Bay, made in 1786 during voyage of Nautilus under Captain T.B. Thompson. Source: scanned from John Kinahan 2001[1991], Plate 3 - At Walvis Bay a sketch is made of a dark skinned man with ‘Bantu features’ carrying a bow and quiver of arrows and wearing, ‘a cloak of sealskin and an inflated sheep’s bladder in his hair [as described by Wikar**], together with red and blue glass beads that would have been acquired by trade with passing ships. Around his neck are bone artefacts, including a knife for cutting wild !nara melons’^[370]; also Jill Kinahan 1990, Fig. 8 p. 42, ‘a portrait of a man with bow and arrows. In his hair he wairs an inflated bladder with three others, as well as glass beads. Around his neck hand two small bone boxes, a !nara knife and bodkin’; Jill Kinahan 2017, Fig. 2 p. 301 ‘"Man in Walwich Bay" 1786 watercolor sketch of a Topnaar [?] man by Captain Thomas Bolden Thompson, Royal Navy. In his hair, the man wears inflated bladders, and red and blue glass beads. Around his neck are two small containers, a bone !nara knife and a bodkin. He wears a sealskin cape around his shoulders and carries a bow and quiver with arrows’. Nb. It is not clear how Jill Kinahan arrives at the attribution of ‘Topnaar’ in the 2017 paper as there is no record of the people encountered in 1786 calling themselves by this name.

”Woman in Walwich Bay, Caffraria”, showing ‘glass beads woven into her hair, her anchor button earing, and a bone !nara knife and bodkin suspended around her neck’. Source: scanned from Jill Kinahan 1990, Fi. 7 p. 41.

Image of people observed by Thompson - ‘[t]he man holds in his right hand a fly-whisk made from a jackal’s brush; he wears a cap with antelope horns and inflated bladder’. Source: Jill Kinahan 1990, Fig. 9 p. 43.

   Their arms are short sticks, bows, & arrows pointed with bone, which they carry in quivers made of hide, the points of which are dipped in some gummous substance, which I understood to be poisonous, a club about 18 inches long with an oval lump on the end, made of a dark, heavy wood, & long spears, some pointed with the horns of deer^[371], & others with iron, from which & the beads of glass & copper I found amongst them I am convinced rhey have had some intercourse with Europeans, probably these articles may have come to their hands thro' the differen't tribes from the Portuguese Settlements of St. Philip de Benguela, & St. Paul de Loando, to the northward.  

   The food of these people is for the most part the fruit of a small thorny plant which the Botanist found to be a kind of Cucumber; this plant grows on the sandy hillocks, & we found also, between the hills, a few reeds & a kind of couch grass, these & the shrubs beforementioned comprehend the whole vegetable productions of their country, & are found but in partial spots; they also use animal food & possess herds of horned cattle, their drink is mild & brackish water, but I could not find out where they procured this last article, neither could any of us come at a sight of their cattle^[372].^[373]

’Probably the earliest drawing of a !nara melon, fruit of Acanthosicyos horrida which is endemic to the Namib coast’. Source: Jill Kinahan 1990, Fig. 10 p. 43.  

   We dug in many places round about the village, & found indeed water, but it was little fresher than that of the ocean.  

   They possess a number of dogs, there were at least thirty about the village & what is very extraordinary, among the whole but two males, a direct opposition to that of their own specie.

   These people are slothfull, dull, & filthy to a great degree, I had proof of the latter in seeing a Woman assiduously employ’d in picking the lice from her husband’s clotted wool, & eating them with vast pleasure and satisfaction.

   [43] They expressed no astonishment at the sight of us, many of them taking little or no notice of us, & on our parting shewed no regret, but they were passionately fond of the buttons off our cloaths, brandy & tobacco, which I found they were acquainted with, & knew the use of: I saw an old woman who drew the smoak of it, thro ' a small tube made of hide, in large mouthfulls & swallowed it 'till her stomach was full of smoak, when she lay down gasping & reaching in a state of intoxication & let it gradually evaporate from her mouth & nostrils.  

   The eyes of these people, & also those of their dogs are all sore & running with water, & the eye lashes eaten away, this is occasioned I observed by a small fly which this country is full of, & the eye is the first place they attack, altho' to prevent this they have always in their hands a flapper made of a Fox or Jackal's brush, affixed to the end of a stick; the sand also if there is the least wind is always swept along in great & thick drifts, which annoys the eye greatly, & they live & sleep in the midst of the smoak of a fire which they keep continually burning in the middle of their huts.  

   Their language is very disonant, & consists in a great measure of monosyllables, each word being preceded by a click in the speech, which is effected by an application of the tongue to the roof of the mouth…

   I found they had among them some clay utensils and callibashes^[374], these last I imagine must have come a long way out of the country.  

   I look upon them to be a wandering people, & only take up their abode in partial spots, where they may chance to find the trees which I have beforementioned growing, & when they are expended by fire, & other occasions, they move & search for another place of residence, as a proof of this I saw two or three spots. which bore the appearance of worn out deserted villages. …

   [44] After making these observations & buying a calf which we found in the village I returned on board, & the next day another party of officers & men paid them a visit, and were fortunate enough to buy from them a fine young heifer, which we killed & served to the Ship's Compy. & was fat & good beef^[375].  

   We were at the same time not idle in digging & searching for fresh water, & procuring wood, but our endeavours to attain water proved all fruitless.  

