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4968 results in Wits University Press

Page 222 of 249

  • Preface

  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp vi-viii

  • Summary

    The last 500 years represents one of the most formative periods of our past, while being, in many senses, the least known. This was a time when, in a jagged and uneven fashion, some of the key cultural contours and categories of modern identities of the sub-continent came into being. It was also a period of enormous internal economic invention and political experimentation in a context where the expanded mercantile force of Europe started to press upon southern African shores and its hinterlands. This suggests that cultural mixing, interaction and change was more a feature of southern Africa in the last 500 years than the standard view of cultural homogeneity and fixity allows.

    While a number of notable archaeological studies have focused on this period of South Africa's past, they have been few and far between, and most archaeological energies have been vested in earlier phases of human activity, historically distant from the immediate identities of the present. At the same time, however, the study of African oral traditions and pre-colonial history in southern Africa has in many areas stalled over the last 25 years. We are thus confronted with the irony of an absence of attention to this critical period in the evolution of southern African societies and identities, at the very moment when the notion of an African Renaissance and its archaeological antecedents is being celebrated.

    In 2006 researchers from different disciplines (archaeology, history, social anthropology) and institutions (museums and universities) in southern Africa formed a group and began to take steps to fill in this gap and produce a fine-grained understanding of the last 500 years. Initially, the group called themselves the ‘500 Year Research Group’ (FYRG). This was based on the perception that the form and function of a research group, as defined by university and government institutions, offered the best way to formalise and develop the project. After much consultation, it became apparent that a research group would not allow the broad institutional and international membership that the group deemed necessary. Thus, in order to facilitate broader participation and membership, the name was changed to the ‘500 Year Initiative’ (FYI).

  • 4 - Towards an outline of the oral geography, historical identity and political economy of the Late Precolonial Tswana in the Rustenburg region

  • from Section 1 - Disciplinary Identities: Methodological Considerations
    • By S. Hall, Department of Archaeology University of Cape Town Rondebosch 7701, M. Anderson, Department of Archaeology University of Cape Town Rondebosch 7701, J. Boeyens, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology University of South Africa Pretoria 0003, F. Coetzee, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology University of South Africa Pretoria 0003
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 55-86

  • Summary

    Introduction

    The purpose of this paper is to offer a broad outline of historical developments in the wider Rustenburg region from about 1700 AD to the late 1820s. While both the oral and the archaeological records are addressed, the emphasis is on the latter because previous reviews by Parsons (1995) and Manson (1995) have already provided an in-depth discussion of the oral material from this period. Our concern is to build upon these insights and explore ideas about their profitable combination with archaeological evidence.

    Such a project falls within the ambit of historical archaeology and the methodological and interpretive relationship between material culture and texts. There is a significant literature on how this relationship is meant to work. Most agree that a unidirectional outcome in which one source simply confirms what is evident in the other is a waste of time. In contrast, most would aspire to an aim that profitably combines sources in order to take interpretation into areas that neither source could penetrate in isolation. At the centre of attaining a balance between sources is the issue of evidential scale (see Deetz 1988). Archaeological evidence can only translate into general perspectives on the past and tends to emphasise cultural concerns, while historical interpretation is more detailed and addresses specific context and the actions and agency of named players. In this regard, a key issue is whether the scale of identity glimpsed through the oral records, on the one hand, can be reconciled with the conventional use of ceramic and settlement style as identity, on the other.

    This focus on the relationship between archaeology and oral texts is an important project for the 18th and early 19th century. This is because it was a period of significant change within Sotho-Tswana communities, which saw dramatic change in the scale of political, social and economic organisation. Very broadly, early in the 18th century, moderately dispersed communities lived within relatively unconstrained space, while by the early 19th century, chiefdoms were pushing increasingly harder against each other and against the environment in which they were situated. Some chiefdoms decayed both from the external pressure of their neighbours and internal dispute, and lost economic independence, while others mounted aggressive takeovers.

  • 13 - Swazi oral tradition and Northern Nguni historical archaeology

  • from Section 3 - ‘Troubled Times’: Warfare, State Formation and Migration in the Interior
    • By P. Bonner, Department of History University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg 2001
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 239-256

  • Summary

    Introduction

    The Swazi Kingdom has been depicted in studies by Kuper, myself and others as something ‘sui generis’ (Marwick 1940; Kuper 1947; Matsebula 1972; Bonner 1983). Starting life as some kind of cross-breed between a refugee and a conquest state, it fused a disparate set of chiefdoms, cultures, languages and even economic practices into a single syncretic unit, albeit divided into three distinct strata each enjoying differential status and access to resources. Interpreted in this manner, the late 18th century/early 19thcentury Swazi Kingdom stands apart from, or in between, the much more centralised and homogenous Zulu Kingdom or state to the south, and the highly variegated Sotho chiefdoms or paramountcies further west, which have been conventionally viewed as more loosely organised but culturally cognate. Certainly, as I understood it thirty years ago, it commanded attention because of its unusual ancestry, which gave it its singular atypical hybrid character and, potentially, its own ambiguous historical vocation.

