Over the last two months, I have read with shock and sometimes disdain at some apparent confusion surrounding the settlement history of Bukalanga. Since December 2012, a number of disingenuous newspaper articles have been published on these two related topics. Misleading information covered in these issues has compelled me to offer some direction on the settlement history of Bukalanga. Among the disingenuous articles I read, there are three which I find interesting.
One article covers a story of one certain Facebook elected Ndebele Induna (chief) who claims to have the right to political leadership of all Bakalanga found in the North East District (NED).
The misled leader is a youthful man better described in newspapers as a tertiary dropout who goes by the name Nhlanhla Simon. The claims by Simon were reported in an article in which Dr Manatsha was erroneously quoted by one Mmegi journalist Lawrence Seretse. Information on the arrival of Baperi of Nswazwi and Tjilagwane in Bukalanga was clearly misinterpreted in the article. Dr Manatsha subsequently offered a candid chronicle of events leading to the NED land situation and chieftainship quandary in a paper published in Volume 30, no 24 of Mmegi dated 15 February 2013. The paper focused mainly on the NED and clarified some misrepresentation of historical events covered in the Seretse article.
The other two articles mainly cover the settlement history of Baperi of Tjilagwane in Bukalanga. Of interest is a recent article written by She (Kgosi) Alphonse Nsala of Tjilagwane ward in Tutume. His article titled ‘The real story of Baperi of Tjilagwane’ appeared in Mmegi newspaper volume 30 No 32 dated 01 March 2013. This is in fact a rebuttal of an earlier account of Baperi of Tutume published by one Barati Mathambo in Mmegi of 13 December 2012. In his account, She Nsala of Tjilagwane attempted but did not quite succeed in correcting some historical delusions carried in Mathambo’s article on the settlement history of the Baperi living in Bulilima (areas of Bukalanga around Sebina, Nshakazhogwe, Madandume, Tjilagwane and Nswazwi where Lilima dialect is spoken).
The point raised by the leader of Tjilagwane about the settlement of the Baperi at Old Shoshong and their subsequent movement to Old Palapye with Bangwato is inconsistent with the available body of literature of the origins of Baperi. Secondly, the statement that the Baperi were led by Tjilagwane and Shabalume into Bukalanga in 1902 is not correct. She Nsala should know that since the Baka Nswazwi Royal Dynasty spans at least 8 generations, his 1902 date cannot be correct. To buttress my point, the dynasty begins with Shabalume who becomes Nswazwi I and ends with John Madawo Nswazwi stylised Nswazwi VIII. This historical information is freely available at the tombstone of She John Madawo Nswazwi VIII at Nswazwi Royal Cemetery. If She John Madawo Nswazwi VIII was born in 1875 in Bukalanga, how is it possible that his first generation forefather, Shabalume or Nswazwi I, led Baperi from Old Palapye into Bukalanga in 1902?
Another important aspect that can be deduced from She Nsala and Barati Mathambo’s articles is the extensive misinterpretation of the settlement record of Bulilima region in Bukalanga. The two articles fail to acknowledge that when Baperi arrived in the areas around Tutume, they found the Bawumbe of Madandume in the areas around Duthu la Majambubi. The Bawumbe of Madandume, Nshakazhogwe, Motshwane ward in Sebina and BaSenete are Balilima. They venerate tjibelu as their totem and have the longest occupation record in Bukalanga than any other groups found in the area.
These people lived in areas around present day Tutume, Goshwe, Nkange up to Maitengwe as early as AD 1700 (Mabuse 2012). The residences of the chiefs of these Balilima are found on hilltop ruins such as Selolwane near Tjilagwane, Sulawali and Matombo Mashaba on the western side of Madandume. The largest of these prehistoric Balilima villages is found at Magapatona Ruin, some 5 kilometres north of Goshwe village. These Balilima people were found here by all Sotho Tswana turned Bakalanga groups of Baperi of Tjilagwane, Nswazwi and Masunga and the Bakaya of Tjizwina.
It should be noted that my preference to stick to the original Ikalanga names of people, places and rivers throughout this paper is deliberate. Sticking to the original Ikalanga names helps promote a better understanding of Bukalanga’s rich cultural heritage. To succeed in this necessary endeavour, I have utilised information on archaeological sites found in Bukalanga. This is readily available to the public at the Botswana National Museum’s Archaeology laboratory. Furthermore, I have turned to the vast archaeological literature published on the prehistory of the area to help link it with Bakalanga people. The interpretation deduced from the archaeological data has been applied to oral traditions of Bakalanga. This is important as archaeological information has the advantage of providing accurate and therefore reliable dates for important historical events. These are easily diluted and distorted as oral traditions are passed from one generation to another. This method has helped establish a comprehensive chronological framework of the prehistory of Bakalanga people. This approach is anticipated to vanquish a fallacy that Bakalanga people arrived late in present day Botswana.