   On the 30th I again paid a visit to the natives, attended by a party, in hopes of purchasing some more cattle, but I was disappointed, however we penetrated 2 or 3 miles into the country to take a view of it, tho' not without much murmuring among the Natives.^[376]

Popham iterates,

As I had finish’d my Observations, I accompanied Captain Thompson on his last expedition to the Town of the Natives; where we arrived after a tedious Walk, over loose sand, at times nearly Knee Deep; it is about 4 miles to the southward of the Beach, situated under some Hills of Sand, where the only shrubb grew that I saw in this Country … of the Twigs or Branches of this Shrub, they build their miserable Huts just high enough for a person to set up right in, and in each of which a Family dwelt, & had a Fire at the Entrance the smoke of which seemed to destroy their Eyes, at least to occasion a continual running (which was the Food of the small Flies that infested their Village), and deprive them of their Eyelashes. The Number of the Men was about 40, but I saw few Women, I beleive not more than sixe, and these to appearance so old, that I should have supposed them the Mothers of the Whole Village. They had the same kind of Skins thrown over their Shoulders as the Men and interwove with their plaits of Hair whatever Trinkets or Buttons they got from us, their Food was chiefly a Fruit that grew near them – of the Specie of Cucumber, much larger and of a glutinous nature; its Vine was without a leaf – they had plenty of Cattle but would not suffer us to see where they kept them, and I beleive drove them further inland on our arrival. they drank their Milk, but I saw no Meat in their Huts, tho’ I am convinced they made use of it as they eat apart of some which we had with us; The Water they had was very Brackish and tho’ it was near the Village we could not find its situation, we dug in many places but always got Salt Water. Their Arms were Bows and Arrows, some Clubs, a few Launces, and some long Poles, which were pointed with Iron, this shews their Communication with Europeans tho’ probably thro’ some hundred different Tribes, they had each likewise the Tail of a Fox or Jackall on a small stick, which they used to drive away the Flies – I believe them too indolent, to be expert Archers – and I look upon them to be part of the laziest, & most filthy Nation in the Universe. On our return we penetrated (much against their inclination) a few Miles into the Country, which was more barren and sandy than the place we left, at Sun set we arrived at the Beach, little pleased with the Excursion, as the Natives would not sell us any Cattle the only motive for our Visit.^[377] 

Thompson continues,

We found no alteration of the soil in this excursion, the whole face of the country being one loose, barren sand, with high mountains: The wind being rather fresh during this walk, the sand which flew in great clouds was very troublesome & almost blinded us, and we were very happy to get again on board.  

   We were employed 'till the 1st of May in the survey of the bay, & supplying the Ship with wood; this we found in great plenty, dead, & cast up on the shores, but where it can have come from I am at a loss to conceive, I am possitively assured it could never have been the growth of this part of the continent of Africa, tho' some people who have before visited a part of Caffraria have said that it appeared to them to have been a country worn out by time, & had once been fruitfull; I am rather led to think it was thus created, & the wood which we found to have been swept out of the rivers to the northward, & cast up here by northerly winds, for all the places which we have seen give strong proofs of the force of the NW gales.  

   Whilst we lay here the seine was hauled every day when the surf would permit, & we were pretty successfull in taking Rays, Catfish, & Sand Eels, which last are sweet, but very full of bones.  

   Walwich Bay is formed by a low, sandy neck to the SW, which bears the appearance of being entirely under water in particular seasons, probably in the northerly winds & is bounded to the eastward & northward by the main land; it is about 7 miles broad, & runs from the entrance to the southward about 6' or 7', & soundings from 12 fathoms to 6 feet, soft, muddy bottom.  

   The head of this bay is full of sand flats, & indeed the whole is surrounded by swamps, from which arise thick fogs & putrid exhalations, they are full of Flamingos, Pelicans, & many other sea birds; it is well sheltered from all winds & you lay in it as in a mill pond.  

   The nights & mornings here were calm, cold, raw & damp, 'till the fogs were dispersed by the SW trade, which seldom set in 'till 10 oclock, & died away again towards Sun set; this weather caused agues to be very frequent & general amongst us, however every care was taken against its attacks, & the Peruvian bark administered, which had a good effect.  

   Whales & Seals are found here, but not in such quantities as to the southward^[378].^[379]       

‘In contrast to his experience further south, Thompson found the people at Walvis Bay friendly and unafraid, and accepted an invitation to visit their encampment. After walking several miles through the dunes, Thompson and his party eventually reached a group of about twenty huts, clustered among stunted trees. Most of those present were men, armed with bows and poisoned arrows, as well as wooden clubs and spears, tipped with either antelope horn or iron. Men and women wore aprons and sandals, and some of the men affected caps with small antelope horns attached^[380]. In their hair, the people wore glass beads and shells, with thickly applied grease and a powdering of haematite, which Thompson likened to brick dust. One man was described as wearing, in addition to the other finery, an inflated bladder in his hair^[381]   

