San peoples

{{Short description|Southern African indigenous hunter-gatherers}} {{Redirect|Bushman|other uses|Bushman (disambiguation)}} {{use British English|date=January 2014}} {{Use dmy dates|date=September 2020}} {{Infobox ethnic group | group = San Bushmen | image = frameless|upright=1.5 | caption = ǃKung children in Namibia | population = ca. 160,000 | region1 = {{flag|Namibia}} | pop1 = 71,201 (2023 census)<ref name="Census2023"/> | region2 = {{flag|Botswana}} | pop2 = 63,500 | region3 = {{flag|South Africa}} | pop3 = ca. 7,000 | region4 = {{flag|Angola}} | pop4 = ca. 16,000 | region5 = {{flag|Zimbabwe}} | pop5 = 1,200 | rels = San religion, Christianity | langs = '''Native''' Languages of the Khoe, Kxʼa, and Tuu families '''Also''' Tswana{{•}} Kgalagadi{{•}} Afrikaans{{•}} English{{•}}Portuguese | related = Khoekhoe, Griqua, Basters, Coloureds }} thumb|Map of modern distribution of "Khoisan" languages. The territories shaded blue and green, and those to their east, are those of San peoples. The '''San peoples''' (also '''Saan'''), or '''Bushmen''', are the members of any of the indigenous hunter-gatherer cultures of southern Africa, and the oldest surviving cultures of the region.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2010-04-28 |title=Foragers to First Peoples: The Kalahari San Today {{!}} Cultural Survival |url=https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/foragers-first-peoples-kalahari-san-today |access-date=2024-03-30 |website=www.culturalsurvival.org |language=en}}</ref>{{Efn|Some scholars contest that cultures and identities cannot be considered fixed or invariable, especially over such a long time period.<ref>{{cite journal |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/abs/primordialism-and-the-pleistocene-san-of-southern-africa/45D6E61597C34A496AB5A0B6FA1C7632 |last1=Pargeter |first1=Justin |last2=Mackay |first2=Alex |last3=Mitchell |first3=Peter |last4=Shea |first4=John |last5=Stewart |first5=Brian |title=Primordialism and the 'Pleistocene San' of southern Africa |year=2016 |journal=Antiquity |volume=90 |issue=352}}</ref>}} Some interpretations of the genetic analysis suggest divergence from other humans as early as 100,000 to 200,000 years ago.<ref>{{Citation |last1=Al-Hindi |first1=Dana R. |title=Genetic Divergence Within Southern Africa During the Later Stone Age |date=2022 |work=Hofmeyr: A Late Pleistocene Human Skull from South Africa |pages=19–28 |editor-last=Grine |editor-first=Frederick E. |url=https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-07426-4_3 |access-date=2025-01-02 |place=Cham |publisher=Springer International Publishing |language=en |doi=10.1007/978-3-031-07426-4_3 |isbn=978-3-031-07426-4 |last2=Reynolds |first2=Austin W. |last3=Henn |first3=Brenna M.|url-access=subscription }}</ref> Their recent ancestral territories span Botswana, Namibia, Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho,<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Mountain Bushmen of Basutoland |last=Walsham How |first=Marion |publisher=J. L. Van Schaik Ltd. |year=1962 |location=Pretoria }}</ref> and South Africa.

The San speak, or their ancestors spoke, languages of the Khoe, Tuu, and Kxʼa language families, and can be defined as a people only in contrast to neighboring pastoralists such as the Khoekhoe and descendants of more recent waves of immigration such as the Bantu, Europeans, and South Asians.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

In 2017, Botswana was home to approximately 63,500 San, making it the country with the highest proportion of San people at 2.8%.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Hitchcock |first1=Robert K. |last2=Sapignoli |first2=Maria |date=8 May 2019 |chapter=The economic wellbeing of the San of the western, central and eastern Kalahari regions of Botswana |chapter-url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335022800 |editor1-first=Christopher |editor1-last=Fleming |editor2-first=Matthew |editor2-last=Manning |title=Routledge Handbook of Indigenous Wellbeing |edition=1st |pages=170–183 |publisher=Routledge |via=ResearchGate |isbn=9781138909175}}</ref> 71,201 San people were enumerated in Namibia in 2023, making it the country with the second highest proportion of San people at 2.4%.<ref name="Census2023">{{cite web|url=https://census.nsanamibia.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/2023-Population-and-Housing-Census-Main-Report-28-Oct-2024.pdf|title=Namibia 2023 Population and Housing Census Main Report|publisher=Namibia Statistics Agency|access-date=2024-10-30|archive-date=10 November 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241110234059/https://census.nsanamibia.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/2023-Population-and-Housing-Census-Main-Report-28-Oct-2024.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref> ''San'' is a pejorative Khoekhoe term that was adopted by Western anthropologists; the Representatives of San peoples stated their preference in 2003 to be referred to as their respective nations.

== Definition == The San or Bushmen are the peoples of southern Africa who traditionally lived a hunter-gatherer lifestyle and spoke non-Bantu languages with click consonants (thus excluding the Twa, Kwisi and Cimba, but also the Kwadi and Damara). These include speakers of three distinct language families living between the Okavango River in Botswana and Etosha National Park in northwestern Namibia, extending up into southern Angola; central peoples of most of Namibia and Botswana, extending into Zambia and Zimbabwe; and the southern people in the central Kalahari towards the Molopo River, who together with the Khoekhoe are the last remnants of the previously extensive indigenous peoples of southern Africa.<ref name="Barnard">{{cite book |last=Barnard |first=Alan |title=Anthropology and the Bushman |year=2007 |publisher=Berg |location=Oxford |isbn=9781847883308 |pages=4–7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=e3MihaaJ314C}}</ref>

==Names== The designations "Bushmen" and "San" are both exonyms. The San have no collective word for themselves in their own languages. "San" comes from a derogatory Khoekhoe word used to refer to foragers without cattle or other wealth, from a root ''saa'' "picking up from the ground" + plural ''-n'' in the Haiǁom dialect.<ref>{{cite web |title=WIMSA Annual Report 2004-05 |url=http://evan.oribi.cc:50080/index.php?option=com_rokdownloads&view=file&task=download&id=19%3Awimsa-annual-report-04-05&Itemid=79 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140318092420/http://evan.oribi.cc:50080/index.php?option=com_rokdownloads&view=file&task=download&id=19%3Awimsa-annual-report-04-05&Itemid=79 |archive-date=18 March 2014 |access-date=18 March 2014 |publisher=WIMSA |page=58 |quote=the term 'San' comes from the Haiǁom language and has been abbreviated in the following way ... Saa – Picking things up (food) from the ground (i.e. 'gathering'), Saab – A male person gathering, Saas – A female person gathering, Saan – Many people gathering, San – One way to write 'all of the people gathering'}}</ref><ref>"The old Dutch also did not know that their so-called Hottentots formed only one branch of a wide-spread race, of which the other branch divided into ever so many tribes, differing from each other totally in language [...] While the so-called Hottentots called themselves Khoikhoi (men of men, ''i.e.'' men ''par excellence''), they called those other tribes ''Sā'', the Sonqua of the Cape Records [...] We should apply the term ''Hottentot'' to the whole race, and call the two families, each by the native name, that is the one, the ''Khoikhoi'', the so-called ''Hottentot proper''; the other the ''San'' (''Sā'') or ''Bushmen''." – Theophilus Hahn, ''Tsuni-ǁGoam: The Supreme Being to the Khoi-Khoi'' (1881), p. 3.</ref>

"Bushmen" is the older cover term, but "San" was widely adopted in the West by the late 1990s. The term ''Bushmen'', from 17th-century Dutch ''{{lang|nl|Bosjesmans}}'', is still used by others and to self-identify, but is now considered pejorative or derogatory by many South Africans.<ref>{{cite book |last=Guenther |first=Mathias |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ovykFTcuPLMC |title=The Politics of Egalitarianism: Theory and Practice |publisher=Berghahn Books |year=2006 |isbn=9781845451158 |editor-last=Solway |editor-first=Jacqueline |location=New York |pages=181–182 |chapter=Contemporary Bushman Art, Identity Politics, and the Primitivism Discourse}}</ref><ref name="Britten">{{cite book |last=Britten |first=Sarah |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vARidvH3b18C |title=McBride of Frankenmanto: The Return of the South African Insult |publisher=30° South |year=2007 |isbn=9781920143183 |location=Johannesburg |pages=18–19}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Adhikari |first=Mohamed |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qLw8KzRbRdQC |title=Not White Enough, Not Black Enough: Racial Identity in the South African Coloured Community |publisher=Ohio University Press |year=2009 |isbn=9780896804425 |page=28}}</ref> In 2008, the use of ''boesman'' (the modern Afrikaans equivalent of "Bushman") in the ''Die Burger'' newspaper was brought before the Equality Court. The San Council testified that it had no objection to its use in a positive context, and the court ruled that the use of the term was not derogatory.<ref>{{cite news |date=11 April 2008 |title=Use of the word 'boesman' not hate speech, court finds |url=http://mg.co.za/article/2008-04-11-use-of-the-word-boesman-not-hate-speech-court-finds |newspaper=Mail & Guardian}} {{cite news |last=Schroeder |first=Fatima |date=14 April 2008 |title=Court: Use of 'boesman' not hate speech |url=http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/court-use-of-boesman-not-hate-speech-1.396406#.UtJP9NIW2yg |newspaper=IOL}} "Objectively speaking and taking into account the context in which (Die Burger) published the word 'boesman' and the evidence of the San Council witness, I find that the usage of the word did not cause harm, hostility or hatred. Instead, the San Council's representative was adamant that no hurt or harm was caused to them or the San community with the manner in which (Die Burger) published the word 'boesman'."</ref>