    Surprisingly little concerted or sustained attention has been paid to the precolonial African histories of the 18th and early 19th centuries in South Africa since the early 1980s, and even less to a systematic effort to compare and to calibrate them. Hamilton (1985) and Wright (1989) have made two of the few major contributions in this regard, showing, among other things, the comparative heterogeneity of the Zulu Kingdom/state, and its internal structuring into distinct strata, moulded along analagous (but more disguised) lines to those employed by the Swazi. A handful of other studies have examined the internal structures and dynamics of African polities elsewhere (Makhura 1993; Lekgoathi 2004). Aside from them, the precolonial African history of this area has been most extensively and illuminatingly explored by archaeologists (see for example Loubser 1981, 1988; Pistorious 1992; Schoeman 1997; Hall 1998; Boeyens 2003). Despite some important shafts of insight that they have thrown on this subject, however, these still remain all too few, as other epochs have by and large attracted more attention. These absences are unfortunate since a closer study of the history of the last 400 to 500 years may well hold the key to understanding and reinterpreting many current South African identities.

  • 8 - Revisiting Bokoni: populating the stone ruins of the Mpumalanga Escarpment

  • from Section 2 - Material Identities
    • By P. Delius, Department of History University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg 2001, M.H. Schoeman, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology University of Pretoria Pretoria 0001
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 135-168

  • Summary

    Introduction

    Stonewalled ruins in Mpumalanga materialise the complex dynamics of the area's precolonial past. Some of these settlements, such as the Ndzundza and Pedi capitals, continue to resonate in the present and were used as symbols of precolonial independence during the 20th century. Many more have become largely disconnected from memory and tradition. This paper revisits a group of these ‘lost sites’ and links them with a fragmented history of Bokoni. To do this we establish a dialogue between history and archaeology, that allows us to reflect on the people who lived in Bokoni and their economy.

    Archaeological research on the Orighstad–Carolina stonewalled sites

    The complex terraced and stonewalled sites between Orighstad and Carolina (Fig. 8.1 & Plate 3) have captivated many generations of South African archaeologists (e.g. Van Hoepen 1939; Mason 1962, 1968; Evers 1973, 1975; Collett 1979, 1982; Maggs 1995; Coetzee 2003; Smith 2006; Maggs this volume). P.W. Laidler, who specialised in precolonial ceramics, was the first archaeologist to visit the sites and collect a ceramic sample. Decoration placement and technique led him to suggest that the pottery associated with the ruins was comparable with pottery of known Zulu origin (Laidler 1932). Laidler did not, however, examine the stonewalled sites in any detail because his passion was pots, not the sites they came from.

    Fortunately the sites did not escape the archaeological gaze for long and the Bloemfontein-based archaeologist E.C.N. van Hoepen published a detailed report on these stonewalled sites in 1939. This pioneering study focused on the stonewalled enclosures and terraces on the farms Blouboskraal, Schoongezicht and Boomplaas, and associated engravings on the farms Blouboskraal, Boomplaas and an unnamed adjoining farm (Plate 3). He (Van Hoepen 1939) provided detailed descriptions of the stonewalled enclosures, including their size, architecture and spatial layout. Much of his report focused on the function of features and use of structures. He interpreted the enclosures as African homesteads occupied by polygamous patriarchs, their wives, and children who were the ancestors of the Pedi and Ndzundza people who lived in the areas in the 1930s.

    Three decades passed before archaeologists were drawn back to the Lydenburg escarpment sites.

  • 14 - Mfecane mutation in Central Africa: a comparison of the Makololo and the Ngoni in Zambia, 1830s-1898

  • from Section 3 - ‘Troubled Times’: Warfare, State Formation and Migration in the Interior
    • By A. Kanduza, Department of History University of Botswana Gaborone
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 257-272

  • Summary

    Introduction

    The Ngoni in Zambia and Malawi would agree with J.D. Omer-Cooper's (1995) assertion that ‘the Mfecane survives its critics’ in that the Mfecane still looms large in their own history. Omer–Cooper responded to revisionist views and accepted some major refinement of what caused, and how the main actors contributed to, a major historical process called the Mfecane in south-eastern Africa at the beginning of the 19th century. In Zambia, the Ngoni of Chipata are the only ethnic group whose recent origin is traced from the south of the country. They settled in what became the Chipata district in about 1870 where they usurped Chewa sovereignty. There are ten Ngoni Chiefs but two of them, namely Mishoro and Mshawa, are not of the Jere clan. Two additional Ngoni Chiefs, traditionally administered from Feni (the Ngoni headquarters in Chipata), are in the Mchinji district in Malawi (Lukhero 1985). Some of the justifications for settling there were the lush pastures and mountains that provided military defence. The topography was also a nostalgic reminder of Swaziland and Zululand. They share this history and celebrate it annually on the last Saturday of February together with Mbelwa's Ngoni who are in northern Malawi. These Ngoni groups were originally one of several refugee groups driven from their homeland by the Mfecane.