   Being an acute observer, Thompson noted such habits of the people as the wearing of bone knives and awls suspended from the neck and waist. He also inferred that they must have met Europeans before, but wondered if their beads had been acquired more indirectly, perhaps through the different inland peoples in contact with the Portuguese settlements to the north.’^[382] The people escort Thompson and his men to their village, ‘begging for tobacco, brandy and brass buttons off the officers’ uniforms’ and owning ‘trade goods such as glass beads and iron’, indicating that these were already important trade items^[383]. Here, ‘although these people evidently owned large herds of cattle, the Royal Navy men were unable to discover where the animals were kept, or the source of the water which sustained them’^[384]. They apparently speak a click language and possess cattle and dogs, as well as eating “the fruit of a small thorny plant which the [ship’s] Botanist found to be a kind of Cucumber”^[385]. ‘The !nara he [Thompson] described as resembling a cucumber on which the Walvis Bay people were largely dependent for food. Of their cattle there was little to be seen, other than spoor [‘Popham found the sporr of vast droves of cattle at Walvis Bay. The people who lived there were evidently skilled pastoralists’^[386]] and the single calf purchased for the ships’ provision. Neither could [100] Thompson see for himself the waterholes in the dunes which, on the day before leaving, he “penetrated .... tho’ not without much murmuring among the Natives.”’^[387] 

The description of this village corresponds with the pastoral encampment excavated at the waterhole of Sandfontein once known as ǂKhîsa-ǁgubus^[388], which ‘refers to the fine dust stirred up by cattle on their way to water’^[389]. Remains at this site include pottery, bone, a [103] ‘low denomination Hollands coin’ (a duit), indicating ‘occupation after the middle of the eighteenth century’, [113] 14 burials – [114] an unusually high number for a site and linked by Kinahan with Thompson’s reports of crew being taken ill with “ague” prior to landing at Walvis Bay – on the western side of the site^[390], a grove of Tamarix usneoides trees that could have formed the basic framework for huts, an area of discoloured silt that could have been the site of a livestock enclosure, and ‘a surface of well-preserved spoor of cattle and goats’ (also found at Khaeros, 10km inland on the !Khuiseb, where there is also [104] evidence that elephant drank here^[391]. At least 9 huts are suggested from the remains of ‘hearths, querns, whale rib posts and whale vertebrae’, as well as [110] ‘melon knives, glass beads ([114] demonstrating trade contact with Europeans], copper beads [[120] indicating possible pre-European exchange of livestock for ‘compact and easily portable valuables’], tobacco pipes and cowrie shells, Cypraea spp.’ and a large glass beead assemblage, copper beads and earrings and other trade items implying ‘a significant concentration of wealth’^[392]. Diet remains are dominated by domestic stock ([112] probably sheep and goats) and marine foods (whale, dolphin, seal, sea-birds such as cormorant and penguin, and mostly fish esp. sea barbel, cob and hake, [112] some of which might represent a ‘sudden windfall’ caused by a red tide)^[393]. Fish appear to have been speared using ‘[s]lender bone points between 60mm and 150mm in length’, possibly fitted to spears which ‘are known to have been used to pinion sandsharks to the muddy bottom of the lagoon’^[394]. Regarding !nara, ‘[t]he technology of processing the melons, and their high nutritional value, leaves no doubt as to their importance, while the facility for storing !nara concentrate and probably dried fish as well shows that seasonal variations in food supply could be eased’^[395].    

This encounter is also summarised in a later paper by Jill Kinahan who writes,

… Captain Thomas Bolden Thompson went ashore at Walvis Bay in search of water and supplies. The local people he met on the beach escorted him and his men to their village of about 20 huts in a grove of tamarisk trees deep in the dunes. The people numbered 85, consisting of eight very old women and three girls, 49 men and 25 boys, and they had at least 30 dogs. Although the villagers begged for tobacco, brandy and brass buttons off the officers' uniforms, and evidently kept cattle …, they had no livestock to trade. Apart from a lone calf, found in the village, and a heifer which "was fat and good beef” [301] …, at that time the seamen could not get the slaughter animals and water they needed.

   Although Thompson's descriptions of the people are sometimes judgmental and unflattering, they give an extraordinary amount of detail. They describe the appearance of the people …, their clothing of sandals, caps and sealskins tied around the neck; their jewellery of shells, beads, and ivory bracelets; thongs tied round their waists to suspend bone knives, bodkins, and small containers; their weaponry of sticks, bows and arrows, clubs and spears with hom or iron tips; their flywhisks of jackals' tails; their pipes and habits of smoking; their clay pots; their !nara melons, and their language. As Thompson described a strong settlement of some 20 huts and at least 85 people, with women and children presumably hidden in the dunes, the material remains of this village would be substantial.

   Many of the items Thompson described occur in abundance in the archaeological remains of an early contact village, ǂKhîsa-ǁgubus, which is situated in the dunes about 5 km from the rapidly expanding suburbs of present-day Walvis Bay …. It is very likely the remains of the village Thompson visited as it is the largest site dating to this period in the area. The Khoekhoegowab name refers to the fine dust stirred up by cattle on their way to water …. Evidently, the site was chosen at the time for its access to the waterhole of Sandfontein. At the northern end of the site, stumps of tamarisk trees and a number of hearths with dense scatters of pottery, bone knives, smoking pipes …, cowrie shells, glass and copper [302] beads, otoliths (fish ear-bones) and dolphin mandibles indicated a domestic area where huts would have stood. Small hummock dunes stabilized by low bushes separated an area of 14 burials; extensive fishbone middens with many bone points formed the eastern perimeter of the site, and two complete dog skeletons were on the southern end.  