The San refer to themselves as their individual nations, such as ǃkung (also spelled ''ǃxuun'', including the Juǀʼhoansi), ǀxam, Nǁnǂe (part of the ǂKhomani), Kxoe (Khwe and ǁAni), Haiǁom, Ncoakhoe, Tshuwau, Gǁana and Gǀui (ǀGwi), etc.<ref>Lee, Richard B. and Daly, Richard Heywood (1999) ''The Cambridge Encyclopedia of -Hunters and Gatherers'', Cambridge University Press, {{ISBN|052157109X}}</ref><ref name="Smith">{{cite book |last=Smith |first=Andrew Brown |title=The Bushmen of Southern Africa: A Foraging Society in Transition |year=2000 |publisher=New Africa Books |location=Cape Town |isbn=9780864864192 |page=2 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2YnZU4NCv3IC}}</ref><ref name="Ouzman">{{cite book |editor1-last=Smith |editor1-first=Claire |editor2-last= Wobst |editor2-first=H. Martin |last=Ouzman |first=Sven |title=Indigenous Archaeologies: Decolonizing Theory and Practice |chapter=Silencing and Sharing Southern Africa Indigenous and Embedded Knowledge |publisher=Routledge|location=Abingdon, Oxon |year=2004 |page=209 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MylyVq_dMoIC |isbn=9781134391554}}</ref><ref name="MG2007">{{cite news |title=San, Bushmen or Basarwa: What's in a name? |url=http://mg.co.za/article/2007-09-05-san-bushmen-or-basarwa-whats-in-a-name |newspaper=Mail & Guardian |date=5 September 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120117025938/http://mg.co.za/article/2007-09-05-san-bushmen-or-basarwa-whats-in-a-name |archive-date=17 January 2012 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Coan |first=Stephen |title=The first people|url=http://www.witness.co.za/index.php?showcontent&global%5B_id%5D=44782 |newspaper=The Witness |date=28 July 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131014184714/http://www.witness.co.za/index.php?showcontent&global%5B_id%5D=44782 |archive-date=14 October 2013 |url-status=live}}</ref> Representatives of San peoples in 2003 stated their preference for the use of such individual group names, where possible, over the use of the collective term ''San''.<ref>Statement by delegates of the Working Group of Indigenous Minorities in Southern Africa (WIMSA) and the South African San Institute attending the 2003 Africa Human Genome Initiative conference held in Stellenbosch. {{cite journal |last=Schlebusch |first=Carina |title=Issues raised by use of ethnic-group names in genome study |doi=10.1038/464487a |date=25 March 2010 |journal=Nature |volume=464 |issue=7288 |page=487 |pmid=20336115 |bibcode=2010Natur.464..487S |doi-access=free}}</ref>

Adoption of the Khoekhoe term ''San'' in Western anthropology dates to the 1970s, and this remains the standard term in English-language ethnographic literature, although some authors later switched back to using the name ''Bushmen''.<ref name=Barnard/><ref>{{cite news |last=Sailer |first=Steve |title=Feature: Name game – 'Inuit' or 'Eskimo'? |url=http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2002/06/20/Feature-Name-game-Inuit-or-Eskimo/UPI-43191024597290/ |newspaper=UPI |date=20 June 2002}} "The fashion of renaming the Bushmen of Southwestern Africa as the 'San' exemplifies many of the problems with the name game. University of Utah anthropologist Henry Harpending, who has lived with the famous tongue-clicking hunter-gatherers said, 'In the 1970s the name "San" spread in Europe and America because it seemed to be politically correct, while 'Bushmen' sounded derogatory and sexist.' Unfortunately, the hunter-gatherers never actually had a collective name for themselves in any of their own languages. 'San' was actually the insulting word that the herding Khoi people called the Bushmen. [...] Harpending noted, 'The problem was that in the Kalahari, "San" has all the baggage that the "N-word" has in America. Bushmen kids are graduating from school, reading the academic literature, and are outraged that we call them "San." [...] one did not call someone a San to his face. I continued to use Bushman, and I was publicly corrected several times by the righteous. It quickly became a badge among Western academics: If you say "San" and I say "San," then we signal each other that we are on the fashionable side, politically. It had nothing to do with respect. I think most politically correct talk follows these dynamics.'"</ref> The compound ''Khoisan'' is used to refer to the pastoralist Khoi and the foraging San collectively. It was coined by Leonhard Schulze in the 1920s and popularized by Isaac Schapera in 1930. Anthropological use of ''San'' was detached from the compound ''Khoisan'',<ref>"Schapera is the author of the convenient term Khoisan, compounded of the Hottentot's name for themselves (Khoi) and their name for the Bushmen (San)." Joseph Greenberg, ''The Languages of Africa'' (1963), p. 66.</ref> as it has been reported that the exonym ''San'' is perceived as a pejorative in parts of the central Kalahari.<ref name=Mountain>{{cite book |last=Mountain |first=Alan |title=First People of the Cape |year=2003 |publisher=New Africa Books |location=Claremont |isbn=9780864866233 |pages=23–24 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nR2d1iJo6_UC}}</ref> By the late 1990s, the term ''San'' was used generally by the people themselves.<ref>{{cite book |last=Lee |first=Richard B. |title=The Dobe Ju/'Hoansi |year=2012 |publisher=Cengage Learning |isbn=9781133713531|page=9 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kRAKAAAAQBAJ |edition=Fourth}}</ref> The adoption of the term was preceded by a number of meetings held in the 1990s where delegates debated on the adoption of a collective term.<ref>{{cite web |title= General Questions |url=http://www.khwattu.org/engage/general-questions/?id=43 |work=ǃKhwa ttu – San Education and Culture Centre |access-date=12 January 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Dieckmann |first=Ute |title=Haiom in the Etosha region: A History of Colonial Settlement, Ethnicity and Nature Conservation |year=2007 |publisher=Basler Afrika Bibliographien |location=Basel |isbn= 9783905758009 |chapter=Shifting Identities |pages=300–302 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7ePQlF_x4vYC}}</ref> These meetings included the Common Access to Development Conference organized by the Government of Botswana held in Gaborone in 1993,<ref name=MG2007/> the 1996 inaugural Annual General Meeting of the Working Group of Indigenous Minorities in Southern Africa (WIMSA) held in Namibia,<ref>{{cite web |last=Le Raux |first= Willemien |title=Torn Apart – A Report on the Educational Situation of San Children in Southern Africa |url=http://www.wim-sa.org/resources/downloads |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140113045520/http://www.wim-sa.org/resources/downloads |url-status=usurped |archive-date=13 January 2014 |publisher=Kuru Development Trust and WIMSA |year=2000 |page=2 |quote=Although the people are also known by the names Bushmen and Basarwa, the term ''San'' was chosen as an inclusive group name for this report, since WIMSA representatives have decided to use it until such time as one representative name for all groups will be accepted by all.}}</ref> and a 1997 conference in Cape Town on "Khoisan Identities and Cultural Heritage" organized by the University of the Western Cape.<ref name=HitchcockBiesele>{{cite web |last1=Hitchcock |first1=Robert K. |last2=Biesele |first2=Megan |title=San, Khwe, Basarwa, or Bushmen? Terminology, Identity, and Empowerment in Southern Africa |url=http://www.khoisanpeoples.org/indepth/ind-identity.htm |work=Kalahari Peoples Fund |access-date=15 January 2014 |archive-date=2 August 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200802215202/http://www.khoisanpeoples.org/indepth/ind-identity.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref> The term ''San'' is now standard in South African, and used officially in the blazon of the national coat-of-arms. The "South African San Council" representing San communities in South Africa was established as part of WIMSA in 2001.<ref name=Marshall>{{cite news |last=Marshall |first=Leon |title=Africa's Bushmen May Get Rich From Diet-Drug Secret |url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/04/0416_030416_san1.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030418003427/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/04/0416_030416_san1.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=18 April 2003 |newspaper=National Geographic News |date=16 April 2003}}</ref><ref name=WynbergChennells>{{cite book |last1=Wynberg |first1=Rachel |last2=Chennells |first2=Roger |title=Indigenous Peoples, Consent and Benefit Sharing Lessons from the San-Hoodia case |chapter=Green Diamonds of the South: An Overview of the San-Hoodia Case |year=2009 |publisher=Springer |location=Dordrecht |isbn=9789048131235 |page=102 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1yrvafKoV2UC |author1-link=Rachel Wynberg}}</ref>

