No General Descriptions provided.
| Southern Zambesia |
| Mapungubwe |
| unknown |
| [1,000 to 2,000] people |
| 10,000 km2 |
| [6,000 to 12,000] people |
| Year Range | Toutswe (zi_toutswe) was in: |
|---|
It seems possible that Toutswemogala may have been the capital of the polity, being the largest settlement with an abundance of the most valuable cattle, but as Denbow theorizes it is also possible that the other two major settlements represent competitors, or only loosely-affiliated clients, within the same cultural group. Evidence is sparse. “The… site of Toutswe shows selection of animals (both cattle and ovicaprines) in their prime (Welbourne, 1975). This culling of breeding age stock has been interpreted… as an indication of increasing social stratification….the concentration of power and wealth is greatest at the Class 3 [Level 1] sites in the Toutswe region.” [1] “…differentiation in site location, size and length of occupation strongly suggests that social and economic networks were also differentiated, with more powerful individuals occupying the larger sites.” [2]
[1]: (Murphy 2011; 593-594) Kimmarie A. Murphy, “A Meal on the Hoof or Wealth in the Kraal? Stable Isotopes at Kgaswe and Taukome in Eastern Botswana,” in International Journal of Osteoarchaeology Vol. 21 (2011): 591-601. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/I3QB6TSV/collection
[2]: (Denbow 1986; 19) James Denbow, “A New Look at the Later Prehistory of the Kalahari,” in The Journal of African History Vol. 27, No.1 (1986): 3-28. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/X3DXN8CW/collection
Term used by some scholars, alternatively for Toutswe. “One of the first states in this tradition [of cattle-based wealth] is often referred to through its association with its principal site, Toutswemogala. Its society is sometimes referred to as the Zhizo tradition.” [1]
[1]: (Erlank 2005; 701) Natasha Erlank, “Iron Age (Later): Southern Africa: Toutswemogala, Cattle, and Political Power,” in Encyclopedia of African History Vol. 2, ed. Kevin Shillington (Fitzroy Dearborn, 2005): 701-702. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/AWA9ZT5B/collection
By 10th century, the cultures of the region exhibit evidence of stratification, as well as regional trade links to neighbouring polities, such as Mapungubwe. “Around the year 700, pastoralists began to move into the area… taking advantage… of local pasturage to support larger cattle herds. Here they came into contact with the Khoisan people already resident in the area…. By 900 a stratified and hierarchical society was emerging on the fringes of the Kalahari Desert, linked regionally to other emergent states like that at Mapungubwe.” [1]
[1]: (Erlank 2005; 701) Natasha Erlank, “Iron Age (Later): Southern Africa: Toutswemogala, Cattle, and Political Power,” in Encyclopedia of African History Vol. 2, ed. Kevin Shillington (Fitzroy Dearborn, 2005): 701-702. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/AWA9ZT5B/collection
Initially formed around 700 CE, the product of mixing between local Khoisan and newly-arrived external cattle herding peoples. The culture’s decline occurred in the mid-13th C. CE, most likely a product of environmental degradation. “Between AD 700 and and 1250, people associated with Toutswe ceramics occupied the western side of the Shashe-Limpopo basin.” [1] “Around the year 700, pastoralists began to move into the area… taking advantage… of local pasturage to support larger cattle herds. Here they came into contact with the Khoisan people already resident in the area…. By 900 a stratified and hierarchical society was emerging on the fringes of the Kalahari Desert, linked regionally to other emergent states like that at Mapungubwe…. Toutswemogala was occupied for approximately 500 years until the fourteenth century…. The power of the state diminished during the thirteenth century, probably as a result of overgrazing and drought and the state went into a decline.” [2]
[1]: (Mosothwane & Steyn 2004; 45) Morongwa N. Mosothwane & Maryna Steyn, “Palaeodemography of Early Iron Age Toutswe Communities in Botswana,” in The South African Archaeological Bulletin Vol. 59, No. 180 (2004): 45-51. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/KJZWB7HR/collection
[2]: (Erlank 2005; 701-702) Natasha Erlank, “Iron Age (Later): Southern Africa: Toutswemogala, Cattle, and Political Power,” in Encyclopedia of African History Vol. 2, ed. Kevin Shillington (Fitzroy Dearborn, 2005): 701-702. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/AWA9ZT5B/collection
General category termed in Pikirayi, encompassing Toutswe, Mapungubwe and Great Zimbabwe, as well as several later polities. All existed as part of a regional trading (and presumably cultural) network, with trade goods from Mapungubwe and the coast being found in Toutswe settlements. All societies in this group possessed some social stratification, and later examples reached increasing levels of specialization. “Southern Zambesian societies were part of a regional network tied to global commerce involving eastern Africa and Asia, and were organized in the form of chiefdoms and states displaying different levels of sociopolitical stratification…. Political centralization occurred here among agropastoralist societies in a broad area covering western Zimbabwe’s plateau, the middle Limpopo Valley, and the eastern fringes of the Kalahari