A-level Notes History - Development of pre-colonial societies and states - Societies In Zimbabwe

Societies In Zimbabwe

The Zimbabwe plateau is a rich  region in both human and material  resources.  It boasts of two major navigable rivers, the Limpopo and Zambezi.  It also had one or two inland navigable rivers, Save and Mutirikwe. The plateau is  rich  in hills and mountain ranges like Nyanga,  Chimanimani,  Mavhuradonha and Mvurwi  range. The area has a rich  history of good climatic conditions and the animal wealth. The soils and pastures are rich  and green. Mineral  deposits are in abundance. The earliest inhabitants of the region were the two Stone Age people, the Khoisan hunter-gatherers  and the Khoikhoi  hunter-herders. The two were Stone Age people. The juicy and romantic rock art in cave dwellings left by the Khoisan has invaluably given historians an intimate insight into their lifestyle. Through ethnography and anthropology more has been learnt about the Stone Age societies in Kalahari and Namib deserts of Botswana and Namibia and many others in  Eastern Zimbabwe and Angola. Anthropological  research among the Shona and the two groups have yielded  revealing results of relations  between Stone Age and Iron Age societies. The 'Mandionerepi' concept comes from the conflict between the San and the Shona which was demeaning. The San rejected  deregatory  language associated with their physical and social  being and so could meet with  instant justice to prove their manhood and womanhood. They easily solved it with physical  blows to prove their worth.

The Khoisan

The Khoisan represent the earliest Stone Age inhabitants in Southern Africa. They were mostly concentrated on the Zimbabwean plateau and South Africa. They are light brown in complexion,  short, stout and swift. The early Stone Age societies used stone tools,  bone and wooden tools. They were hunters and gatherers. The basic technology of brittle tools and weapons enabled them to hunt small game and largely depend on a vegetable diet. The Khoisan culture depended mostly on the environment for survival.  From anthropological  research the Stone Age societies were forced out of their natural  inhabitants by the technological  superior Bantu  Iron  Cultures. They were forced to migrate to the Kalahari and Namib deserts where most of them are found today.  Many others were incorporated through acculturation into the Bantu societies by way of matrimonial  relations and labor recruitments. They were the best hunters of the time who understood their environment better than the Bantu. The knowledge of the environment and hunting expertise were most sought after for the adaptation  of the Bantu societies. They were expert doctors and clinical  nurses of various ailments and tropical diseases which facilitated the successful settlement of the Bantu on the plateau.  They made their own medicine. They made and sharpened their stone,wooden  and bone tools. The San discovered fire ,roasted and cooked their food. They invented fishing hooks, snares and traps. The Stone Age people made their on loin  leather clothes. They preserved their food by roasting and sun drying.  Phenomenally they recorded their daily activities on the cave walls. The San were advanced enough to control  birthrates and degradation of the environment.

The Khoisan were a strong and united cultural society that lived  in relatively  very small groups, averaging 50 members. The size of the group determined the nature of their economic activities. They depended mostly on gathering which was supplemented  by hunting. They did not produce surplus due to the precarious  nature of environmental constraints and limitations. What they produced as a group was shared communally as a group which forced the sizes of the communities down.  Hunting was not only a dangerous occupation but a limited economic activity which sometimes,  or,  more often than not, the hunters came back home empty handed or with a very small  catch. The hunting activity was a zerosome game and so there was no food security or guarantee that they would have a decent adequate meal. This situation evolved the San to develop ways and means of living to sustain themselves and the environment. They preserved and conserved the environment to sustain themselves. They devised birth control  methods to control population  explosions. They resorted to mobile lifestyle to avoid exhausting the environment of game and food stuffs. They lived  a nomadic life to allow the environment to recover.

The Khoisan principally were expert hunters. Their principle hunting weapons were wooden bow and arrow, sometimes improvised with stone,  bone and porcupine arrows. The arrows had at times poisoned tips for the biggest animals. They also used dug outs or pit laced with spikes at the bottom to kill big game,  like elephants,  buffaloes,  kudus and Impalas. They also used traps and snares for smaller animals.  In fish, they poisoned the pools,  used

funnel shaped traps made of reeds,  nets and fishing hooks.  Even on their cave drawings they had big fish as their catch.  Poison was made from a mixture of insects or snake venom,  animal  blood,  roots or leaves of trees. The concoctions were so dangerous that hunters needed to be trained in the field to avoid human fatalities which could be hunters or their families.

The Khoisan technical  industry included the use of hooves for making glue which they used as adhesive for tool  making and bags (nhava). This was also used in making and preparing their cloth loins and shoes (nyatera/ nyahwa).  Roots of trees, fruits,  grass,  leaves, barks and animal fat were important for preparing concoctions and various medical remedies for various ailments. The Khoisan used fibre for weaving string bags, for carrying various sizes of arrows and additional  hunting weapons. They also made leather bags for carrying weapons and water. Animal  skins were also used to make loin  leather clothes and blankets, and at times reinforced their shelters under big trees. They made beautiful earrings from animal  bones,  ivory and stones. At the history museum at Matopos some of the jewelry and various regalia and weapons were captured. Various ornaments were made from wood,  stone and bone like plates, cups,  spoons (ndiro,  mukombe nemugwaku). The San people also used fire for roasting and drying meat, scaring away animals, warming themselves and light at night. Fire was also used for ritual and ceremonies as they converged around a fire at night and drove off evil spirits. The Khoisan were innovative and technologically  advanced in some areas but lagged on settlement and widening economic activities.

Societal System of the San

According to anthropological,  ethnographic,  rock art painting  and archaeological research,the San were nomadic people. They migrated from one region and season to the other in search of mainly game, foodstuffs and water. The nomadic lifestyle was necessitated by the economic survival  of the San which depended on the environment. They also lived  in smaller communities to enable them to get adequate food from the environment. Their food security, only came from managing their numbers and the environment which they did expeditiously. The Khoisan lived a communal way of life because of the economic dependence on the environments. They engaged in a number of recreational social  activities,  because of their limited economic activities. They engaged in  rituals and ceremonies to celebrate the coming of the new moon,  new season and new, year. They sang and danced imitating animals and sometimes painted themselves  in the colors of the animals. They also got ample time to document their social,  economic and political activities on the walls of their cave dwellings. The detail on the rock art is amazing and lasting. They were able to mix colors from blood,  soot,  herbs and sand to write their graphic stories in colors. The talking pictures are the San writing and communication with the environment and future generations. They complement anthropology, ethnography and archaeology.