The term ''Basarwa'' (singular ''Mosarwa'') is used for the San collectively in Botswana.<ref name=Suzman>{{cite book |last=Suzman |first=James |title=Regional Assessment of the Status of the San in Southern Africa |year=2001 |publisher=Legal Assistance Centre |location=Windhoek |isbn=99916-765-3-8 |pages=3–4 |url=http://www.lac.org.na/projects/lead/Pdf/sanintro.pdf}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Marshall |first=Leon |title=Bushmen Driven From Ancestral Lands in Botswana |url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/04/0416_030416_san2.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030418002510/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/04/0416_030416_san2.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=18 April 2003 |newspaper=National Geographic News |date=16 April 2003}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Basarwa Relocation – Introduction |url=http://www.gov.bw/basarwa/background.html |publisher=Government of Botswana |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060409191312/http://www.gov.bw/basarwa/background.html |archive-date=9 April 2006}}</ref> The ''mo-/ba-'' noun class prefixes are used for people; the older variant ''Masarwa'', with the ''le-/ma-'' prefixes used for disreputable people and animals, is offensive and was changed at independence.<ref name=HitchcockBiesele/><ref>{{cite web |last=Bennett |first=Bruce |title=Botswana historical place names and terminology |url=http://www.thuto.org/ubh/bw/plnam.htm |work=Thuto.org |publisher=University of Botswana History Department |access-date=12 January 2014}}</ref>

In Angola, they are sometimes referred to as ''mucancalas'',<ref>{{Citation |year=2013 |title=ZOONIMIA HISTÓRICO-COMPARATIVA BANTU: Os Cinco Grandes Herbívoros Africanos |language=pt |publisher=Rhino Resource Center |location=Utrecht, Netherlands |url=http://www.rhinoresourcecenter.com/pdf_files/140/1403765149.pdf |access-date=19 February 2016}}</ref> or ''bosquímanos'' (a Portuguese adaptation of the Dutch term for "Bushmen"). The terms ''Amasili'' and ''Batwa'' are sometimes used for them in Zimbabwe.<ref name=HitchcockBiesele/> The San are also referred to as ''Batwa'' by Xhosa people and as ''Baroa'' by Sotho people.<ref>{{cite book |last=Moran |first=Shane |title=Representing Bushmen: South Africa and the Origin of Language |year=2009 |publisher=University of Rochester Press |location=Rochester, NY |isbn=9781580462945 |page=3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mz1sSYP4g7MC}}</ref> The Bantu term ''Batwa'' refers to any foraging tribesmen and as such overlaps with the terminology used for the "Pygmoid" Southern Twa of South-Central Africa.

== History ==

=== Origins === Although there is some debate among social scientists, there is a general consensus on the claim that the modern communities described as San descend from the oldest Neolithic societies of southern and east Africa. Some 10,000 years ago, these social groups were spread from Tanzania, Zambia and Angola down to Cape Agulhas.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Mellet |first=Patric Tariq |title=The lie of 1652: a decolonised history of land |date=2020 |publisher=Tafelberg, an imprint of NB Publishers |isbn=978-0-624-08970-4 |edition=First |location=Cape Town, South Africa}}</ref>{{Rp|page=|pages=29}} As such, the San can be regarded as the oldest cultures on Earth.<ref name="Anton & Shelton">{{cite book |last1=Anton |first1=Donald K. |last2=Shelton |first2=Dinah L. |title=Environmental Protection and Human Rights |date=2011 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-76638-8 |page=640 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F_dFYq4oFeYC&q=san+kalahari}}</ref> Peoples related to or similar to the San occupied the southern shores throughout the eastern shrubland and may have formed a Sangoan continuum from the Red Sea to the Cape of Good Hope.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Smith |first=Malvern van Wyk |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wDZjDwAAQBAJ&q=Boskopoid |title=The First Ethiopians: The image of Africa and Africans in the early Mediterranean world |date=2009-07-01 |publisher=NYU Press |isbn=978-1-86814-834-9 |language=en}}</ref>

In the first millennium BCE, Mellet mentions two dominant groups in Southern Africa. The first one was the Tshua San, who were spread across what are now Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia, and strategically occupied the Shashe-Limpopo basin. The second group, further West, was the Khwe San, whose territory included present-day Botswana, Namibia, Angola and Zambia.<ref name=":1" />{{Rp|page=|pages=52}} The historical presence of the San in Botswana is particularly evident in northern Botswana's Tsodilo Hills region. The two groups engaged with other communities who occupied this area on their migratory drifts southwards, including some migrant herder groups, who later evolved into the Khoekhoe, as well as herder-farmers during the Bantu expansion (2000 BCE–1000 CE). In this process, San were partly driven off their ancestral lands or incorporated by Bantu speaking groups.<ref name=":0" />{{Rp|page=|pages=11-12}}

The San were believed to have closer connections to the old spirits of the land, and were often turned to by other societies for rainmaking, as was the case at Mapungubwe. San shamans would enter a trance and go into the spirit world themselves to capture the animals associated with rain.<ref name=":5">{{Cite book |last1=Chirikure |first1=Shadreck |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3pa7CgAAQBAJ&dq=kingdom+of+mapungubwe&pg=PT6 |title=Mapungubwe Reconsidered: A Living Legacy: Exploring Beyond the Rise and Decline of the Mapungubwe State |last2=Delius |first2=Peter |last3=Esterhuysen |first3=Amanda |last4=Hall |first4=Simon |last5=Lekgoathi |first5=Sekibakiba |last6=Maulaudzi |first6=Maanda |last7=Neluvhalani |first7=Vele |last8=Ntsoane |first8=Otsile |last9=Pearce |first9=David |date=2015-10-01 |publisher=Real African Publishers Pty Ltd. |isbn=978-1-920655-06-8 |language=en}}</ref> Thus, Mellet claims that the San would have been involved in the early foundations of the Kingdom of Mapungubwe and subsequent birthing of the states of Thulamela, Great Zimbabwe, Mutapa Empire and others. <ref name=":1" />{{Rp|page=|pages=52-54}}

=== Pre-colonial times === ''Bush-Men Hottentots armed for an Expedition,'' 1804|thumb|right|upright=1 Due to their mode of sustenance based primarily on hunting and foraging, San were able to migrate and spread more rapidly than herder or farmer cultures, and are believed to have spread to present-day South Africa, including the South coast, before the Khoe and Bantu peoples. It is possible that they occasionally herded small numbers of sheep.<ref name=":1" />{{Rp|page=|pages=63}} After 650 CE, as the Khoe and Xhosa migrated into present-day Eastern Cape and after 1000 CE, into the Western Cape, the majority of the San moved from the coastal areas into the interior, with only small fishing communities remaining near the coast.<ref name=":1" />{{Rp|page=|pages=46-47}}

They were traditionally semi-nomadic, moving seasonally within certain defined areas based on the availability of resources such as water, game animals, and edible plants.<ref name="Anaya">{{cite report |author=Anaya, James |date=2 June 2010 |title=Addendum – The situation of indigenous peoples in Botswana |publisher=United Nations Human Rights Council. A/HRC/15/37/Add.2 |url=http://unsr.jamesanaya.org/docs/countries/2010_report_botswana_en.pdf}}</ref> The San organised themselves into hunting parties, and did not have clans nor chiefs, with decisions taken by elders.<ref name=":12">{{Cite encyclopedia |title=Iron Age (Later): Southern Africa: Peoples |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of African History 3-Volume Set |publisher=Routledge |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=umyHqvAErOAC&q=historiography |last=Ajayi |first=Ademola |date=2005 |editor-last=Shillington |editor-first=Kevin |language=en |isbn=978-1-135-45670-2}}</ref> Early San societies left a rich legacy of cave paintings across Southern Africa,<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Mlambo |first=A. S. |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofzimbabw0000mlam/mode/2up?view=theater |title=A history of Zimbabwe |date=2014 |publisher=New York, NY : Cambridge University Press |others=Internet Archive |isbn=978-1-107-02170-9}}</ref>{{Rp|page=|pages=11-12}} which depict hunting, battles, domestic life, and mythological events.<ref name=":12" />

===Displacement, marginalisation and genocide during European colonisation === In the first few decades after the Dutch settled at the Cape of Good Hope under Jan van Riebeeck in 1652, the size of the Cape San population was estimated at 30 000 to 50 000,<ref name="Szalay95">{{cite book |last1=Szalay, M. |title=The San and the Colonization of the Cape, 1770–1879: Conflict, Incorporation, Acculturation. |date=1995 |publisher=Rüdiger Köppe Verlag |location=Köln}}</ref>{{rp|pp=108}}<ref name="Adhikari">{{cite book|author=Adhikari, Mohamed|title= The Anatomy of a South African Genocide: The Extermination of the Cape San People|publisher= UCT Press|location=Cape Town|year=2014}}</ref>{{rp|p=24}} but European colonists had relatively few contacts with them. This changed at the start of the 18th century, when farmers started moving into the interior. From about 1714, when the Dutch East India Company (or VOC) initiated the loan farm system, which provided willing stock farmers with grazing rights on less fertile land in the dry Cape interior. This policy gave rise to a new social group, the Trekboers, or semi-nomadic pastoralists, who moved with their livestock into territories that were hitherto occupied by San bands.<ref name="Adhikari">{{cite book|author=Adhikari, Mohamed|title= The Anatomy of a South African Genocide: The Extermination of the Cape San People|publisher= UCT Press|location=Cape Town|year=2014}}</ref>{{rp|pp=28-29}} As the presence of these Trekboers on the dry land traditionally occupied by San intensified, the San experienced restrictions in their access to the natural resources that they lived off (land, water, game and plants). This was a result of Trekboers occupying waterholes, shooting the animals that the San subsisted on for biltong, overgrazing and damaging the ecology of the area.<ref name="Newton-King">{{cite book|author=Newton-King, S.|title=Masters and Servants on the Cape Eastern Frontier, 1760–1803| publisher= Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge|year=1999}}</ref>{{rp|pp=97-100}}<ref name="Penn2005">{{cite book|author=Penn, S.|title=The Forgotten Frontier: Colonist and Khoisan on the Cape’s Northern Frontier in the 18th Century| publisher=Double Storey |location=Cape Town|year=2005}}</ref>{{rp|p=18, 228}} Over most of the 18th century, the encroachment by Trekboers deepened, prompting the San to resist by attacking the Boer, raiding their stock and sometimes torturing or mutilating their victims.<ref name="Adhikari"/>{{rp|p=38}} These San raids in turn motivated Trekboers to use militia units known as ''commandos'' - first to mount punitive expeditions, then increasingly to pre-empt possible attacks.<ref name="Adhikari"/>{{rp|pp=39-41}} Such peaks of violence against San were observed in the early 1700s, 1730s, mid-1750s. From the beginning of the 1770s until the late 1790s, this violence became generalised along the frontier of the Dutch Cape Colony.<ref name="Newton-King" />{{rp|p=63-71}}<ref name="Penn2005"/>{{rp|p=19-22}}