Desert…. The region experienced increasingly wet conditions from the onset of the second millennium to about AD 1300, a change that undoubtedly attracted farming communities to the Shashe-Limpopo floodplain…. These communities lived in sizeable homesteads and villages, some possibly small towns…. It is highly likely that the first chiefdoms and state societies in southern Africa developed around these sites.” [1] “The most obvious cultural connections lie in the pottery recovered from Toutswe sites. Although Toutswe pottery has been called a tradition in order to emphasise its cultural independence from neighbouring areas… it does have close ties with both Zhizo and Leopard’s Kopje…. Some pottery items were physically transferred between the two areas [of Leopard’s Kopje and the Toutswe area]…. Contacts would have been easy to sustain and… traded items could readily have been passed from settlement to settlement involving relatively simple journeys…. Although the societies of east central Botswana participated in the exchange of goods, the distribution of items such as glass beads was by no means equal.” [2] “Evidence that both local and long-distance trads goods reached even the smaller sites of the Toutswe hierarchy is provided by the discovery of a pot containing over 2,600 glass beads, 5,000 ostrich eggshell beads, and 50 cm of wound wire necklace on the floor of one of the houses [as Kgaswe].” [3]
[1]: (Pikirayi 2013; 915-917) Innocent Pikirayi, “The Zimbabwe Culture and its Neighbours,” in The Oxford Handbook of African Archaeology, eds. Peter Mitchell and Paul J. Lane (Oxford University Press, 2013): 916-928. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/NVZ5T427/collection
[2]: (Reid & Segobye 2000; 61) Andrew Reid & Alinah Segobye, “Politics, Society and Trade on the Eastern Margins of the Kalahari,” in South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series Vol. 8 (2000): 58-68. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/7KBFCB3J/collection
[3]: (Denbow 1986; 19) James Denbow, “A New Look at the Later Prehistory of the Kalahari,” in The Journal of African History Vol. 27, No.1 (1986): 3-28. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/X3DXN8CW/collection
This apparent polity, located in the eastern Shashe-Limpopo, appears to have begun its increase in social complexity in the 10th and 11th centuries, and fell into decline in the 13th century, its gold trade-derived wealth being diverted into the rising polity of Great Zimbabwe instead. Unclear whether the decline of this polity occurred substantially after, or contemporaneously with, the decline of Toutswe. Needs further research. “…the first complex state in the region, a precursor to Great Zimbabwe. The most important site linked to this state has been found at Mapungubwe, on the south side of the Limpopo River… in the Limpopo River valley…. From the tenth century, sites in the region became more complex, showing evidence of larger cattle herds…. These shifts are taken to indicate the beginnings of more complex social structure in the area…. Mapungubwe has been identified as the center of a state that emerged… at the end of the tenth century…. By the thirteenth century, the Mapungubwe state was in decline, probably as a result of its loss of control of the gold trade. Arab traders were locating themselves further north… and trading directly with a newly emergent state… Great Zimbabwe.” [1]
[1]: (Erlank 2005; 702-703) Natasha Erlank, “Iron Age (Later): Southern Africa: Leopard’s Kopje, Bambandyanalo, and Mapungubwe,” in Encyclopedia of African History Vol. 2, ed. Kevin Shillington (Fitzroy Dearborn, 2005): 702-703. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/AWA9ZT5B/collection
No actual evidence of the political machinery operating between the capital of Toutswemogela and its subordinate settlements has been found in the literature examined for this sheet, as of this time (17/08/2021). The similar scale of the three discovered Level 1 settlements in this area suggest to Denbow that the Toutswe tradition may have been more decentralized, and consequently its major centers more economically and politically independent than those of its contemporaries, but this is only a hypothesis. “In the Toutswe region, such [competitive] relations may have existed between Toutswe and the two other [Level 1] settlements (Bosutswe and Shoshong) located approximately one hundred kilometres from Toutswe. Their spatial separation… and the clustering of satellite… communities around each… suggests that each may represent the core of a competing system outside… direct control…. It is possible that each cluster was a separate, autonomous or semi-autonomous unit. By contract, Mapungubwe and Great Zimbabwe have no equals in size (and thus importance) during their respective time periods.” [1]
[1]: (Denbow 1986; 23) James Denbow, “A New Look at the Later Prehistory of the Kalahari,” in The Journal of African History Vol. 27, No.1 (1986): 3-28. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/X3DXN8CW/collection
