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Prehistory and Human Origins from Jan Christiaan Smuts to Thabo Mbeki

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Prehistory and Human Origins from Jan Christiaan Smuts to Thabo Mbeki 22 South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series 12: 22–30, 2019 RECOMPOSING IDENTITIES: PREHISTORY AND HUMAN ORIGINS FROM JAN CHRISTIAAN SMUTS TO THABO MBEKI NATHAN SCHLANGER École nationale des chartes, PSL, Paris, UMR Trajectoires, Nanterre, France, and Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa E-mail: [email protected] ABSTRACT colonisation, with its emphasis on territories, boundaries, The development of prehistoric archaeology in South Africa represents contacts, and exchanges, as in the colonisation of the globe by an instance of colonial archaeology as a research setting, in which an Homo sapiens, or the Mediterranean by the Roman Empire interest in the material past is imported and implemented in the (cf. Gamble 1993; Gosden 2004; Dietler 2010). Second, nor does context of settlement and domination. The utility of such a discipline is it refer to a chronological time span – usually set from Colum- amply demonstrated in the second quarter of the 20th century. bus’ 1492 travels onwards – encompassing the archaeological Encouraged by empirical discoveries, by dedicated scientists, and by and historical evidence of European implantations and interac- Field Marshal J.C. Smuts, prehistory proved twice useful: to position tions in foreign lands (Schrire 1995; Orser 1996). Both these South Africa and the southern hemisphere as a global actor, and to aspects are germane, but what is at stake with colonial archae- provide an equidistant unifying ground for the infighting Boer ology here is rather a distinctive research setting in which and Briton communities of the Union. The ‘cradle of humankind’, archaeology, imported or imposed from the outside, is carried promoted in those interwar years on both scientific and economic out in political, economic and cultural conditions of adminis- grounds, provides a link to post-apartheid times. As former President trative and cognitive domination by practitioners – predomi- Thabo Mbeki expressed on numerous occasions, the deep past of nantly white and Westerners – who have no ostensible humanity carries historical but also moral meaning, as a cornerstone ‘historical’ or ‘ethnic’ affinities, let alone ‘racial’ ones, with the of the African renaissance – then as now, the prehistoric past can serve populations or the lands whose past they study (Schlanger as a means for recomposing identities in the present. 2012). This begs the question: in the light of the aforementioned national postulate, and leaving aside possible references to the Key words: prehistoric archaeology, colonial archaeology, ‘pure and disinterested’ pursuit of knowledge, why bother at history of archaeology, African terminology, Afrikaans, cradle all? Why on earth sweat and toil under the tropical sun in order of humankind, Jan Christiaan Smuts, Thabo Mbeki. to painstakingly uncover vestiges of a past to which one is INTRODUCTION alien? The emergence of archaeology as a scientific discipline One set of possible answers has been advanced by during the 19th century has often been associated with the rise historian of archaeology Bruce Trigger in an influential paper of nationalism. Throughout this period – and indeed up to the entitled ‘Alternative archaeologies: Nationalist, Colonialist, present day – numerous attempts have been made to recover Imperialist’ (Trigger 1984). Trigger saw colonial archaeology as and root some tangible pasts into the ideological make-up of effectively a ‘colonialist’ one, whose practitioners seek, “by the modern nation state. In Europe, this tendency is perhaps emphasising the primitiveness and lack of accomplishments of best exemplified by Napoleon III’s creation of the Musée des these [indigenous] peoples, to justify their own poor treatment antiquités nationales (itself partly inspired from the earlier of them” and thus legitimise their domination. Furthermore, Danish National Museum), or again, some decades later, by he added, “Colonialist archaeology, wherever practised, Gustaf Kossinna’s promotion of archaeology as a “pre-emi- served to denigrate native societies and peoples by trying to nently national discipline” (hervorragend nationale Wissenschaft). demonstrate that they had been static in prehistoric times and However, while many similar cases can be mentioned, to lacked the initiative to develop on their own” (Trigger 1984: reduce the raison d’être and the development of archaeology to 360, 363, Trigger 1989; Robertshaw 1990; Rowlands 1998, and nationalism alone will not do – especially if this merely implies more general comments in Van der Linde et al. 2012; Effros the recovery and reappropriation of some original autoch- & Lai 2018). By