In those last three decades of the 18th century, ''commando'' activity became a regular feature of the late winter, and involved surrounding the San camp at night and attacking at dawn, killing all the men on the spot. Women and children were often killed, but could also be taken captive.<ref name="Adhikari"/>{{rp|pp=45-47}} In addition to routine killings of small groups, there were larger massacres in which hundreds of San could be killed in one raid.<ref name="Adhikari"/>{{rp|pp=48-49}},<ref name="Penn2005"/>{{rp|p=226}} These acts of extreme brutality were often justified by the racist perception that the San hunter-gatherers were either not fully human, or belonged to an inferior category of humans doomed for extinction.<ref name="Adhikari"/>{{rp|pp=52-55}} In 1777, after several decades of unsuccessfully calling for restraint, the VOC officially endorsed the policy of eradication of the San.<ref name=”vandermerwe37”>{{cite book |last1=Van der Merwe, P.J. |title=Die Noordwaardse Beweging van die Boere Voor die Groot Trek, 1770–1842. |date=1937 |publisher=W.P. van Stockum |location=The Hague}}</ref>{{rp|p=41}}<ref>{{cite book |author1=Smith A. |author2=Malherbe C. |author3=Guenther M. |author4=Berens P. |title=The Bushmen of Southern Africa: A Foraging Society in Transition. |date=2000 |publisher=David Philip. |location=Cape Town |page=47}}</ref>

By the end of the 18th century, when the British took control of the Cape colony, thousands of San had been killed and forced to work for the colonists. The British attempted a policy of cultural assimilation to make the San adopt an agricultural lifestyle,<ref name=" Adhikari" />{{rp|pp=61-64}} but this approach mostly failed. They were also not successful in stopping sporadic commando attacks against the San, although the death toll was significantly reduced compared with the end of the VOC period - official government records, which are certainly incomplete, indicate that 2,480 San were killed and 654 captured in the last decade of VOC rule, compared to 367 killed and 252 captured in the first decade of British and Batavian rule.<ref name=”vandermerwe37”/> {{rp|p=53, 93}} By the 1850s, independent San existence as hunter-gatherers had become extremely precarious and gradually most San became tied to farmers, due to a combination of threats, retention of wives and children, and starvation.<ref name=" Adhikari" />{{rp|p=71}} There is also some evidence of bartering of San children against sheep or goats, which was banned in 1817<ref name=" Adhikari" />{{rp|p=70-71}}, leading to clandestine child trafficking.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Philip, J. |title=Researches in South Africa, 2 vols. |date=1828 |publisher=James Duncan |location=London |page=vol. II, 265–66}}</ref> Along the Northern border of the Cape Colony, the San also suffered attacks and massacres from pastoralist groups such as the Griqua, Korana and 'Bastard'.<ref name=" Adhikari" />{{rp|pp=73-74}} In 1863, [https://digitalbleeklloyd.uct.ac.za/louis-anthing.html Louis Anthing] estimated that there were no more than 500 San left in the whole of Bushmanland, and that they were in a desperate situation, facing starvation. The Korana wars of 1868-69 and 1878-79 1870s, in which some |xam people participated on the side of the Korana, led to the killing, starvation or captivity and bondage of the last San of the Cape.<ref name=" Adhikari" />{{rp|p=76}}

The recognition of the violence, physical and cultural destruction of the Cape San as a genocide has not been unanimous. Historians writing before the coining of the word genocide referred to ''a war of extermination'',<ref>{{cite book |last1=Stow, G. |title=The Native Races of South Africa: A History of the Intrusion of the Hottentots and Bantu Into the Hunting Grounds of the Bushmen, the Aborigines of the Country |date=1964 |publisher=Struik |location=Cape Town |page=233, 575}}</ref> ''extinction'',<ref>{{cite book |last1=MacMillan, W.M. |title=The Cape Colour Question: A Historical Survey |publisher=Balkema |location=Cape Town |date=1968 |page=26}}</ref> ''extirpation''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=MacCrone, I.D. |title=Race Attitudes in South Africa: Historical, Experimental and Psychological Studies. |date=1937 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=London |page=104–5}}</ref> More recent authors have used the word genocide.<ref name="Newton-King" />{{rp|p=112}}, <ref>{{cite journal |last1=Smith, A. |title=‘On becoming herders: Khoikhoi and San ethnicity in southern Africa’, |journal=African Studies |date=1991 |volume=50 |issue=1 |pages=510}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Skotnes, P. |title=Miscast: Negotiating the Presence of the Bushmen. |date=1996 |publisher=UCT Press |location=Cape Town |page=17}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Morris A. |title=‘Trophy skulls: museums and the San’, |date=1996 |publisher=in Miscast, ed. Skotnes |location=Cape Town}}</ref>, with N. Penn preferring preferring to refer to a 'partial genocide' or 'fighting that approached the genocidal'<ref name="Penn2005" />{{rp|p=123}} because the systematic killing did not apply to all San. Anthropologist Miklós Szalay has been the most prominent academic voice objecting to applying the label of genocide to the destruction of Cape San society, arguing that commandos were primarily designed to procure labour force for the Boer farmers and that the VOC policy of 1777 was a slogan that wasn't put into practice.<ref name="Szalay95"/>{{rp|p=5, 11, 13-33}} However, Adhikari<ref name=" Adhikari" />{{rp|p=85-87}} shows that Szalay's arguments are disproved by evidence, especially the high ratio of San killed to those made captive in the 1770-1795 period, and the fact that even enslavement of women and children contributed to the collapse of San society.

Regarding the experience of San people in other African countries, there is evidence that they also faced continued threats of displacement, marginalisation and violence in the context of European encroachment, yet some groups were able to survive. In German South West Africa, specifically in the area stretching from Otavi to Gobabis, the worst genocidal violence against San groups happened between 1912 and 1915.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gordon |first1=Robert J. |title=Hiding in Full View: The “Forgotten” Bushman Genocides of Namibia |journal=Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal |date=2009 |volume=4 |issue=1: Article 4}}</ref> Following an order by the German Governor endorsing shootings of San people, over 400 anti-Bushmen patrols were deployed between 1911 and 1913, and the San population in the area dropped from 8-12,000 in 1913 to 3,600 in 1923.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gordon |first1=Robert J. |title=Namibia’s forgotten genocide: how Bushmen were hunted and killed under German colonial rule |journal=The Conversation |date=6 August 2025 |url=https://theconversation.com/namibias-forgotten-genocide-how-bushmen-were-hunted-and-killed-under-german-colonial-rule-261267#:~:text=Accordingly%2C%20the%20German%20governor%20ordered,known%20as%20South%20West%20Africa. |access-date=11 Feb 2026}}</ref> After the territory was taken over by South Africa in 1915, there is evidence that South African government also issued licenses for people to hunt the San in South West Africa (present-day Namibia), with the last one being reportedly issued in 1936.<ref>{{Cite journal |title="More to explore", Southern Africa's hunter-gatherers seek a foothold. |url=http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0102/feature6/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160314082909/http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0102/feature6/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=2016-03-14 |journal=National Geographic}}</ref>

In the colony of Bechuanaland, the Ghanzi district, which was regarded as a stronghold of San communities, was divided among white cattle farmers in the second half of the 19th century, forcing San individuals to become what was called "farm Bushmen", working as cattle herders.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hermans, J. |title=Official Policy Towards the Bushmen of Botswana: A Review, Part 1. |journal=Botswana Notes & Records |date=1977 |volume=9 |pages=55-67}}</ref> Throughout the colonial period, they experienced further displacement and marginalisation.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Kelso, C. |title=The Landless Bushmen |journal=Africa Report |date=1993 |volume=38 |issue=2 |pages=51-54}}</ref>