This approach will expectantly help us appreciate the fact that the origin of the culture of Bakalanga people is archaeologically traceable to around AD 1000. In fact, this unique culture developed in the very same area that Bakalanga people have lived since the last 1013 years or so of their existence in Southern Africa. This illustrative settlement record has considerable amounts of sociopolitical and economic development among Bakalanga which saw their land attracting attention of the foreign world in centuries that followed. Due to this prolonged existence in one area, it is perhaps necessary for one to divide this paper into three idiosyncratic topics. The first one deals with the origins of Bakalanga and their involvement in the development of prehistoric civilization in Southern Africa. The second part traces Bakalanga migration patterns and their causes in the broader area known as Bukalanga in Botswana. The last part covers an important question of the true identity of the Bakalanga, why they are often confused with the Ndebele and the Shona people of Zimbabwe.
A journey into prehistoric times in Bukalanga shows that the original Bakalanga people descended from Leopards Kopje farmers (Huffman 2008). These people occupied areas covering parts of north eastern Botswana, western and southern Zimbabwe, adjacent parts of South Africa and Mozambique by around AD 1000. (Emmanuel 2012). In fact, Huffman (1974) detailed study of the Leopards Kopje Tradition concludes that these Leopards Kopje farmers spoke Proto Ikalanga language in this vast area. These ancestral Bakalanga people reared cattle and goats and grew crops such as millet, melons and beans. They made clay pots and smelted iron into farming implements and household utensils. Van Waarden (1998) demonstrates that they traded in ivory, furs and feathers with the Indian Ocean coast for goods such as glass beads, cotton clothes and other ornaments that originated as far as Asia.
The majority of these prehistoric Bakalanga villages have been discovered in Botswana in areas close to major rivers such as Motloutse, Shashe, Tati and Tutume and around the Makgadikgadi Pans. Closer inspection of these villages shows that they were usually built on terraced hilltops with stone walls built around them. These walls were built as an outward expression of prestige and power in a similar fashion that rich and well to do people prefer to build walls commonly known as stop nonsense around their homes today in Bukalanga. The most outstanding ruins of these ancestral Bakalanga people are found at Nyangabwe, Selolwe hills and Sekukwe Kop in and around Francistown respectively, Phanga Hills near Sebina and at Letsibogo Dam and Ridinpitwe Hills to the south west of Tobane.
In the Makgadikgadi region, Kaitshe near Mosu, Tlapana near Mmeya, Thitaba near Tshwagong and the stone walled ruin at Lekhubu are some examples of ancestral Bakalanga ruins. A newly reported site known as Dongogulu at Madandume lands near Tutume presents one of the largest ancestral Bakalanga villages I have ever visited in Botswana. These early sites, together with many later period ruins are instrumental in our understanding of the settlement history of the original Bakalanga populations and subsequent groups that acculturised into present day Bakalanga. The most characteristic features of these sites are dry stone walls built without the use of mortar around dwelling areas. Within these stone walls, round houses were built using red hardened clay, wooden poles and thatch (van Waarden 1991). The settlement organisation of the homesteads followed a Central Cattle Kraal pattern in which houses formed a circle around a centralised cattle kraal. The majority of these prehistoric cattle kraals are identified by Cenchrus ciliaris grass, mosekangwetsi which grows in them. The villages usually had large granaries, archaeologically shown by stone platforms on which clay, pole and thatch granaries were built for storage of food supplies. By the year AD 1000 some of these people had become quite rich in cattle and had more political control in their areas (Tlou and Campbell 2000).
By around AD 1000 these people lived in small chiefdoms that had control of trade in the various areas where they lived. The early Bakalanga people living in the Shashe Limpopo basin monopolised trade due to their access to the Indian Ocean coast. By around AD 1220 a new and more powerful kingdom developed around Mapungubwe Hill, some 5 kilometres to the east of Botswana’s border with South Africa. Some of the early Bakalanga people living in the lower Shashe – Limpopo valley probably moved towards or became part of this newly formed kingdom. This development led to the demise of the Shashe – Limpopo Bakalanga chiefdoms. In a series of articles titled ‘The Evolution and Apex of Bakalanga State of Butua’ published in Mmegi newspaper in 2012, I reasoned that the movement of Leopards Kopje people ( who are ancestral Bakalanga) towards Mapungubwe facilitated the development of civilization in Southern in many ways.