   Adjacent to the middens was an area of discolored silt which might have been a small livestock enclosure, and on the northern limits of the site were silts bearing preserved spoor of cattle and goats describing a winding path. Small stock and cattle remains were sparsely scattered over the site, possibly scavenged by dogs at the time of occupation, but most butchery was done near the huts, and some of the remains disposed of in shallow pits. The age distribution of the small stock remains indicated management on a sustained yield basis, the slaughtered animals having been either very young (less than one year) or over two years old …. A low denomination Hollands coin, a duit, together with the glass bead assemblage, set occupation after the middle of the eighteenth century, a period that includes the date of Captain Thompson's description of the village he visited.  

   A site at Khaeros, approximately 25 km upstream on the south bank of the dry !Khuiseb riverbed, on the edge of a hardened river silt deposit near a small waterhole exemplifies a stockpost from the same period. The site consists of a small scatter of cultural material and fragmented bone near a hearth. The glass bead types and proportions in which they occur, as well as pottery and copper beads, mirror those found on ǂKhîsa-ǁgubus. Preserved in the hardened mud are cattle spoor, and meandering across the siltpan are the tracks of an elephant, an animal which has not occurred in this environment since the late eighteenth century …, implying that the mud, and the artefacts situated on it, have been preserved from at least that time.  

   South of ǂKhîsa-ǁgubus, close to the coast, are numerous siltpans that were flooded by exceptionally high tides flowing into the dunes from the lagoon. The hardened mud is crowded with tracks of elephant, giraffe, zebra, ostrich, as well as cattle, small stock and people, the spoor converging near a waterhole. The site of the spoor literally shows the footprint of livestock brought down to the coast for trade in the late eighteenth century.^[396]       

At Fish Bay^[397] further north,writes that “[t]here were tracks of the Natives and their Dogs in every place I landed, but what their Business could have been in this place I cannot suggest for it certainly was the most barren Spot, I had seen on the Coast”^[398]. As Thompson iterates, “Mr Popham in his researches up the head of the bay, found the tracks of natives, but saw none, nor any verdure, upon the northern point of the peninsula he found a large piece of Pump leather, & the runner tackle of a large boat, the blocks of which were painted green, & did not appear to have been exposed there above a year’^[399]. Leaving Fish Bay Thompson writes ‘[h]ere in compliance with my orders & instructions, my researches terminated, & I hauled to the westward, nor did any man feel a regret at leaving so dreary a coast, along which we had sailed nearly 1 200 miles in a direct line, without seeing a tree or procuring a drop of fresh water, altho' every effort & every diligent attention was exerted by all, & everyone, employed on this occasion’^[400]. They make their way to St. Helena finding in St. James Bay ‘a French Bark belonging to Nantz, who was bound to Angola for a cargo of slaves’, and leaving here two of his crew suffering ‘violent attacks of the ague’^[401].    

Two months later the expedition returned home^[402].

1786-mid-1810s

British reserve exclusive rights to catch whales and seals in waters off the Namibian coast, although do not proclaim ‘any official annexation’^[403].

1789

The French Revolution overturns aristocratic rule in Paris/France.

William Paterson publishes his Narrative of Four Journeys into the Country of the Hottentots and Caffraria. The population of the Cape Colony is estimated by government as 16,947^[404].

1790

After 1790 the slave trade ‘revived at Luanda with a Portuguese director at the big inland slave fair at Kasanje§’ with Portugal ‘again pre-eminent in the West Central African slave trade’ until 1850^[405].

Rumours are in circulation ‘that the [Cape] colonial rulers were considering military service for the Nama’^[406].

1790-1810

Peak of whaling off Namibian coast^[407]. Turn of the century sees migrating from Cape frontier into Namaland – ‘dispossessed Khoesan who had had experience of the ways of colonists, usually in the capacity of servants, and who had acquired their own stock and guns [and whose] … technological superiority gave them a distinct advantage over the local Khoekhoen [such that] … intense social disruption and violence followed their arrival in the country until they had established their hegemony’^[408].

early 1790s

Copper, initially throught to be gold, reported as occurring several days’ journey north of Gariep^[409]. The Afrikaner family, under Klaas Afrikaner, is working for Petrus Pienaar, ‘a successful white farmer based in the Orange River District’ who ‘employed the members of the group as a commando’ who ‘acquired a fearsome reputation for aggressive (and profitable) raiding’^[410]. The Orange River region develops into ‘a refuge for various impoverished and uprooted Nama and Oorlam peoples because in [18] these sparsely populated areas they could live independently from the white settlers and Cape authorities’, leading to intensifying resistance to colonial control^[411].

1791

Responding to rumours of copper deposits in Namaqualand, the van Reenen brothers (Willem, Valentyn and D.S.^[412]) in different journeys travel across the Orange^[413]. Willem, ‘at his own expense but with the permission of the authorities’^[414] for ‘a hunting and exploring expedition’ by Willem^[415] travels with several Dutch companions, including one Pieter Brand and the guide Barend Freyn whose headquarters were in Warmbad^[416], starting out in October 1791, crossing the Orange at Ramansdrift, on to Sandfontein and Warmbad, trekking upstream to Heinabis / Hariepbegos (reached previously by Hendrik Hop), encountering ‘thieving Bushmen’ en route^[417]. They journey on to Moddersfontein (Swartmodder^[418]) (now Keetmanshoop) where a Gideon Visagie was [33] raising and dealing in cattle there^[419]. Here their horses and trek-oxen are attacked and scattered by three lions and in the following search they lose 12 oxen, presumably to ‘Bushmen’, following which a Bastard guide named Jan Sieberd who lives in the area is recruited^[420].

