STRANDLOPERS AND SHELL MIDDENS An investigation into the identity, nomenclature and life-style of the indigenous inhabitants of the southern African coastal region in the prehistoric and early historical period, with a recent example. MICHAELy LEWIS of Cape WILSON Town Universit Thesis submitted to the University of Cape Town in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts (Archaeology) September 1990 The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgement of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non- commercial research purposes only. Published by the University of Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author. University of Cape Town This study is dedicated to the memory of FRANZ RICHARD (FRANK) SCHWEITZER (1925-1979) friend and mentor, who called his home 'Strandlopernes'. 11 ABSTRACT This study investigates the use of the name ·Strandloper' and its application to people and archaeological sites in the southern African coastal region. The evidence in the early records left by voyagers and settlers from Europe is that the name was originally applied to a small band of Khoisan people, the Goringhaicona, who lived on the shore of Table Bay during the seventeenth century and whose way of life was typical of neither the Khoikhoi herders nor the San hunter-gatherers. Towards the end of the last century the name was applied to human skeletons and archaeological sites found in the coastal region, thence finding its way into the scientific and popular literature. The early claims of physical anthropologists for a separate 'race' of 'Strandlopers' are shown to be unsubstantiated. An investigation of the stature of skeletons from the coastal region has shown that the stature of the prehistoric people was within the range of modern Khoisan and South African Negro samples,... but generally closer to that of the San. The archaeological evidence also does not support the suggestion of a culturally distinct people whose technology differed from that of other people in the region, and who subsisted solely by 'strandloping', or collecting and scavenging along the shore. It is shown that sites in the coastal region are the result of the activities of three groups with differing economies: hunter-gatherers, herders and farmers. Most of these sites contain a terrestrial component as well as a marine one, and it is argued that these sites represent only one part of these groups' subsistence activities. The name 'Strandloper' is thus shown to be misleading in its implications and therefore correctly applicable only to the Goringhaicona, who were given that name and applied it to themselves. Even then, the implications of the name misrepresent these people's actual life-style, so it should only be used informally, as a sobriquet. iii CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................... v LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................... vii LIST OF FIGURES ............................................................................................................ viii INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................. 1 The information base ....................................................................................................... 3 Notes on nomenclature .................................................................................................... 4 PART I. THE DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE Chapter 1. Early contacts First meetings ............................................................................................................... 8 I..ater contacts ............................................................................................................. 14 Discussion .................................................................................................................... 15 Chapter 2. Strandlopers and related names Watermen .................................................................................................................... 17 Strandlopers ................................................................................................................ 18 Vismans ....................................................................................................................... 22 Strandlopers (continued) .......................................................................................... 24 Chapter 3. The Goringhaicona: Khoikhoi or San? The sources ................................................................................................................. 32 Discussion .................................................................................................................... 37 Chapter 4. Strandlopers in the late eighteenth century Gordon and Paterson ................................................................................................ 39 Discussion .................................................................................................................... 42 IV PART II. THE EVIDENCE OF ARCHAEOLOGY AND OTHER DISCIPLINES Chapter 5. Physical anthropology Introduction ................................................................................................................ 43 Craniology ................................................................................................................... 44 Stature .......................................................................................................................... 52 Discussion .................................................................................................................... 68 Chapter 6. Archaeology Sites and artefacts ...................................................................................................... 78 Discussion .................................................................................................................... 92 Chapter 7. Archaeology ( continued) Subsistence in the coastal region ............................................................................. 94 Discussion .................................................................................................................. 115 Chapter 8. Archaeometry Isotopes and proteins in coastal diet.. ................................................................... 121 Discussion .................................................................................................................. 132 Chapter 9. Archaeobotany Plant remains from coastal sites ............................................................................ 134 Discussion .................................................................................................................. 137 Chapter 10. Ethnography The fAonin .............................................................................................................. 140 Discussion .................................................................................................................. 141 Chapter 11. Summary and conclusions ................................................................... 144 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................... 152 APPENDIX. An evaluation of the reconstruction of prehistoric coastal human diet by Buchanan (1988) .............................................................................. 170 V ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS A thesis is expected to bear the hallmark 'all my own work'. However, as will be seen from the text and bibliography, I am indebted to all the researchers and recorders whose publications I have consulted, or to which I have referred, and the results of whose work I have used. Without the benefit of their spadework, this study would have been immeasurably the poorer - if, indeed, it would have been possible at all. To this great extent, then, I acknowledge my debt to them. Where I have disagreed with them, I trust that they will take this in good spirit as one of the bases of scientific enquiry, and in accordance with the principle of audi alteram parte. If I have misquoted or misunderstood them, I apologise and ask that they accept that the error is mine. In addition to the assistance provided by those whose works form the basis of this study, there are others who have contributed in numerous ways: my colleagues at the South African Museum, Margaret and Graham Avery, Bill van Rijssen, Vivien van Zyl and Louis Lawrence (Archaeology), Marilyn and John Pether and Noel Fouten (Palaeontology), Thea Reyneke, Rina Krynauw, Jacqueline Truman­ Baker and Isgaq Bendie (Library), Bettie Louw (Publications) and Gerald Klinghardt (Ethnography); also to Richard Klein, University of Chicago; John Lundy, Clark College, Vancouver; Alan Morris, UCT Medical School; Judy Sealy, UCT Archaeology Department; Dieter Noli, an Archaeology Ph.D. student at UCT; and Thea Toussaint van Hove, friend and voluntary co-worker. Not least, I am grateful to my supervisor, John Parkington, for his wise direction. VI I take this opportunity to pay tribute to Professor G. S. Nienaber of the Instituut vir Naam- en Kultuurnavorsing,