THE EARLIEST SOUTH AFRICANS
South Africa has provided a home for human settlement since very early times. The presence of homo sapiens goes back perhaps 125 000 years. These first South Africans" were followed much later by hand-toolmakers of the Middle Stone Age (probably 40 000 years ago), the so-called Wilton-Smithfield cultural system (small flake tools, weapons, pottery) has been uncovered.
There are three reasons for the linkage between these Late Sone Age people and the earliest negroid inhabitants, who may have arrived as early as 8000 years ago. The Khoison (that is Bushman-Hotten…