===San communities in decolonised African states=== From the 1950s through to the 1990s, San communities switched to farming because of government-mandated modernization programs. Despite the lifestyle changes, they have provided a wealth of information in anthropology and genetics. One broad study of African genetic diversity, completed in 2009, found that the genetic diversity of the San was among the top five of all 121 sampled populations.<ref>{{cite news |last=Connor |first=Steve |title=World's most ancient race traced in DNA study |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/worlds-most-ancient-race-traced-in-dna-study-1677113.html |newspaper=The Independent |date=1 May 2009}}</ref><ref name=Gill>{{cite news |last=Gill |first=Victoria |date=1 May 2009 |title=Africa's genetic secrets unlocked |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8027269.stm |format=online edition |work=BBC News |access-date=2009-09-03 |url-status=live |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090701001654/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8027269.stm |archive-date=1 July 2009}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |doi=10.1126/science.1172257 |title=The Genetic Structure and History of Africans and African Americans| journal =Science |volume=324 |issue=5930 |pages=1035–1044 |year=2009 | pmid=19407144|pmc=2947357 |last1=Tishkoff |first1=S. A. |last2=Reed |first2=F. A. |last3=Friedlaender |first3=F. R. |last4=Ehret |first4=C. |last5=Ranciaro |first5=A. |last6=Froment |first6=A. |last7=Hirbo |first7=J. B. |last8=Awomoyi |first8=A. A. |last9=Bodo |first9=J. -M. |last10=Doumbo |first10=O. |last11=Ibrahim |first11=M. |last12=Juma |first12=A. T. |last13=Kotze |first13=M. J. |last14=Lema |first14=G. |last15=Moore |first15=J. H. |last16=Mortensen |first16=H. |last17=Nyambo |first17=T. B. |last18=Omar |first18=S. A. |last19=Powell |first19=K. |last20=Pretorius |first20=G. S. |last21=Smith |first21=M. W. |last22=Thera |first22=M. A. |last23=Wambebe |first23=C. |last24=Weber |first24=J. L. |last25=Williams |first25=S. M. |bibcode=2009Sci...324.1035T}}</ref> Certain San groups are one of 14 known extant "ancestral population clusters"; that is, "groups of populations with common genetic ancestry, who share ethnicity and similarities in both their culture and the properties of their languages".<ref name=Gill/>

Despite some positive aspects of government development programs reported by members of San and Bakgalagadi communities in Botswana, many have spoken of a consistent sense of exclusion from government decision-making processes, and many San and Bakgalagadi have alleged experiencing ethnic discrimination on the part of the government.<ref name=Anaya/>{{rp|8–9}} The United States Department of State described ongoing discrimination against San, or ''Basarwa'', people in Botswana in 2013 as the "principal human rights concern" of that country.<ref name=StateDept>{{cite book |author=Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor |title=Botswana 2013 Human Rights Report |publisher=United States Department of State |url=https://2009-2017.state.gov/documents/organization/220296.pdf}}</ref>{{rp|1}}

==Society== {{Further|San healing practices|San rock art|San religion}} thumb|left|upright|Drinking water from the bi bulb plant thumb|Starting a fire by hand thumb|Preparing poison arrows thumb|San man

The San kinship system reflects their history as traditionally small mobile foraging bands. San kinship is similar to Inuit kinship, which uses the same set of terms as in European cultures but adds a name rule and an age rule for determining what terms to use. The age rule resolves any confusion arising from kinship terms, as the older of two people always decides what to call the younger. Relatively few names circulate (approximately 35 names per sex), and each child is named after a grandparent or another relative, but never their parents.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

Children have no social duties besides playing, and leisure is very important to San of all ages. Large amounts of time are spent in conversation, joking, music, and sacred dances. Women may be leaders of their own family groups. They may also make important family and group decisions and claim ownership of water holes and foraging areas. Women are mainly involved in the gathering of food, but sometimes also partake in hunting.<ref name="krugerpark.co.za">{{Cite web |title=San - Bushmen - Kalahari, South Africa... |url=https://www.krugerpark.co.za/africa_bushmen.html |access-date=2024-03-30 |website=www.krugerpark.co.za}}</ref>

Water is important in San life. During long droughts, they make use of sip wells in order to collect water. To make a sip well, a San scrapes a deep hole where the sand is damp, and inserts a long hollow grass stem into the hole. An empty ostrich egg is used to collect the water. Water is sucked into the straw from the sand, into the mouth, and then travels down another straw into the ostrich egg.<ref name="krugerpark.co.za"/>

Traditionally, the San were an egalitarian society.<ref name=shostak>Marjorie Shostak, 1983, ''Nisa: The Life and Words of a ǃKung Woman''. New York: Vintage Books. Page 10.</ref> Although they had hereditary chiefs, their authority was limited. The San made decisions among themselves by consensus, with women treated as relative equals in decision making.<ref>Shostak 1983: 13</ref> San economy was a gift economy, based on giving each other gifts regularly rather than on trading or purchasing goods and services.<ref>Shostak 1983: 9, 25</ref>

As of 1994, about 95% of San relationships were monogamous.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Goldsmith |first1=Timothy H. |title=The Biological Roots of Human Nature: Forging Links Between Evolution and Behavior |date=1994 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-509393-3 |pages=61–62 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=93Q8DwAAQBAJ&dq=san+people+are+a+monogamous&pg=PA61 |access-date=18 March 2025 |language=en}}</ref>

===Subsistence=== Villages range in sturdiness from nightly rain shelters in the warm spring (when people move constantly in search of budding greens), to formalized rings, wherein people congregate in the dry season around permanent waterholes. Early spring is the hardest season: a hot dry period following the cool, dry winter, when most plants are still dead or dormant, and supplies of autumn nuts are exhausted. Meat is particularly important in the dry months when wildlife cannot range far from the receding waters.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

Women gather fruit, berries, tubers, bush onions, and other plant materials for the band's consumption. Ostrich eggs are gathered, and the empty shells are used as water containers. Insects provide perhaps 10% of animal proteins consumed, most often during the dry season.<ref>{{cite book |first=Brian |last=Morris |title=Insects and human life |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ok-3NLX_8GQC&pg=PA57 |year=2004 |publisher=Berg |isbn=978-1-84520-075-6 |page=57}}</ref> Depending on location, the San consume 18 to 104 species, including grasshoppers, beetles, caterpillars, moths, butterflies, and termites.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=ok-3NLX_8GQC&pg=PA39 Brian Morris (2005). Insects and Human Life, pp39-40.] See page 19: [https://books.google.com/books?id=ok-3NLX_8GQC&q=san&pg=PA19 for insect use in medicine, poison for arrows etc. Also page 188 regarding Kaggen, the Praying Mantis trickster deity who created the moon] More on Kaggen, who might sabotage a hunt by transforming into a louse and biting the hunter: [https://books.google.com/books?id=NtyI0b1CiDkC&pg=PA111 Mathias Georg Guenther (1999). ''Tricksters and Trancers: Bushman Religion and Society.'' p111.]</ref>

Women's traditional gathering gear is simple and effective: a hide sling, a blanket, a cloak called a ''kaross'' to carry foods, firewood, smaller bags, a digging stick, and perhaps, a smaller version of the kaross to carry a baby.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

Men, and presumably women when they accompany them, hunt in long, laborious tracking excursions. They kill their game using bow and arrows and spears tipped in diamphotoxin, a slow-acting arrow poison produced by beetle larvae of the genus ''Diamphidia''.<ref name=biodiversity>[http://www.biodiversityexplorer.org/beetles/chrysomelidae/alticinae/arrows.htm "How San hunters use beetles to poison their arrows"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120603064943/http://www.biodiversityexplorer.org/beetles/chrysomelidae/alticinae/arrows.htm |date=3 June 2012 }}, Biodiversity Explorer website</ref>

===Early history=== [[File:Wandering hunters (Masarwa bushmen), North Kalahari Desert.jpg|thumb|''Wandering hunters (Masarwa Bushmen), North Kalahari desert'', published in 1892 (from H. A. Bryden photogr.)]]

A set of tools almost identical to that used by the modern San and dating to 42,000 BCE was discovered at Border Cave in KwaZulu-Natal in 2012.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19069560 |title=Earliest evidence of modern human culture found |first=Nick |last=Crumpton BBC News |date=31 July 2012}}</ref>

In 2006, what is thought to be the world's oldest ritual is interpreted as evidence which would make the San culture the oldest still practiced culture today.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061130081347.htm |title=World's Oldest Ritual Discovered -- Worshipped the Python 70,000 Years Ago}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.world-archaeology.com/world/africa/botswana/ritual-organised-activity-identified-as-worlds-oldest/ |title=Ritual: Organised Activity Identified as World's Oldest |date=6 March 2007}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://afrol.com/articles/23093 |title=Afrol News - World's oldest religion discovered in Botswana}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://damienmarieathope.com/2017/03/stone-snake-of-south-africa-first-human-worship-70000/ |title=Stone Snake of South Africa: "first human worship" 70,000 years ago | Damien Marie AtHope}}</ref> {{Disputed inline|World's_oldest_ritual_claim|for=Proof never published|date=December 2025}}

Historical evidence shows that certain San communities have always lived in the desert regions of the Kalahari; however, eventually nearly all other San communities in southern Africa were forced into this region. The Kalahari San remained in poverty where their richer neighbours denied them rights to the land. Before long, in both Botswana and Namibia, they found their territory drastically reduced.<ref>[http://www.theartofafrica.co.za/serv/moderntimes.jsp "The modern day Bushmen / San"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110618001626/http://www.theartofafrica.co.za/serv/moderntimes.jsp |date=18 June 2011 }}. Art of Africa. Retrieved 2012-01-29.</ref>

