Oldest dated evidence of cattle in
southern Africa found
A team of researchers working with colleagues from the Botswana National Museum
shed new light on the questions of when cattle were brought to southern Africa
and from where.
A domestic cow bone, dated to about 2000 years ago was excavated
from a site at Toteng, located in the Kalahari Desert of northern Botswana. This
bone, dated by the Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS) radiocarbon technique,
provides the oldest directly dated evidence of cattle in southern Africa. Domestic sheep were also present at Toteng at about the same time.
Historical
and linguistic information suggest northern Botswana figured prominently in the
arrival and dispersal of livestock in southern Africa. The new dates support
this view and confirm a long-term association between people and livestock in
this part of the Kalahari. The discovery of the 2000 year old cow and sheep
bones are important because of the long held view that the Kalahari was a
comparatively isolated area that was primarily occupied by foraging peoples
until recently.
The findings, to be published in the August/October issue of Current
Anthropology, are also interesting in the broader context of the spread of
domestic livestock throughout Africa. Whereas livestock had spread into northern
Kenya in East Africa by as early as 4000/4500 years ago, it took an additional
2000 years for their eventual spread into southern Africa.
Experts have stressed
that this delay was largely due to the presence of trypanosomiasis, carried by
tsetse flies, as well as other diseases that kill livestock in much of the
intervening area. The Toteng sites are situated near the southern edge of the
Tsetse fly zone and the new dates of about 2000 years ago appear to date the
initial penetration of livestock through this zone.
More information:
For more information,
University of Chicago Press Journals
Robbins, Larry, et al. "The advent of herding in southern Africa: Early
AMS dates on domestic livestock from the Kalahari Desert, Botswana."
Current Anthropology 46:4.
 Lactose Intolerance is Normal!
|