Green writes that ‘[a]n American sailor Colquhoun’ lands at Walvis Bay^[421] (see 1793).

John Wesley, ‘chief promoter and patron of itinerant preacher’ and inspiration for the Wesleyan Missionary Society which later directs missionaries to southwestern Africa (e.g. Barnabas Shaw of Lilyfontein), dies on March 2nd^[422].

1792

Traveling through waterless stretches northwards in January the Willem van Reenen expedition shoot and eat rhinoceroses, giraffes and buffalo (at the ‘Leber River’^[423]), on 23 January reaching a mountain in ‘the land of the Heydamarassen [Bergdamas]’ ‘which he [Willem] named Rheniusberg’ – considered by Mossop to be near Rehoboth – where a “valuable hot spring” welled up and in the neighbourhood of which was a copper mine from which Willem van Reenen brings back ore ‘which proved to contain copper’^[424]. Esterhuyse reports that in this area Willem van Reenen ‘came into contact with the Hereros’, and returns with samples of ore rich in high quality copper^[425]. Willem van Reenen commenced journey home in February, reaching Modderfontein/Keetmanshoop from Rhenius mountain / Rehoboth in March and staying with Visagie and his wife – ‘the first mention of a white woman having her home in South West Africa’^[426]. He trades six of his best guns with natives for cattle and arrives back at his homestead on the Olifants River on 20 June, [37] his party having killed 65 rhinos, six giraffes and other game in ‘no inconsiderable quantity which the big-game hunter did not regard as worthy of mention’^[427].

This seems to be at a moment when Cape Nama [‘Goedonse’ or ‘sheep-stealers’ in Van Reenen] had ousted the Dama and murdered Jan Sieberd at the springs, stimulating threats of retaliation by the head of the Red Nation / Kaiǁkhaun who also laid claim to this area and was concerned to resist incursions by ‘Cape Nama’^[428].

Pieter Brand, who had been travelling with van Reenen, travelled further north, ‘accompanied by seven Bastard Hottentots to look for the “cattle-rich Damaras”’, encountering Bergdama living on roots some 5-6 days journey from Rhenius mountain (in Auas Mountains^[429]), observing:

[n]ow as to the Damrassen, they are a nation … which has neither sheep nor cattle and for their subsistence enjoy nothing other than roots and bulbs and gum of the thorn trees^[430].

And reporting Bergdama,

to be in the Auas Mountains and along the Swakop River, when they were nomadic hunters mainly in the regions of the Auas and Erongo Mountains and the Brandberg – there is still much archaeological evidence of their occupation of these areas. They called themselves Nu-khoin^[431].

Vedder, following, Brand in Mossop 1935, adds that:

“When they want meat to eat they forge bangles and beads out of copper and exchange these with the Namas for cattle. They sometimes make useful slaves to the Namas.” He asked them why they did not keep stock like the Namas and the Hereros. They replied that they had had a large number of stock, consisting of goats, sheep, and cattle, but the Namas had taken everything away from them, and if any of them were to possess anything, they ran the risk of being robbed of it, and even of being killed. They said, too, that in former times they had defended themselves against the Namas, but that since the Namas had come into possession of iron arrow-heads and assegais, they could no longer prevail against them. Brand’s guide confirmed what they stated and said that the Hereros were just as defenceless as the Bergdamas, for their only weapon of defence was the knobkerrie, while, for knives, they used hard stones, which they knew how to break off in such a way that they could use the sharp edges for cutting. Brand was astonished at this seeing that “this part of the country is so rich in copper”. He was told that, from the place from which he commenced his return journey to the camp, a journey of a further [36] nine days was necessary in order to meet the “cattle-rich Hereros”. The Bergdamas said that, when the Namas wanted cattle, they, too, got them by barter from the Hereros, or stole them from them.^[432]   

He also observes ‘abundant game’, living along the Swakop River^[433]. Brand mentions too ‘that when the Dama required meat for food, they smelted copper into armrings and beads which were traded for cattle from the Dama’, and that ‘the Dama bartered (or stole) cattle from the Commaka Dammereassen (Herero) in the north of the territory’^[434], who did not appear to have a knowledge of metal working^[435]. He also comments that the Dama ‘even render service to the Namaquas as slaves’^[436].

Their journey lasts nine months.

The repeated mentions of copper indicate the northern areas of Rehoboth where copper mines, known to Bergdama, were discovered 50 years later and then worked by Europeans^[437]. Later (see below) encounters with ‘Bergdama’ in the Swakop River indicate that in this year Europeans visit the copper mines south of the river^[438].

By this year ‘it seems that’ Pieter Pienaar determines to take action against increasing resistance to and attacks on white settlers to the north of the Cape Colony, at a moment when the Afrikaners appear to still be collaborating with him and gaining cattle, arms and ammunition from commando raids against Nama^[439].

1793

A Board of Agriculture is founded in Britain with Arthur Young (1741-1820) as first Secretary, in a context of social change following enclosures and a ‘spirit of improvement’ determining the Board’s activities and recommendations^[440].

In this year, during the French Revolution, a man kills with a sword the rhinoceros given to Louis XV of the royal household of Versailles: ‘[t]echnically, it was a difficult feat for taxidermists Jean-Claude Mertrud and Felix Vicq d'Azyr to skin and beautifully mount the animal’ which is now in The Natural History Museum in Paris^[441].