casting local populations as being ‘without thonous birth- or land rights, or again, the exaltation of some history’ (Wolf 1982) and ‘outof time’ (Fabian 1983), colonial(ist) shared heroic or cohesive past, in the mould of ‘our ancestors archaeology would help to invalidate or belittle their possible the Gauls’ (or the Danes, or the Germans). To endorse too claims for natural or historical justice. This archaeological hastily this ‘nationalist’ viewpoint may result in a rather historiography clearly echoes social anthropology’s long- one-dimensional appraisal of the archaeological discipline and standing disquiet over its own practical and ideological its broader implications as a body of practices and of represen- congruence with the colonialist enterprise (see classic state- tations (see notably Kohl & Fawcett 1995; Díaz-Andreu & ments in Leiris 1966; Asad 1973). The notion of colonial (sensu Champion 1996; Kohl 1998; Kaeser 2002; Díaz-Andreu colonialist) archaeology is in this respect of undeniable utility 2007). In order to highlight some of the issues involved, I for alerting the scholarly community to the ideological stakes will dedicate the coming pages to what appears on the face of inherent to their discipline – all the more so since such denials it to be a striking counter-example: given archaeology and of history are still occasionally encountered in the 21st century nationalism, what are we to make of the phenomenon of colo- in fairly blatant forms, as in the case of the infamous Dakar nial archaeology? speech by French former President Sarkozy (see Chrétien 2008). That granted, there remains considerable scope to move COLONIAL ARCHAEOLOGY AND COLONIALIST beyond this Machiavellian ideal type – and here again, compar- SENSIBILITIES isons with social anthropology are instructive. Intimate knowl- The colonial archaeology that concerns us here needs to be edge of native political and kinship structures (as secured defined. First, it does not refer directly to the archaeology of through functionalist fieldwork) has proved time and again to South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series 12: 22–30, 2019 23 be a patent asset to good governance: we may therefore pay australopithecine ape-like ‘missing link’ skull at Taung in 1924; heed to Bronislaw Malinowski, a leading expert in these and, at another level, the visit of metropolitan scientists such as matters, when he remarks that “the colonial ‘practitioner’ [can- Cambridge-based Miles Burkitt in 1927, and particularly the not] base his decisions upon an anthropology concerned with renowned French prehistorian and Africanist Henri Breuil, the Pithecanthropus erectus, or with the purely antiquarian whose 1929 grand tour of the region coincided with the joint reconstruction of various archaic cultures” (Malinowski 1930: meeting of the British and South African Associations for 428). Indeed, to take this disparaging comment one step the Advancement of Science in Cape Town. However, what further, of what utility could such an ‘antiquarian’ archaeology contributed most decisively to making prehistoric archaeology possibly be, as a handmaid of colonialism? a ‘frontline’ discipline (at least ideologically, if not in financial Such an archaeology can actually be quite useful, once we or infrastructural terms) was the crucial endorsement it have recognised that the notion of ‘colonialism’ covers a diver- received from Field Marshal Jan Christiaan Smuts (1870–1950), sity of political, cultural and socio-economic manifestations South Africa’s leading soldier, statesman and politician for (see Stoler 1989; Pels 1997). It would clearly be a misleading much of the first half of the 20th century (see Hancock 1968; oversimplification to lump together all colonisers in Africa, for and Schlanger 2002, for a detailed discussion). instance – be they soldiers, settlers, administrators, traders, Making the most of an electoral setback, Smuts found farmers, city-dwellers, missionaries, the liberal professions, himself free, between 1924 to about 1935, to pursue his philo- working classes, women, men, of English, Irish, French, Dutch sophical and scientific interests in geology, botany and prehis- or Lebanese origins, and so forth, and various permutations of toric archaeology. Smuts’ interests were particularly broad- all the above – into a single unitary group supposedly sharing ranging: he is notably credited with introducing the term some essential practical and ideological disposition. Avoiding ‘holism’ from philosophy and popular psychology, and also generalisations and stereotypes, we need to appreciate the with some prescient and innovative views on the phenomenon diversity of interests and assumptions that underlie the of globalisation. At the same time, his scientific agenda was practice of archaeology in colonial settings. This in turn should
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