Inhabitants. Population estimates discussed in Pikirayi give a general estimated range of between 1,000 – 2,000 per ‘centre’ in this region and period, though not referring to Toutswe territory specifically. If we assume this to be accurate to Toutswe territory as well, then we might presume Toutswemogala to be represented within this range. However, this is an extremely rough estimate, and should be replaced with data based on specific population estimates for Toutswemogala, Shoshong and Bosutswe as soon as such estimates are located (if they exist). “From the 11th century onwards, population increased in the middle Limpopo valley and adjacent eastern Botswana, as is made evident by the growth of homesteads, villages and towns….settlement activity became concentrated at Taukome, Toutswemogala, Bosutswe, Mokgware and other places, where inhabitants kept large herds of cattle …. Population estimates in each of these centres range from 1,000 to 2,000…..” [1]
[1]: (Pikirayi 2017; 886) Innocent Pikirayi, “Trade, Globalisation and the Archaic State in Southern Africa,” in Journal of Southern African Studies Vol. 43, No. 5 (2017): 879-893. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/FBAX3ZMJ/collection
in squared kilometers. General estimation performed by the RA based on the width and breadth of the territory occupied by known Toutswe sites, as laid out in map form in Denbow (1986) 19. This is not a definitive number, and only a general estimation. Should be replaced at the first opportunity, if a better-founded estimation of Toutswe-occupied territory is located. [1]
[1]: (Denbow 1986; 19) James Denbow, “A New Look at the Later Prehistory of the Kalahari,” in The Journal of African History Vol. 27, No.1 (1986): 3-28. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/X3DXN8CW/collection
People. These figures are entirely estimates of the RA’s creation. No population estimates specifically for Toutswe settlements or territory have been discovered at this time, and the above figure is based on the following general estimates of population trends within the region. Population estimates discussed by Pikirayi give a general estimated range of between 1,000 – 2,000 per ‘centre’ in this region and period, though not referring to Toutswe settlements specifically. Huffman describes a general trend in Southern African history of polities being built upon “a base of small settlements near agricultural lands that typically accommodates more than half the population.” While intended as a survey of Bantu trends, if this trend proliferates in the region, and is true of the similarly cattle-wealth-predominant Bantu, it may be applicable to understanding the population demographics of other cattle-based societies within the region as well. If we assume that Pikirayi’s comments above hold true of the Toutswe settlements as well as others, and that Huffman’s comments are also valid for Toutswe society, then the above figures may be reasonable minimum-maximum estimates. Still, these should not be seen as definitive in any way. More detailed figures should be located, and if available, should replace this estimate. “From the 11th century onwards, population increased in the middle Limpopo valley and adjacent eastern Botswana, as is made evident by the growth of homesteads, villages and towns….settlement activity became concentrated at Taukome, Toutswemogala, Bosutswe, Mokgware and other places, where inhabitants kept large herds of cattle …. Population estimates in each of these centres range from 1,000 to 2,000….” [1] “As another consequence of the relationship between wealth and power, the absolute size of a capital and its relative difference from subordinate settlements varies with the degree of political stratification…. Apart from a few anomalies, clear trends emerge from this survey which are important for the investigation of political stratification in the past. First, every hierarchy has a base of small settlements near agricultural lands which typically accommodates more than half the population.” [2]
[1]: (Pikirayi 2017; 886) Innocent Pikirayi, “Trade, Globalisation and the Archaic State in Southern Africa,” in Journal of Southern African Studies Vol. 43, No. 5 (2017): 879-893. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/FBAX3ZMJ/collection
[2]: (Huffman 1986; 283) Thomas N. Huffman, “Archaeological Evidence and Conventional Explanations of Southern Bantu Settlement Patterns,” in Africa Vol. 56, No. 3 (1986): 280-298. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/WSH2S2SN/collection
levels. (1) hilltop towns/villages; (2) hilltop hamlets; (3) homesteads. These categorizations discussed in Murphy, based on the archaeological classification scheme created by Denbow from his archaeological findings, and some of the basics of which are outlined in his own words below. The names used here for each level are the RA’s own. Level 3 consists of farms with 1000-5000 m2 kraals, housing, and grain storage bins. Level 2 settlements have ca. 10,000 m2 kraals, located on hilltops and with some fortifications. Level 1 settlements possess ca. 80-100,000 m2 kraals. Level 1 otherwise similar to Level 2 except for size. Only three Level 1 sites known to exist: Toutswemogala, Bosutswe and Shoshong. Note that these Levels are numbered in the exact opposite order of those discussed by Murphy & Denbow, I.E. A Level 1 settlement in this system corresponds to a Class 3 settlement in the following quotes. “Denbow has identified three classes of sites within the Toutswe region which appear to form a political and social hierarchy. Class 1 sites are small, more or less circular sites with kraal areas averaging between 1000 and 5000 m2…. Class 1 sites also possess pole and daga house structures surrounding