On instruction of the Cape colonial government, Klaas Afrikaner and Oorlam followers conduct ‘a commando campaign against the “Bastaard Hottentotten”, descendants of Nama slaves who had migrated northwards from the Cape^[442]. Their travels take them deep into the territory north of the Orange, getting caught on return to the Orange ‘in a skirmish with Guilliam Visagie, the first “white” to settle in Namibia’ (see 1785), in which ‘Visagie, his son and some of Visagie’s Basters attacked Klaas Afrikaner who lost four of his men and was forced to retreat’^[443]. As the Oorlam Afrikaners become more independent in weapon supplies gained through commando activities they become increasingly resistant to white settlers^[444].

Pieter Pienaar (‘a well-known big game hunter’^[445]) [the same Petrus Pienaar who employs Klaas Afrikaner^[446] (father of Jager Afrikaner and grandfather of Jonker Afrikaner - see below) and commando in early 1790s in Orange River District] travels under the auspices of the Dutch East India Co. with brothers (and prominent Cape burghers) of Willem van Reenen, Sebastiaan Valentijn van Reenen and Dirk Gijsberg van Reenen^[447], by the Meermin (under Captain Duminy who ‘presented the Hottentots with tobacco and trinkets’^[448]) from the Cape to Walvis Bay where they are met by their guide from Warmbad, Barend Freyn^[449]. The Dutch vessel the Meermin leaves Table Bay in the Cape on 3 January 1793 heading for Walvis Bay^[450], recording a similar population of sea-harvesters on the coast and pastoralists inland as that encountered in 1786 by the Nautilis^[451].

No reference is made to !nara even though ‘it would have been in season during the five and a half weeks the Frenchman du Miny’s crew and supercargo [the Van Reenen brothers and Pieter Pienaar – shot in 1796 by Oorlam Afrikaners] spent at Walvis Bay’^[452]. The Dutch learnt that the inhabitants were ‘Namaqua Hottentots’, i.e. Nama, with one of them – Claas [= Klaas Afrikaner?, see above] – speaking ‘the language of the country’,

[f]ifty men, armed with spears, came to pay their respects but left “very dissatisfied … that they had received no presents according to the custom of the Europeans.” They returned the next day, nevertheless, with two oxen and five sheep for barter. Serious misunderstandings were overcome, tobacco and glass beads were offered for copper beads from the mine of the Poor Damaras eight days’ journey away. … The Walvis Bay people being also fishermen, the Meermin’s visit ended with an armed clash when attempts were made to seize the Meermin’s fishing nets. There might have been a greater clash still had the inhabitants come to understand that the Meermin’s mission, to erect a “Stone of Possession in the name of the States-General (of the Netherlands) and the Noble (Dutch East India) Company” had been accomplished [to forestall occupation by foreign powers^[453]], and that without any reference whatever to themselves. No attempt by the Dutch to colonize Walvis Bay was to follow, however.^[454] 

Of this complexity, Moritz simply reports that,

Van Reenen, who landed with the "Meermin" on the coast near Walvisbaai in 1793, saw two Damaras creeping up on them on 21 February and willing to show them water. Furthermore, there is also talk of five Damara kraals lying in the Rivier, probably in the Kuiseb or near there^[455].

Duminy is thus under orders to ‘annex part of the coastline’ for the Netherlands^[456], hoisting the Company's flag at Possession Island and Angra Pequeña^[457]. Captain Duminy erecys stone beacons and proclaims Dutch sovereignty over Angra Pequeña, Halifax Island and Walvis Bay (‘Bahia de Baleas’ translated by the Hollanders as Walvisch Bay)^[458], and produces maps of Walvis Bay and Angra Pequeña^[459]. They experience uneasy relations with inhabitants of Walvis Bay, armed with assegais, who are unable to bring cattle for exchange and would not act as guides^[460]. The Meermin was also in communication ‘with seal-hunting English and American vessels’ with an American captain telling du Miny [Duminy] ‘of his visit to a Nama village at Walvis Bay a few years before, where he had found over 100 cattle’^[461].

The Meermin captain’s journal is accompanied by reports from the Van Reenen brothers and Pieter Pienaar of ‘their journeys into the interior’ which describe ‘the landscape, wildlife and the situations of the neighbouring Nama and Herero, with no element of the wars and depredation which were later to so disfigure Namibian history’^[462]. Pienaar reports ‘a “splendid valley” at the mouth of the river with fresh water, luxuriant vegetation of camelthorns and ana trees and a great number of game: such as elephants, rhinoceroses, gemsbuck and springbuck’^[463].

