How early does South Africa's history start?

Private Sharon Doubell Private User Pam Karp Private User Private User John Sparkman

I think that anything of significance should be there. The recent interest in DNA suggests that the San played an important roll in the human race! Perhaps anything that isn't speculation? Anything that we can pin down to a date? So look at Mapungubwe 1075. http://www.geni.com/documents/view/project-8532?doc_id=600000001515... It should be there as part of South Africa's History and timeline. Maybe the phrase "of genealogical significance" needs to be removed - and be simply "Settlement and Colonisation" with a pre-Settlement and Colonisation before it.

I like that.
I'm busy reading 'the House of Phalo' which is an attempt at documenting the Xhosa genealogies, which go back into the San too - so precolonial settlement patterns are very relevant to this.

Also the various precolonial explorers and shipwrecks are interesting, as they left genetic traces eg one theory has Krotoa Eva as descended from shipwrecked people's DNA too.

One of the most crucial SA projects, imo guys. Thanks.

I updated the link - which appeared to be wrong - on the Welkom Cuzzins Page

Dankie Brendan ek sal more kyk. LOL.
Sharon I discovered lovely things on the SAN yestrday but as always - IN BOOK FORM. I lief die blaaie. Juds

Me too Judi - Maybe we should collect the info on a project for the Koisan / Khoena?
I see there are some good books by Karel Schoeman in this area, but they were expensive.

I have worked through the table of events changing the tense to the past so that it is consistant - some entries were past tense and others present. I will double check later - have work starting in the kitchen today,

I added the Early and Pre-historic section.

I am also a little concerned that some of the events (relating to the Barry family) were not of significance to the overall history of South Africa or genealogy and need reviewing Brendan Swemmer - maybe some need to be moved to the personal time lines for the individuals, or if the event had historical significance this needs to be explained.

the 20th Century needs expanding - Sharon Doubell perhaps the events around Nelson Mandella need to be added and more of the Xosa/Zulu/ history included.

There also need to be more links to projects of the events such as the Boer war etc.

Musty dash

... PS I changed the format because the big headings for years was getting ti be too cumbersome

SA's undocumented history starts way back millions BC with hominins that were here before our species: Homo sapiens sapiens. Taung,Swartkrans & other sites up north include Australopithecines,while down in the Saldanha Bay area of Western Cape,fossilised remains of Homo erectus(think name's changed since) have been found. Many scientists believe SA could be the cradle of our species. Recent DNA studies have found up to 4% Homo sapiens neanderthalis(Neanderthal) DNA in 'European' & Asian populations & interestingly,5% DNA from a Homo erectus girl found in Denisova Cave, Siberia came up in Australian aborigines-so many of us carry DNA from ancestral earlier species. Archaeologists believe that early modern humans in SA were busily innovating at some of the earliest dates so far indicated by current research-they seem to have been larger ancestors of the San/Khoi. The San are SA's most ancient people according to DNA analysis & Madiba of course carries a fair bit of this DNA along with DNA from Bantu-speaking West Africa(Quest magazine 2011). Stone tools from the earliest Stone Age periods lie around in abundance-a hand axe from circa 500 000 BC was found in the Cape Point Nature Reserve by a ranger who had studied archaeology and Cape shorelines are littered with shell middens,bits of pottery & tools-Miller's Point(penguin colony) & Sandy Bay in Cape Town being 2 well-known sites.

I have added that information to the project Alistair Moncur Knox - slightly edited. Thank you very much.

Okay, I'll add in Xhosa history for the period I'm working on as I go. I'll do Nelson Mandela too

I really like the idea of adding ancestral information as far back as we can trace it. The recent discovery of Australopithicus Sediba fossils (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australopithecus_sediba) at the Cradle of Humankind is another amazing piece of our history. The fossila date back two million years and are provisionally believed to represent a transitional species between Australopithecines and early hominids/hominims. I'll have a look at the project and post this info. if it isn't there already.

Oops, I see I can't add this info. - perhaps the curators would like to do so ...

@Lee - you have to collaborate on the project to add text - BUT HELP is exactly what we need - so I'm sending you a collaboration request asap!

Do you think we should start having profiles for Mrs Ples et al? :-) :-)

I would love to see a profile for Mrs Ples... linking her in to the big tree will be challenge tho.....

We'll just connect her to god :-)

And attach her to the SA Prog page :-)

Back down to earth - I think we need to keep information on this time-line to a minimum - so if there is more to be said about an event then it needs to have its own project or a link to a page where it can be read about in more depth. Alternatively a document loaded with a link as with Mapungubwe

Sharon - thanks. I sent a request to collaborate and it's been accepted, so I can now add to the text. :)

June - I agree that this could get unwieldly. So, as far as Sediba is concerned, I'm just adding a line or two as well as a link to a very good Wikipedia article on the subject.

Great Lee.

June, I've added Mandela stuff, but won't get back to finishing the Huguenots if I start adding Nguni stuff - Anyone who wants to select key events from my Nguni timeline, is welcome and encouraged to:
http://www.geni.com/projects/Nguni-Peoples-1700s-1800s/8648

Thanks, everybody, for your contributions thus far.

Firstly, if anybody wants to change something that has been added by someone else then could that person please liaise with the other person, or at least let them know and why. History and people's interpretation of it can be a very touchy subject as I have seen from another project. And if there are any disagreements then please talk about it with the rest of us. If the discussion or argument isn't resolved then a dispute annotation could always be added.

Secondly, some entries and links to profiles are bold and others aren't, some have been removed and others haven't been added. I prefer the links to profiles to be bold as I have often missed one in certain light conditions and bold solves that problem nicely and draws the eye. When mentioning a profile then please search Geni and make the link, if you can.

I don't think that text, other than names and headings, should be in bold for various reasons including the problem of personal intentions. Perhaps profiles not on Geni should be in bold.

Most of the other projects when a profile is on Geni the link is bold, if the link is to wikipedia for example it is not...

Difficult to know who to engage when suggesting a change.... I suggest changing "Kaffir wars" to: The Xhosa Wars, or the Cape Frontier Wars...

Feel free Don!

Anything ion particular that you are worried/upset about Brendan?

I'm not worried/upset about anything at all June.

I appreciate that this Timeline grew out of the History and Families of Witsand (White Sands) and Port Beaufort, but I question the relevance of the Barry family history in a general South African Timeline...

No - it didn't grow out of that project Don - see the message I posted yesterday at 8:16 AM and the note I have towards the top of the project page.