the kraal, grain storage bins and human burials both within and outside the kraal areas…. Class 2 sites are roughly similar in shape to Class 1 sites, but are twice the size with kraal areas averaging 10,000 m2…. Features here include kraals, hut structures, grain storage bins and burials. Class 2 sites are located on hilltops, away from arable land and water sources, and are often fortified…. Class 3 sites share most of the same features with Class 2 sites, differing primarily in their size, number and faunal mortality profiles. Only three Class 3 sites have been identified with an average kraal area estimated at 80,000-100,000 m2.” [1] “In the region surrounding Toutswe a threefold hierarchy of settlements in terms of size, location and length of occupation has been found…. The smallest sites in the Toutswe hierarchy (Class 1) have central middens that range between 1,000 and 5,000 square metres in area…. Over 75 per cent of the 159 Class 1 settlements located within a sixty kilometre radius of Toutswe contained shallow dung deposits partially surrounded by the remains of pole and daga houses and grain bins…. Class 2 and 3 villages were located exclusively on hilltops, often at some distance from water supplies and arable land…. The location of the larger village on hilltops away from productive resources may have been related to political factors such as protection of cattle and other resources from raids.” [2]
[1]: (Murphy 2011; 592-593) Kimmarie A. Murphy, “A Meal on the Hoof or Wealth in the Kraal? Stable Isotopes at Kgaswe and Taukome in Eastern Botswana,” in International Journal of Osteoarchaeology Vol. 21 (2011): 591-601. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/I3QB6TSV/collection
[2]: (Denbow 1986; 18-23) James Denbow, “A New Look at the Later Prehistory of the Kalahari,” in The Journal of African History Vol. 27, No.1 (1986): 3-28. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/X3DXN8CW/collection
A distinctive feature of this cultural group, found in settlements of all levels, acting as both cattle enclosures and male burial sites. “Sites in the Toutswe region date between CE 700 – 1300 and share a variety of settlement patterns, economic features and material culture…. Remains of animal enclosures, or kraals… have been recovered.” [1] “Males were mostly buried in central kraals or middens while women and children were buried next to huts surrounding the central kraal…. Although information on the Toutswemogala burials is sparse, it appears that the burials were found in different parts of the site below the cattle dung deposits.” [2]
[1]: (Murphy 2011; 592) Kimmarie A. Murphy, “A Meal on the Hoof or Wealth in the Kraal? Stable Isotopes at Kgaswe and Taukome in Eastern Botswana,” in International Journal of Osteoarchaeology Vol. 21 (2011): 591-601. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/I3QB6TSV/collection
[2]: (Mosothwane & Steyn 2004; 49) Morongwa N. Mosothwane & Maryna Steyn, “Palaeodemography of Early Iron Age Toutswe Communities in Botswana,” in The South African Archaeological Bulletin Vol. 59, No. 180 (2004): 45-51. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/KJZWB7HR/collection
Ostrich eggshell beads; glass beads. Large finds of each have been found in certain Toutswe sites, and their presence in a variety of sites as well as their foreign origins suggest their use as part of trading networks of exchange. “Evidence that both local and long-distance trade goods reached even the smaller sites of the Toutswe hierarchy is provided by the discovery of a pot containing over 2,600 glass beads, 5,000 ostrich eggshell beads [in Kgaswe].” [1] “Evidence for this trade [around the vicinity of the Kalahari Desert] is occasionally present from sites in east central Botswana. Primarily this consists of… glass beads. These are regularly if sporadically encountered…. The single largest occurrence… comes from Kgaswe….” [2]
[1]: (Denbow 1986; 19) James Denbow, “A New Look at the Later Prehistory of the Kalahari,” in The Journal of African History Vol. 27, No.1 (1986): 3-28. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/X3DXN8CW/collection
[2]: (Reid & Segobye 2000; 61) Andrew Reid & Alinah Segobye, “Politics, Society and Trade on the Eastern Margins of the Kalahari,” in South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series Vol. 8 (2000): 58-68. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/7KBFCB3J/collection
The use of cattle as primary form of wealth, in addition to symbolic power, in Toutswe society is highly probable. “The transition from a society organized around chiefdoms to one that can be characterized as a state was probably achieved through the accrual of wealth in cattle…. The power of Toutswemogala developed firstly out of the accumulation of wealth in cattle. The ability to control the breeding and distribution of cattle gave the elite of the emergent state access to stores of wealth. These… could be used to barter for more wealth or to secure the allegiance of outer lying groups…. Cattle would have held both symbolic and literal wealth.” [1]
[1]: (Erlank 2005; 701-702) Natasha Erlank, “Iron Age (Later): Southern Africa: Toutswemogala, Cattle, and Political Power,” in Encyclopedia of African History Vol. 2, ed. Kevin Shillington (Fitzroy Dearborn, 2005): 701-702. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/collections/GWWIKDDM/items/AWA9ZT5B/collection