Sebastiaan Valentijn van Reenen set out ‘with the assistance of some natives’ to discover copper mines, and Pieter Pienaar with ‘[h]is Cape Hottentots’ went eastwards ‘following the valley of a river inland [the Swakop], at first in a South-Easterly and East-South-Easterly and then in N.N. Easterly direction’^[464] on a hunting trip into the interior [38] but could not find water, although he encountered two ‘Damaras’ who showed him water to the north-east in what was the Swakop River^[465]. Pienaar travelled inland along the Swakop for 12 days seeing no cattle but finding five Damara [Bergdamas as Pienaar’s Cape Hottentots could understand them^[466]] settlements, without cattle, and obtaining by barter ‘several copper bangles’ said to be made from mines 12-14 ‘stages’[schoften’^[467]] (‘one stage equaled a four hour trek in an ox-wagon’) south of the Swakop (between modern day ‘Protection Bay’[?] and the Swakop River^[468]), but a five year drought and reports of no water en route prohibited travel at that time and he did not see the source of the mineral^[469]. Pienaar was told by ‘Hottentots’ that the mine ‘had been visited by Christians the previous year’^[470]. He encounters ‘over 300 rhinoceros and even a greater number of elephants, gemsbuck, springbuck, buffaloes, and lions’, and kills 20 rhinos, three elephants and ‘much other game which he never counted’, thereby providing food for the Damaras that had joined his party^[471]. Further landings north of Walvis Bay speak of the “splendid valley” of the Swakop, good water, and ‘five old huts … which they reckoned had been erected by English or Americans’ as they fetched water here^[472]. Crew observe ‘great numbers of wild animals, such as elephants, rhinoceros, gems buck, and springbuck’ as well as camelthorn and ana trees^[473].

By the end of 1793 still ‘[n]o explorer’s eye had seen anything that lay northwards of the Kuiseb and the Swakop and in the distant east’^[474].

An American skipper, the Colquhoun, visits a Namaqua kraal in Walvis Bay finding 100 head of cattle there (reported by S.V. van Reenen in 1793)^[475].

1794

Jacobus Coetse Jansz (see 1760) and his wife and Margaretha ‘are returned as owning ten slaves, with their six child-slaves, twenty horses, a hundred beeves [beef cattle] and three hundred sheep’^[476].

1795

Coffee displaces sugar in the plantations of Principe^[477]. 

Under Colonel Gordon’s Governorship of the Dutch Cape Colony (under the Prince of Orange^[478]) and during the Napoleonic Wars when the Dutch Republic surrenders to the French^[479], the British, under Sir James Craig^[480], take the Cape Colony (until 1803)^[481] (after which Gordon commits suicide^[482]), and send the British frigate HMS Star ‘to hoist the British flag at all the landing places along the SWA/Namibian coast as far as Angola’, in the course of which few natives are met^[483]. At Walvis Bay, the Star’s captain, Alexander, finds ‘the people less approachable’, which Kinahan suggests might be linked with the multiple deaths of people evidenced by burials at Sandfontein / ǂKhîsa-ǁgubus, possibly caused by disease brought in 1786 on HMS Nautilis^[484]. Admiral Elphinstone estimated that ‘between 20 and 30 American whaleships were in Walvis Bay every season’^[485] and thereafter flourished under English control as foreign control through headquarters at Possession Island ceased, accompanied by trade between ships’ crews and Nama of Walfish Bay and Angra Pequena^[486].

Map of the Dutch Cape Colony in 1795, from page 374 of "History of Africa south of the Zambesi - from the settlement of the Portuguese at Sofala in September 1505 to the conquest of the Cape Colony by the British in September 1795" (1916). Public Domain, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3e/Map_of_the_Dutch_Cape_Colony_in_1795.jpg, from https://archive.org/stream/historyofafricas03thea/historyofafricas03thea#page/n374/mode/1up  accessed 200616

Mid-1790s

Klaas Afrikaner is commissioned by Dutch farmer Pienaar ‘to run a farm on one of the islands in the Orange river’, from where Klaas launches ‘raiding and hunting expeditions into Namaland, apparently on behalf of trekboer Pienaar and even the Cape government’^[487].

1796

To undermine American commercial competition, Captain Alexander of a sloop called the Star claims Walvis Bay and Angra Pequena for the British^[488], although British commitments to the Napoleonic wars means that little attention is paid to the Transgariep at this time^[489]. By this time coastal inhabitants are ‘so wary that Alexander and his men could not get near them’^[490]. The inscription on the Dias padrão at Lüderitz is observed as already illegible by this year^[491].

Initial employment of Oorlam Afrikaners by European settlers in the northern frontier zone of the Cape Colony during the latter years of the 18th century leads to rebellion, and the shooting in March^[492] of Pieter Pienaar, his wife and a daughter at Tulbagh in the Cape by Klaas Afrikaner^[493] – perhaps ‘provoked by Pienaar’s [19] improper behavior towards the wives of the Oorlams during their absence in times of commando raids, and/or linked with the Oorlam Afrikaners’ refusal of Pienaar’s order to go on another raid on Nama groups^[494] – signaling the beginning of a ‘resistance phase’ by Oorlam Afrikaners to white settlers^[495]. Of this shooting WMS missionary Benjamin Ridsdale writes,

[a]fter shooting of the Dutch Boer, Pinnar, to whom old Afrikaner [Klaas] and his clan were at that time subject, and by whom they were oppressed beyond all endurance, Afrikaner and his people fled to this place [Schans Vlakte].^[496]

Fleeing with all the livestock and firearms to the Orange River where the Cape police could not reach him, the Cape Government declared Klaas an outlaw with a price of £200 on his head, and in the vicinity of the Orange River he did indeed live a bandit’s life, stealing livestock and ‘bartering firearms with unscrupulous traders’^[497] and trading in ivory and arms, joined by Khoekhoe and San followers using southern Namibia, e.g. the inaccessible Karas Mountains, as a refuge^[498]. After the shooting of Pienaar the Afrikaner family moved across the Orange to settle around Blydeverwacht (later called Hoole’s Fountain) and Jerusalem^[499].

