The Stone Ages of South Africa 181 



stones beat them out and shape them to weapons. They rarely make 

 anything else of iron." 



Vogel (" A Ten Years' Jom-ney to the Eastern Indies "), quoted 

 by Kolben, makes the following statement : " They get the hardest 

 stone they can, and putting the iron upon it, as upon an anvil, heat 

 it 2oith a rounded stone which serves for a hammer," &c. 



I am able to corroborate Kolben's statement by finds made on the 

 floor of temporarily removed sand-dunes in the Cape Peninsula. 

 Here, are occasionally found small cairns of greyish-black stones, 

 the object of which remained for a long time conjectural. That 

 they were not sepultures deep digging had proved. Were they, 

 then, merely the heaps of stones alleged to be one of the many 

 graves of the ubiquitous sorcerer, " Heitse Eibip," to which any 

 Hottentot who passes adds another for luck *? All the stones were 

 calcined limestone. The revelation came at last in the find, along- 

 side one of these cairns, of pounders heavier than usual, with ends 

 greatly abraded ; of mortars, with the usual central depression, 

 broken across ; of ! kwe's cleft in halves, showing that they had 

 served as hammers — the rounded stone of Vogel's account probably ,', 

 and, lastly, of pieces of iron ore of very poor quality. That the site 

 had been that of a smithy was thus clearly established. But on this, 

 very site were found also minute ostrich egg-shell beads and tiny 

 stone borers or drills ; the usual Cape Flats type of small scraper 

 knives ; brass buttons — an article of trade mentioned by Kolben ; 

 bowls of small, white clay pipes with the stem broken close ; occa- 

 sionally a leaden bullet ; and also, but rarely, small beads of 

 European manufacture. 



Some of these finds show that the antiquity of these smithies is 

 not great, but it proves conclusively that the stone and iron industry 

 existed side by side until recently. 



Kolben's statement that the Hottentot rarely makes anything else 

 of iron except his weapons seems to me to be the true explanation of 

 the survival of the stone industry. The material is difficult to pro- 

 cure, difficult also to shape in the manner required, and the more 

 primitive method proves of great help in the new line of progress. 



So far, however, I have dealt only with the South Afi'ican neolithic 

 stone industry in connection with the Hottentot race. Is there no 

 other that is also connected with it ? and what of the Bantu-speaking 

 people whom we here call Kaffirs : the Bechuana, Barotse, Basuto, 

 Bakalanga, Xosa, Zulu, Ova-Herero, and Ovampo, not ignoring the 

 Berg-Damara ? 



Traditions as well as speculation have it that they are compara- 