Mapungubwe’s usurp of trade control in the hinterlands of the Shashe – Limpopo Rivers owes much to trade routes and networks that were established by the ancestral Bakalanga that lived for over 200 years in the area. Long before the establishment of Mapungubwe, the ancestral Bakalanga of the Shashe-Limpopo region were connected with their counterparts living in the Makgadikgadi areas through trading networks and routes. Mapungubwe’s flourish benefited from its advantageous position as it was now easy to bring gold from Vumba schist near Francistown. Copper from Thakadu Mine near Matsitama; iron from the Tswapong Hills, ivory, furs and salt from the Makgadikgadi Pans were all brought to this more centralised centre for easy trade with the eastern coast. This allowed development of centralised political organisation in Mapungubwe. Leading archaeologists on state formation in Southern Africa suggest that Mapungubwe was a stratified society in which the ruler lived on top of Mapungubwe Hill. About 5000 elites surrounded his ruling class while a further 4000 commoners occupied the valley to form a large and obviously powerful capital. This class stratification heralded the beginning of civilization in Southern Africa.
Mapungubwe flourished quickly, allowing the development of profitable trade by the ruling families. This obviously created inequality in political power and wealth between the ruling class and commoners in Mapungubwe ( Van Waarden 2009) Within 10 years, Mapungubwe had gained control over an area measuring over 30 000 km┬▓. Unfortunately, Mapungubwe’s supremacy was shortened by loss of trade control to a competing centre on which the monumental town of Great Zimbabwe was finally established. Studies of climatic data from the area suggest that a disastrous drought struck Mapungubwe and forced the ordinary population to scatter in pursuit of wetter areas to grow crops and graze their livestock (Huffman 1996a). Archaeological evidence shows that the Shashe -Limpopo region was uninhabited between A.D 1300 and 1420 due to a prolonged drought in the area. Van Waarden (1998) argues that the presence of sites dating to this period in the Soutpansberg area suggests that the majority of the population moved there. Although it is not clear as to what happened to the ruling class of the kingdom, we know from detailed archaeological research that Mapungubwe had become a ghost town by AD 1290. Its golden era lasted no more than 50 years culminating in the rise of Great Zimbabwe.
Although the question of who built Great Zimbabwe has been a speculation of writers, travellers, kings and commoners for a considerable amount of time, we now all know that it was done by the indigenous populations living in the areas occupied by ancestral Bakalanga people. Van Waarden (1998) shows that as Mapungubwe perished in A.D 1290, the Zimbabwe plateau and parts of north eastern Botswana continued to receive better rains that helped sustain the ancestral Bakalanga populations. The continuous habitation of this area by ancestral Bakalanga people provides an answer to the development of prestigious stone walling techniques that became fashionable in the entire region in the next 500 years that followed. Dr Catrien Van Waarden’s comprehensive study of prehistoric ruins in Bukalanga areas has yielded commendable information that suggests that Bakalanga were involved in the development of Great Zimbabwe. The results of her studies show that Domboshaba type stone walls found in north eastern Botswana are a local architect began within the Tati and Shashe River basins. While a portion of the ancestral Bakalanga people living in the lower Shashe River basin were usurped by the rise of Mapungubwe Kingdom, the remaining populations living in the interiors continued to develop without blanket influence of this kingdom.
The ancestral Bakalanga living in the Tati River basin produced large quantities of gold for trade with Mapungubwe. They also continued to increase their herds of cattle, grew crops in the same region and lived in reasonably sized settlements. This political independence allowed some controlled amount of trade in gold with the east and fostered some degree of specialization in stone building skills, pottery production and mining of gold. Radiocarbon dates from ruins found at Tholo Hill, Mupane and Mupanipani shows that typical Zimbabwe stone walling tradition began in the Tati River Basin among the ancestors of the Bakalanga. This tradition became fashionable over time and was improved until reaching its apex at Great Zimbabwe, which had become a powerful capital controlling trade with the east coast. Sacred leadership practiced in the site allowed building of the large prestigious walls. Great Zimbabwe then became a large powerful state from around AD 1250 and lasted 200 years. During this period, many satellite sites with stone walling tradition similar to the style expressed at Great Zimbabwe were built in Bukalanga. Such ruins are found at Domboshaba near Vugwi village, Vukwi near Mambo and Schermer’s Ruin near Tjizwina.
Great Zimbabwe collapsed in AD 1450 as two new competing states were formed. Munumutapa State developed around the Zambezi valley while another one known as Butua developed southwest of Great Zimbabwe. The capital of the newly formed state of Butua was built at Kame (which was later on corrupted to Khami), to the west of Great Zimbabwe. In many ways, the state of Butua was a continuation of Great Zimbabwe state. The whole state was ruled by the Sipundule (Chibundule) kings known as Mambo. The citizens of Butua began to be known as the Bakalanga. In fact there is little doubt that the early people of Butua are the ancestors of the Bakalanga, particularly the Balilima, and that they arose from the Mambo people (the early Bakalanga people who lived in the Zimbabwe plateau and north eastern Botswana at around AD 1300). No other living people in the area today have roots that stretch right back almost 1000 years ( Tlou and Campbell 2000: 100).
*Abel A. Mabuse is Head of Archaeological Research Laboratory at Botswana National Museum and writes in his personal capacity as an Archaeologist with Bukalanga roots.