Afrikaner reportedly negotiates for land areas with the chieftain of the Rooi Nasie Nama (Red Nation, Kaiǁkhaun) who, after encountering Europeans with firearms, was keen to acquire this technology and associated powers, particularly so as to fend off Herero incursions into Rooi Nasie pasturage in the vicinity of Hoachanas north-east of Mariental^[500].

1796-98

The fortified settlement of ǁKhauxa!nas is thought to have been built by Oorlam Afrikaner Nama led by Klaas Afrikaner (following his shooting of Pieter Pienaar in March) in the east of the Great Karas Mountains, [12] the outcome of concerted human effort involving ‘hundreds, if not thousands of workers’^[501]. As Ridsdale describes,

[h]ere they resolved upon making a stand against the commandos sent in pursuit of them by the Colonial Government. Within this entrenchment, at the top of the mountain, they built their houses, had kraals for their calves, and in fact everything necessary to a Namaqua village, and considered themselves able to defy all their enemies. They seemed scarcely able to conceive of a valour that would proceed in the face of their bullets, scale their fort, bound over its walls, drive them over the fearful precipice on the opposite side, and plunge them into the abyss of black waters beneath. The opportunity of defending themselves in their impregnable fortification, however, never occurred, as the commandos of Boers from the Colony pursued them no farther than Nisbett Bath [Warmbad].^[502]

‘Fortress ruins at Schans Vlakte [ǁKhauxa!nas]’. Source: scan from Lau (1994[1987a], p. 21, photo by Klaus Dierks. 

1797

The Cape blaubok becomes extinct^[503]. Lord Macartney becomes governor of the British Cape Colony^[504].

1798

The first ‘national exhibition of industry’ takes place on the Champs de Mars in Paris ‘to entertain the working classes, … [becoming] for them a festival of emancipation’^[505] in which ‘[t]he worker occupies the foreground, as customer’^[506], i.e. constituting ‘their first clientele’^[507].. Walter Benjamin argues [in the 1930s] that this ‘entertainment industry’ is a precedent for the later ‘world exhibitions’ of merchandise, starting with the Great Exhibition in London’s Crystal Palace in 1851.

Morrell makes reference to a Captain Wood of ‘his Britannic majesty’s ship Garland’ charting as a navigational hazard ‘Alligator Rocks’ in the vicinity of ‘Bird Island’ (north of Spencer Bay), stating that perhaps in the hazy weather along the coast Wood had mistaken Bird Island for a treacherous reef than in fact is not there^[508].

A John Barrow journeys to ‘Namaqua country’ (not sure how far north) in the course of travels between 1797-99^[509] and later (in 1806) writes that,

[t]he Namaqua Plains are now desolate and uninhabited. All those numerous tribes of Namaquas, once possessed of vast herds of cattle, are in the course of less than a century dwindled away to four hordes, which are not very numerous and in a great measure are subservient to the Dutch peasantry. A dozen years, and probably a shortened period, will see the remnant of the Namaqua nation in a state of entire servitude^[510].    

He reports

a Damara near the Kamiesberg at the Cape, who describes the Damaras as a "very poor tribe" whose land stretches along the coast and who trade with the Namas. Their land goes from the Orange River to the Tropic of Cancer.^[511] 

1798-99

Uprising in Little Namaqualand^[512].

1799

In 1799 during the first British occupation (1795-1803) Sir George Young is appointed Governor and finds the Company Garden to be in a state of neglect, due to which he stops all access to the Garden and spends ‘public money beautifying the Garden around Government House, apparently for his own benefit’, although re-opened the Avenue due to public pressure^[513].

On 17 May ‘an abortive commando’ is sent against the Oorlam Afrikaners who retaliate against this and other ‘official commandos’ from the cape ‘by attacking white settlers in the Cape Colony’, returning to their hiding place at ǁKhauxa!nas with ‘their spoils of war’^[514]. Around this time Klaas relinquishes his leadership to Jager Afrikaner / |Hoa|aramab and,

rumours that all Nama had to undergo a general census in preparation for taxation resulted in more Nama joining the Oorlam Afrikaners who, with increasing strength, raided cattle and weapons from the white settlers in the Oranje frontier zone.^[515]

Jager Afrikaner. Source: scan from Lau (1994[1987a], p. 21), drawing on Moffat (1842, p. 172). 

The LMS establish stations among the Griqua along the Orange River and the Gaikas in ‘what was then called Kaffirland’^[516].

William Threlfall is born in Hollowforth, Lancashire, on 6th June, later becoming a Wesleyan missionary in the northern Cape^[517].

1799-1803

Last ‘Khoekhoe war of resistance in the east’ [in South Africa?]^[518]. During these years a British missionary, Reverend Kicherer from London, preaches among ‘frontier Bushmen’ despairing of their hostility and wretchedness and observing that ‘he only ever managed to attract a congregation when he offered free “victuals and tobacco”^[519].

Prior to 1800

Otjiherero-speakers migrate from Kaoko via Tsumeb to the Waterberg, ‘including a journey by one leader, Kaimu, and his people to the sea and back again to the centre of the country’, by which ‘all Mbanderu clans are said to have migrated eastwards as far as Ghanzi in modern Botswana’^[520]. By or just after 1800, the Oorlam Nama (Afrikaner) settlement of ǁKhauxa!nas in Great Karas mountains must have been established^[521].