==Genetics== Various Y chromosome studies show that the San carry some of the most divergent (earliest branching) human Y-chromosome haplogroups. These haplogroups are specific sub-groups of haplogroups A and B, the two earliest branches on the human Y-chromosome tree.<ref name=j1>{{cite journal |doi=10.1016/S0960-9822(03)00130-1 |title=African Y Chromosome and mtDNA Divergence Provides Insight into the History of Click Languages |year=2003 |last1=Knight |first1=Alec |last2=Underhill |first2=Peter A. |last3=Mortensen |first3=Holly M. |last4=Zhivotovsky |first4=Lev A. |last5=Lin |first5=Alice A. |last6=Henn |first6=Brenna M. |last7=Louis |first7=Dorothy |last8=Ruhlen |first8=Merritt |last9=Mountain |first9=Joanna L. |journal=Current Biology |volume=13 |issue=6 |pages=464–73 |pmid=12646128 |s2cid=52862939 |doi-access=free |bibcode=2003CBio...13..464K}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |pmid=11420360 |url=http://www.familytreedna.com/pdf/Hammer_MBE_2001.pdf |year=2001 |last1=Hammer |first1=MF |last2=Karafet |first2=TM |last3=Redd |first3=AJ |last4=Jarjanazi |first4=H |last5=Santachiara-Benerecetti |first5=S |last6=Soodyall |first6=H |last7=Zegura |first7=SL |title=Hierarchical patterns of global human Y-chromosome diversity |volume=18 |issue=7 |pages=1189–203 |journal=Molecular Biology and Evolution |doi=10.1093/oxfordjournals.molbev.a003906 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1186/2041-2223-1-6 |title=Development of a single base extension method to resolve Y chromosome haplogroups in sub-Saharan African populations |year=2010 |last1=Naidoo |first1=Thijessen |last2=Schlebusch |first2=Carina M. |last3=Makkan |first3=Heeran |last4=Patel |first4=Pareen |last5=Mahabeer |first5=Rajeshree |last6=Erasmus |first6=Johannes C. |last7=Soodyall |first7=Himla |journal=Investigative Genetics |volume=1 |page=6 |pmid=21092339 |issue=1 |pmc=2988483 |doi-access=free}}</ref>

Mitochondrial DNA studies also provide evidence that the San carry high frequencies of the earliest haplogroup branches in the human mitochondrial DNA tree. This DNA is inherited only from one's mother. The most divergent (earliest branching) mitochondrial haplogroup, L0d, has been identified at its highest frequencies in the southern African San groups.<ref name=j1/><ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1086/302848 |title=MtDNA Variation in the South African Kung and Khwe—and Their Genetic Relationships to Other African Populations |year=2000 |last1=Chen |first1=Yu-Sheng |last2=Olckers |first2=Antonel |last3=Schurr |first3=Theodore G. |last4=Kogelnik |first4=Andreas M. |last5=Huoponen |first5=Kirsi |last6=Wallace |first6=Douglas C. |journal=The American Journal of Human Genetics |volume=66 |issue=4 |pages=1362–83 |pmid=10739760 |pmc=1288201}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1093/molbev/msm155 |title=History of Click-Speaking Populations of Africa Inferred from mtDNA and Y Chromosome Genetic Variation |year=2007 |last1=Tishkoff |first1=S. A. |last2=Gonder |first2=M. K. |last3=Henn |first3=B. M. |last4=Mortensen |first4=H. |last5=Knight |first5=A. |last6=Gignoux |first6=C. |last7=Fernandopulle |first7=N. |last8=Lema |first8=G. |last9=Nyambo |first9=T. B. |first10=U. |last10=Ramakrishnan |first11=F. A. |last11=Reed |first12=J. L. |last12=Mountain |journal=Molecular Biology and Evolution |volume=24 |issue=10 |pages=2180–95 |pmid=17656633 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1002/elps.200900197 |title=SNaPshot minisequencing to resolve mitochondrial macro-haplogroups found in Africa |year=2009 |last1=Schlebusch |first1=Carina M. |last2=Naidoo |first2=Thijessen |last3=Soodyall |first3=Himla |journal=Electrophoresis |volume=30 |issue=21 |pages=3657–64 |pmid=19810027 |s2cid=19515426}}</ref>

In a study published in March 2011, Brenna Henn and colleagues found that the ǂKhomani San, as well as the Sandawe and Hadza peoples of Tanzania, were the most genetically diverse of any living humans studied. This high degree of genetic diversity hints at the origin of anatomically modern humans.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Henn |first1=Brenna |last2=Gignoux |first2=Christopher R. |last3=Jobin |first3=Matthew |year=2011 |title=Hunter-gatherer genomic diversity suggests a southern African origin for modern humans |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America |volume=108 |issue=13 |pages=5154–62 |publisher=National Academy of Sciences |doi=10.1073/pnas.1017511108 |pmid=21383195 |pmc=3069156 |url=https://digital.csic.es/bitstream/10261/44431/1/1017511108.full.pdf |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Kaplan |first=Matt |year=2011 |title=Gene Study Challenges Human Origins in Eastern Africa |journal=Scientific American |publisher=Nature Publishing Group |url=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/gene-study-challenges-human-origin-africa/ |access-date=22 June 2012}}</ref>

A 2008 study suggested that the San may have been isolated from other original ancestral groups for as much as 50,000 to 100,000 years and later rejoined, re-integrating into the rest of the human gene pool.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7358868.stm |title= Human line 'nearly split in two' |work=BBC News |date=24 April 2008 |access-date=2009-12-31 |first=Paul |last=Rincon}}</ref>

A 2016 DNA study of fully sequenced genomes showed that the ancestors of today's San hunter-gatherers began to diverge from other human populations in Africa about 200,000 years ago and were fully isolated by 100,000 years ago.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Schlebusch |first1=Carina M. |last2=Skoglund |first2=Pontus |last3=Sjödin |first3=Per |last4=Gattepaille |first4=Lucie M. |last5=Hernandez |first5=Dena |last6=Jay |first6=Flora |last7=Li |first7=Sen |last8=De Jongh |first8=Michael |last9=Singleton |first9=Andrew |last10=Blum |first10=Michael G. B. |last11=Soodyall |first11=Himla |last12=Jakobsson |first12=Mattias |title=Genomic Variation in Seven Khoe-San Groups Reveals Adaptation and Complex African History |journal=Science |date=19 October 2012 |volume=338 |issue=6105 |pages=374–379 |doi=10.1126/science.1227721 |pmid=22997136 |pmc=8978294 |bibcode=2012Sci...338..374S }}</ref>

==Ancestral land conflict in Botswana== {{main|Ancestral land conflict in Botswana}}

thumb|San family in Botswana According to professors ''Robert K. Hitchcock, Wayne A. Babchuk, "''In 1652, when Europeans established a full-time presence in Southern Africa, there were some 300,000 San and 600,000 Khoekhoe in Southern Africa. During the early phases of European colonization, tens of thousands of Khoekhoe and San peoples lost their lives as a result of genocide, murder, physical mistreatment, and disease. There were cases of "Bushman hunting" in which commandos (mobile paramilitary units or posses) sought to dispatch San and Khoekhoe in various parts of Southern Africa.<ref>{{Citation |last1=Hitchcock |first1=Robert K. |chapter=Genocide of Khoekhoe and San Peoples of Southern Africa |url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9780203790830-7/genocide-khoekhoe-san-peoples-southern-africa-robert-hitchcock-wayne-babchuk |title=Genocide of Indigenous Peoples |access-date=2023-03-25 |doi=10.4324/9780203790830-7 |last2=Babchuk |first2=Wayne A. |date=2017 |pages=143–171 |isbn=9780203790830 |url-access=subscription}}</ref>

Much aboriginal people's land in Botswana, including land occupied by the San people (or ''Basarwa''), was conquered during colonization. Loss of land and access to natural resources continued after Botswana's independence.<ref name="Anaya" />{{rp|2}} The San have been particularly affected by encroachment by majority peoples and non-indigenous farmers onto their traditional land. Government policies from the 1970s transferred a significant area of traditionally San land to majority agro-pastoralist tribes and white settlers.<ref name="Anaya" />{{rp|15}} Much of the government's policy regarding land tended to favor the dominant Tswana peoples over the minority San and Bakgalagadi.<ref name="Anaya" />{{rp|2}} Loss of land is a major contributor to the problems facing Botswana's indigenous people, including especially the San's eviction from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve.<ref name="Anaya" />{{rp|2}} The government of Botswana decided to relocate all of those living within the reserve to settlements outside it. Harassment of residents, dismantling of infrastructure, and bans on hunting appear to have been used to induce residents to leave.<ref name="Anaya" />{{rp|16}} The government has denied that any of the relocation was forced.<ref name="Forced Evictions-- Towards Solutions?: Second Report of the Advisory Group on Forced Evictions to the Executive Director of UN-HABITAT">{{cite book |last=Advisory Group on Forced Evictions, United Nations Human Settlements Programme |title=Forced Evictions-- Towards Solutions?: Second Report of the Advisory Group on Forced Evictions to the Executive Director of UN-HABITAT |year=2007 |publisher=UN-HABITAT |isbn=978-92-1-131909-5 |page=115 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gbpwMRxCsegC&q=%22C.S+Maribe%22}}</ref> A legal battle followed.<ref name="LandsBack">{{cite news |url=http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/africa/12/13/bushmen.reut/index.html |title=Botswana's bushmen get Kalahari lands back |work=CNN |access-date=2006-12-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061220110621/http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/africa/12/13/bushmen.reut/index.html |date=13 December 2006 |archive-date = 20 December 2006}}</ref> The relocation policy may have been intended to facilitate diamond mining by Gem Diamonds within the reserve.<ref name="Anaya" />{{rp|18}}

