TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION H. 513 
Kattea. 
Before proceeding further I must here make allusion to an obscure race who 
may possibly be the true aborigines of Africa south of the Zambezi, These are the 
Kattea—or Vaalpens, as they are nicknamed by the Boers, on account of tbe dusty 
colour their abdomen acquires from the habit of creeping into their holes in the 
ground—who live in the steppe region of the North Transvaal, as far as the Lim- 
popo. As their complexion is almost a pitch black, and their stature only about 
1,220 m. (4 ft.), they are quite distinct from their tall Bantu neighbours and 
from the yellowish Bushmen. The ‘ Dogs,’ or ‘ Vultures,’ as the Zulus call them, 
are the ‘lowest of the low,’ being undoubtedly cannibals and often making a 
meal of their own aged and infirm, which the Bushmen never do. Their habita- 
tions are holes in the ground, rock shelters, and lately a few hovels. They have no 
arts or industries, nor even any weapons except those obtained in exchange for 
ostrich feathers, skins, or ivory. Whether they have any religious ideas it is 
impossible to say, all intercourse being restricted to barter carried on in a gesture 
language, for nobody has ever yet mastered their tongue, all that is known of 
their language being that it is absolutely distinct from that of both the Bushman 
and the Bantu. There are no tribes, merely little family groups of from thirty to 
fifty individuals, each of which is presided over by a headman, whose functions 
are acquired, not by heredity, but by personal qualities. I have compiled this 
account of this most interesting people from Professor A. H. Keane’s book, ‘The 
Boer States,’ in the hope that a serious effort will be made to investigate what 
appears to be the most primitive race of all mankind. So little information is 
available concerning the Kattea that it is impossible to say anything about their 
racial affinities. 
Perhaps these are the people referred to by Stow (p. 40), and possibly allied to 
these are the dwarfs on the Nosop River mentioned by Anderson; these were 
1.320 m. (4 ft, 4 in.) or less in height, of a reddish-brown colour, with no forehead 
and a projecting mouth ; Anderson’s Masara Bushmen repudiated any suggestion 
of relationship with them, saying they were ‘monkeys, not men,’ 
Bushmen. 
The San, or Bushmen (Bosjesman of Colonial Annals), may, with the possible 
exception of the Kattea, be regarded as the most primitive of the present inhabitants 
of South Africa; according to most authors, there is no decisive evidence that there 
was an earlier aboriginal population, although several Bushman tales speak of 
previous inhabitants. 
The main physical characteristics of the Bushmen are a yellow skin, and very 
short, black woolly hair, which becomes rolled up into little knots; although of 
quite short stature, with an average height of 1.529 m. (5 ft. 04 in.), or, accord- 
ing to Schinz, 1.570 m. (6 ft. 13 in.), they are above the pygmy limit of 
1.450 m. (4 ft. 9 in.) The very small skull is not particularly narrow, being what 
is termed sub-dolichocephalic, with an index of about 75, and it is markedly low 
in the crown ; the face is straight, with prominent cheekbones and a bulging fore- 
head ; the nose is extremely broad—indeed, the Bushmen are the most platyrrhine 
of all mankind; the ear has an unusual form, and is without the lobe. Their 
hands and feet are remarkably small. 
Being nomadic hunters the Bushmen could only attain to the rudiments of 
material culture. The dwellings were portable, mat-covered, dome-shaped huts, 
but they often lived in caves; the Zulus say ‘their village is where they kill 
game ; they consume the whole of it and go away.’ Clothing consisted solely of a 
small skin; for weapons they had small bows and poisoned arrows. Their only 
implement was a perforated rounded stone into which a stick was inserted; this 
was used for digging up roots. A very little coarse pottery was occasionally 
made. Although with a dearth of personal ornaments, they had a considerable 
amount of pictorial skill, and were fond of decorating their rock shelters with 
spirited coloured representations of men and animals, They frequently cut off the 
1905. LL 