==''Hoodia'' traditional knowledge agreement== ''Hoodia gordonii'', used by the San, was patented by the South African Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in 1998, for its presumed appetite suppressing quality, although, according to a 2006 review, no published scientific evidence supported hoodia as an appetite suppressant in humans.<ref name="hoopla">Kathleen Doheney, [http://www.webmd.com/diet/guide/hoodia-lots-of-hoopla-little-science?page=1 "Hoodia: Lots of Hoopla, Little Science; Few studies support the promise of the South African appetite suppressant, but believers abound"], WebMD, September 6, 2006, Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD Retrieved March 24, 2007</ref> A licence was granted to Phytopharm, for development of the active ingredient in the ''Hoodia'' plant, p57 (glycoside), to be used as a pharmaceutical drug for dieting. Once this patent was brought to the attention of the San, a benefit-sharing agreement was reached between them and the CSIR in 2003. This would award royalties to the San for the benefits of their indigenous knowledge.<ref>{{Cite journal |doi=10.1111/j.1747-1796.2004.tb00231.x |title=Rhetoric, Realism and Benefit-Sharing |journal=The Journal of World Intellectual Property |volume=7 |issue=6 |pages=851–876 |year=2005 |last1=Wynberg |first1=R. |url=http://www.icimod.org/resource/2248 |url-access=subscription |archive-date=4 March 2016 |access-date=4 September 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304030858/http://www.icimod.org/resource/2248 |url-status=dead }}</ref> During the case, the San people were represented and assisted by the Working Group of Indigenous Minorities in Southern Africa (WIMSA), the South African San Council and the South African San Institute.<ref name=Marshall/><ref name=WynbergChennells/>

This benefit-sharing agreement is one of the first to give royalties to the holders of traditional knowledge used for drug sales. The terms of the agreement are contentious, because of their apparent lack of adherence to the Bonn Guidelines on Access to Genetic Resources and Benefit Sharing, as outlined in the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).<ref>{{Cite journal |doi=10.1111/1467-9388.00346 |title=The Bonn Guidelines on Access to Genetic Resources and Benefit Sharing |journal=Review of European Community and International Environmental Law |volume=12 |pages=84–98 |year=2003 |last1=Tully |first1=S. |url=https://www.cbd.int/doc/articles/2003/A-00457.pdf}}</ref> The San have yet to profit from this agreement, as P57 has still not yet been legally developed and marketed.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

===Early representations=== The San of the Kalahari were first brought to the globalized world's attention in the 1950s by South African author Laurens van der Post. Van der Post grew up in South Africa, and had a respectful lifelong fascination with native African cultures. In 1955, he was commissioned by the BBC to go to the Kalahari desert with a film crew in search of the San. The filmed material was turned into a very popular six-part television documentary a year later. Driven by a lifelong fascination with this "vanished tribe", Van der Post published a 1958 book about this expedition, entitled ''The Lost World of the Kalahari.'' It was to be his most famous book.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

In 1961, he published ''The Heart of the Hunter,'' a narrative which he admits in the introduction uses two previous works of stories and mythology as "a sort of Stone Age Bible", namely ''Specimens of Bushman Folklore''' (1911), collected by Wilhelm H. I. Bleek and Lucy C. Lloyd, and Dorothea Bleek's ''Mantis and His Friend.'' Van der Post's work brought indigenous African cultures to millions of people around the world for the first time, but some people disparaged it as part of the subjective view of a European in the 1950s and 1960s, stating that he branded the San as simple "children of Nature" or even "mystical ecologists".{{cn|date=August 2025}} In 1992 by John Perrot and team published the book [http://www.khoisanpeoples.org/sites/book-site.htm ''Bush for the Bushman''] – a [http://savethesan.org "desperate plea"] on behalf of the aboriginal San addressing the international community and calling on the governments throughout Southern Africa to respect and reconstitute the ancestral land-rights of all San.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

===Documentaries and non-fiction=== {{Advert section|date=July 2019}}

John Marshall, the son of Harvard anthropologist Lorna Marshall, documented the lives of San in the Nyae Nyae region of Namibia over a period spanning more than 50-years. His early film ''The Hunters,'' shows a giraffe hunt. ''A Kalahari Family'' (2002) is a series documenting 50 years in the lives of the ''Juǀʼhoansi'' of Southern Africa, from 1951 to 2000. Marshall was a vocal proponent of the San cause throughout his life.<ref name="Thomas">{{cite book |last=Thomas |first=Elizabeth Marshall |title=The Old Way: A Story of the First People |year=2007 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=9781429954518 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rtHR8_gK_WwC |pages=xiii, 45–47}}</ref> His sister Elizabeth Marshall Thomas wrote several books and numerous articles about the San, based in part on her experiences living with these people when their culture was still intact. ''The Harmless People,'' published in 1959, and ''The Old Way: A Story of the First People,'' published in 2006, are two of them. John Marshall and Adrienne Miesmer documented the lives of the ǃKung San people between the 1950s and 1978 in ''Nǃai, the Story of a ǃKung Woman.''<ref>{{Citation |last1=N!ai |title=N!ai: the story of a !Kung woman |date=2004 |url=http://www.aspresolver.com/aspresolver.asp?ANTH;763708 |access-date=2024-03-30 |others=Documentary Educational Resources (Firm), Public Broadcasting Associates |publisher=Documentary Educational Resources |last2=Marshall |first2=John |last3=Marshall-Cabezas |first3=Sue |last4=Miesner |first4=Adrienne |last5=Mbulu |first5=Letta}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Reflecting on N!ai, The Story of a !Kung Woman |url=https://africa.harvard.edu/event/reflecting-nai-story-kung-woman |access-date=2024-03-30 |website=africa.harvard.edu |language=en}}</ref> This film, the account of a woman who grew up while the San lived as autonomous hunter-gatherers, but who later was forced into a dependent life in the government-created community at Tsumkwe, shows how the lives of the ǃKung people, who lived for millennia as hunter gatherers, were forever changed when they were forced onto a reservation too small to support them.<ref>Kray, C. (1978) [http://people.rit.edu/cakgss/nai.html "Notes on 'Nǃai: The Story of a ǃKung Woman'"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080714061158/http://people.rit.edu/cakgss/nai.html |date=14 July 2008 }}. RIT. n.d. Web. 5 October 2013.</ref>

South African film-maker Richard Wicksteed has produced a number of documentaries on San culture, history and present situation; these include ''In God's Places'' / ''Iindawo ZikaThixo'' (1995) on the San cultural legacy in the southern Drakensberg; ''Death of a Bushman'' (2002) on the murder of San tracker Optel Rooi by South African police; ''The Will To Survive'' (2009), which covers the history and situation of San communities in southern Africa today; and ''My Land is My Dignity'' (2009) on the San's epic land rights struggle in Botswana's Central Kalahari Game Reserve.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

A documentary on San hunting entitled, ''The Great Dance: A Hunter's Story'' (2000), directed by Damon and Craig Foster. This was reviewed by Lawrence Van Gelder for the ''New York Times,'' who said that the film "constitutes an act of preservation and a requiem."<ref>{{cite news |last1=Van Gelder |first1=Lawrence |title=A Hunter's Story |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2000/09/29/movies/film-in-review-the-great-dance.html?pagewanted=print&src=p |work=The New York Times |date=29 September 2000 |archive-url= |archive-date=}}</ref>

Spencer Wells's 2003 book ''The Journey of Man''—in connection with National Geographic's Genographic Project—discusses a genetic analysis of the San and asserts their genetic markers were the first ones to split from those of the ancestors of the bulk of other ''Homo sapiens sapiens.'' The PBS documentary based on the book follows these markers throughout the world, demonstrating that all of humankind can be traced back to the African continent (see Recent African origin of modern humans, the so-called "out of Africa" hypothesis).{{cn|date=August 2025}}

The BBC's ''The Life of Mammals'' (2003) series includes video footage of an indigenous San of the Kalahari desert undertaking a persistence hunt of a kudu through harsh desert conditions.<ref>{{cite web |last=Attenborough |first=David |author-link=David Attenborough |title=Human Mammal, Human Hunter (video) |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=826HMLoiE_o |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211104/826HMLoiE_o |archive-date=2021-11-04 |url-status=live |work=The Life of Mammals |publisher=BBC |date=5 February 2003}}{{cbignore}}</ref> It provides an illustration of how early man may have pursued and captured prey with minimal weaponry.

The BBC series ''How Art Made the World'' (2005) compares San cave paintings from 200 years ago to Paleolithic European paintings that are 14,000 years old.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.pbs.org/howartmadetheworld/episodes/pictures/san/|title=How Art Made the World. Episodes . The Day Pictures Were Born. The San People of South Africa|website=www.pbs.org|access-date=2016-05-20}}</ref> Because of their similarities, the San works may illustrate the reasons for ancient cave paintings. The presenter Nigel Spivey draws largely on the work of Professor David Lewis-Williams,<ref>{{Cite web|title=Download How Art Made the World (Hardback) - Common ePub eBook @6B3B522E7DEEE17DDA23E86C6926E2F6.NMCOBERTURAS.COM.BR|url=http://6b3b522e7deee17dda23e86c6926e2f6.nmcoberturas.com.br/|website=6b3b522e7deee17dda23e86c6926e2f6.nmcoberturas.com.br|access-date=2020-05-26}}</ref> whose PhD was entitled "Believing and Seeing: Symbolic meanings in southern San rock paintings". Lewis-Williams draws parallels with prehistoric art around the world, linking in shamanic ritual and trance states.

===Films and music=== thumb|Rock painting of a man in Twyfelfontein valley

A 1969 film, ''Lost in the Desert,'' features a small boy, stranded in the desert, who encounters a group of wandering San. They help him and then abandon him as a result of a misunderstanding created by the lack of a common language and culture. The film was directed by Jamie Uys, who returned to the San a decade later with ''The Gods Must Be Crazy,'' which proved to be an international hit. This comedy portrays a Kalahari San group's first encounter with an artifact from the outside world (a Coca-Cola bottle). By the time this movie was made, the ǃKung had recently been forced into sedentary villages, and the San hired as actors were confused by the instructions to act out inaccurate exaggerations of their almost abandoned hunting and gathering life.<ref>''Nǃai, the Story of a ǃKung Woman.'' Documentary Educational Resources and Public Broadcasting Associates, 1980.</ref>

"Eh Hee" by Dave Matthews Band was written as an evocation of the music and culture of the San. In a story told to the Radio City audience (an edited version of which appears on the DVD version of ''Live at Radio City''), Matthews recalls hearing the music of the San and, upon asking his guide what the words to their songs were, being told that "there are no words to these songs, because these songs, we've been singing since before people had words." He goes on to describe the song as his "homage to meeting... the most advanced people on the planet." thumb|Rock engraving of a giraffe in Twyfelfontein valley

===Memoirs=== In Peter Godwin's memoir ''When a Crocodile Eats the Sun'', he mentions his time spent with the San for an assignment. His title comes from the San's belief that a solar eclipse occurs when a crocodile eats the sun.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

===Novels=== Laurens van der Post's two novels, ''A Story Like The Wind'' (1972) and its sequel, ''A Far Off Place'' (1974), made into a 1993 film, are about a white boy encountering a wandering San and his wife, and how the San's life and survival skills save the white teenagers' lives in a journey across the desert.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

James A. Michener's ''The Covenant'' (1980) is a work of historical fiction centered on South Africa. The first section of the book concerns a San community's journey set roughly in 13,000 BCE.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

In Wilbur Smith's novel ''The Burning Shore'' (an instalment in the Courtneys of Africa book series), the San people are portrayed through two major characters, O'wa and H'ani; Smith describes the San's struggles, history, and beliefs in great detail. San characters also appear in many of his other books, often working as trackers and guides for Smith's main characters.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

Norman Rush's 1991 novel Mating features an encampment of Basarwa near the (imaginary) Botswana town where the main action is set.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

Tad Williams's epic ''Otherland'' series of novels features a South African San named ǃXabbu, whom Williams confesses to be highly fictionalized, and not necessarily an accurate representation. In the novel, Williams invokes aspects of San mythology and culture.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

In 2007, David Gilman published ''The Devil's Breath''. One of the main characters, a small San boy named ǃKoga, uses traditional methods to help the character Max Gordon travel across Namibia.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

Alexander McCall Smith has written a series of episodic novels set in Gaborone, the capital of Botswana. The fiancé of the protagonist of ''The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency'' series, Mr. J. L. B. Matekoni, adopts two orphaned San children, sister and brother Motholeli and Puso.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

The San feature in several of the novels by Michael Stanley (the ''nom de plume'' of Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip), particularly in ''Death of the Mantis''.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

In Christopher Hope's book ''Darkest England'', the San hero, David Mungo Booi, is tasked by his fellow tribesmen with asking the Queen for the protection once promised, and to evaluate the possibility of creating a colony on the island. He discovered England in the manner of 19th century Western explorers.{{cn|date=August 2025}}

==Notable individuals== === ǃkung === *Nǃxau ǂToma *Royal ǀUiǀoǀoo

=== Gǁana === *Roy Sesana

=== ǀxam === [[File:!Kweiten-ta ken (also known as Rachel or Griet) 1870s.jpg|thumb|A photograph of ǃKweiten-ta-ǁKen when she was in Mowbray in 1874–1875]] * ǁkabbo * ǃkweiten-ta-ǁKen

=== ǂKhomani or Nǁnǂe === *Dawid Kruiper (Khoekhoe-speaking)

* Elsie Vaalbooi (Nǁng-speaking) * Katrina Esau (Nǁng-speaking)

=== Naro === * Cgʼose Ntcoxʼo * Coexʼae Qgam

== Notes == {{Notelist}}

==See also== *First People of the Kalahari *Kalahari Debate *Khoisan *Negro of Banyoles *{{section link|Botswanan art|San art}} *Strandloper *Vaalpens *Contemporary San Art

==References== {{Reflist}}

==Bibliography== *{{Cite book |author=Shostak, Marjorie |author-link=Marjorie Shostak |year=1983 |title=Nisa: The Life and Words of a ǃKung Woman |location=New York |publisher=Vintage Books |isbn=0-7139-1486-6}}

==Further reading== * {{Cite book |author=Gordon, Robert J. |year=1999 |title=The Bushman Myth: The Making of a Namibian Underclass |publisher=Avalon |isbn=0-8133-3581-7 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/bushmanmythmakin00gord }} *{{Cite book |author=Howell, Nancy |year=1979 |title=Demography of the Dobe ǃKung |location=New York |publisher=Academic Press |isbn=0-12-357350-5}} *{{Cite book |author=Lee, Richard |author2=Irven DeVore |year=1999 |title=Kalahari Hunter-Gatherers: Studies of the ǃKung San & Their Neighbors |publisher=iUniverse |isbn=0-674-49980-8}} *{{cite web|last=Solomon|first=Anne|title=The myth of ritual origins? Ethnography, mythology and interpretation of San rock art|url=http://www.antiquityofman.com/Solomon_myth_ritual.html|year=1997|work=The Antiquity of Man|publisher=South African Archaeological Bulletin|access-date=26 February 2007|archive-date=4 April 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130404104352/http://www.antiquityofman.com/Solomon_myth_ritual.html|url-status=dead}} *{{cite web|last=Minkel|first=J. R.|title=Offerings to a Stone Snake Provide the Earliest Evidence of Religion|url=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=offerings-to-a-stone-snak|date=1 December 2006|work=Scientific American|access-date=12 January 2014}} *{{cite news|last=Choi|first=Charles|title=African Hunter-Gatherers Are Offshoots of Earliest Human Split|url=http://www.livescience.com/23378-african-hunter-gatherers-human-origins.html|newspaper=LiveScience|date=21 September 2012}} * San Spirituality: Roots, Expression,(2004) and Social Consequences, J. David Lewis-Williams, David G. Pearce, {{ISBN|978-0759104327}} * Barnard, Alan. (1992): ''Hunters and Herders of Southern Africa.'' Cambridge University Press. {{ISBN|978-0521411882}}.

==External links== {{Commons category}} {{eB1911 poster|Bushmen}}  * [http://www.khoisanpeoples.org/ The site of the Khoisan Speakers] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190126153823/http://www.khoisanpeoples.org/ |date=26 January 2019 }} * [http://www.khwattu.org/ ǃKhwa ttu – San Education and Culture Centre] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20070911175447/http://www.kuru.co.bw/ Kuru Family of Organisations] * [http://www.san.org.za/ South African San Institute] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126091535/http://www.san.org.za/ |date=26 January 2021 }}  * [http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/bushman/ Bradshaw Foundation – The San Bushmen of South Africa] * [http://www.culturalsurvival.org/country/botswana Cultural Survival – Botswana] * [http://www.culturalsurvival.org/country/namibia Cultural Survival – Namibia] * [http://www.iwgia.org/regions/africa International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs – Africa] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170911082804/http://www.iwgia.org/regions/africa/ |date=11 September 2017 }} * [http://www.kalaharipeoples.org/ Kalahari Peoples Fund] * [http://www.survival-international.org/tribes/bushmen Survival International – Bushmen]

{{Ethnic groups in Angola}} {{Ethnic groups in Botswana}} {{Ethnic groups in Namibia}} {{Ethnic groups in South Africa}}

Category:San people Category:African nomads Category:Ethnic groups in Angola Category:Ethnic groups in Botswana Category:Ethnic groups in Namibia Category:Coloureds Category:Ethnic groups in Zimbabwe Category:Hunter-gatherers of Africa Category:Indigenous peoples of Southern Africa Category:Ethnic and religious slurs