    Another such group settled in the Western and Southern Provinces of Zambia. The Makololo, with their headquarters at Linyati in northern Botswana, asserted political and military power in western and southern Zambia in about 1838 and became a colonial power in Bulozi (Lozi country in the Zambezi flood plain and its eastern plateau). They extended power over the Masubiy Toka and Leya in the Livingstone area. The Lozi overthrew their colonisers in 1864 but have retained, to this day, southern Sesotho as their main language. The Lozi derive part of their identity from their Luba–Lunda origin (Gluckman 1951; Mainga 1973). They spoke Luyana before Kololo colonisation (Lubinda 1994). In contrast, the Ngoni of Chipata in Eastern Province of Zambia claim to speak Chingoni; a language which bears extremely limited resemblance to Sizulu or Siswati (Soko 1994; Miti 1996, 2006) despite oral and cultural evidence that their origins lie in Swaziland or Zululand.

  • 10 - Post-European contact glass beads from the southern African interior: a tentative look at trade, consumption and identities

  • from Section 2 - Material Identities
    • By M. Wood, Department of Archaeology University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg 2001
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 183-196

  • Summary

    Introduction

    The glass beads that were traded into the interior of southern Africa in the past five hundred years are the most frequently found imported artefacts in archaeological deposits. They have unfortunately been little studied even though they have the potential to help interpret several aspects of archaeological sites where they are present. These include illuminating trade contacts and routes, determining cultural affiliations and refining site chronology. This study includes a brief introduction about using beads in site interpretation and a discussion and interpretation of bead assemblages from four areas in the interior.

    Glass bead characteristics

    Before discussing the glass beads found in the southern African interior, a few terms used to describe beads should be explained (information from this section was taken from Karklins (1985), and Kidd and Kidd (1970)). Glass beads are first categorised according to their method of manufacture. The methods pertinent to this study include drawing and winding. Drawn beads are made by creating a hollow in a gather (globule) of molten glass either by blowing a bubble into it or perforating it with a tool. (This hollow will remain to form the perforation in the finished bead.) The gather is then drawn or pulled out into a long tube that is next cut into segments the lengths of the desired beads. The resultant segments may then be reheated to round the sharp edges – the length of time this heating process is carried out determines the roundness of each bead. Beads that are not reheated, or are reheated to only a small extent, retain the straight profile of the original tube and are thus called tubes. Beads that are heated until the ends are decidedly rounded but the body retains straight sections are referred to as cylinder, and those reheated to the extent that the entire profile is rounded are known as oblates. Drawn beads may be decorated with stripes or may be composed of more than one layer of glass. Stripes are created by impressing rods of coloured glass on to the exterior of the gather before it is drawn out. Additional layers of glass are made by dipping the gather into molten glass of another colour (or several colours) before being drawn.

  • 2 - Historical archaeologies of southern Africa: precedents and prospects

  • from Section 1 - Disciplinary Identities: Methodological Considerations
    • By J. Behrens, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology University of South Africa Pretoria 0003, N. Swanepoel, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology University of South Africa Pretoria 0003
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 23-40

  • Summary

    Introduction

    The Five Hundred Year Initiative (FYI) has set an important and ambitious agenda: to reinterrogate the last 500 years in order to generate a more comprehensive understanding of modern South Africa(ns) (FYI mission statement 2007). The project has grown, at least in part, from a frustration with the current state of research where a general lack of interdisciplinary vision and co-operation has resulted in the circumscribed use of documentary, oral and material records with an accompanying lack of integration and historical depth. The effort to reconnect these erstwhile disparate sources into a coherent intellectual agenda envisages ‘historical archaeology’ as a capacitating framework. This is perhaps unsurprising. Archaeology has always been a multidisciplinary subject and such tendencies are well pronounced in the field of historical archaeology where inspiration, analytical methods and intellectual vision straddle the traditional limits of a number of disciplines, most obviously history and archaeology.

    The call for a ‘new agenda’ in the (historical) archaeology of southern Africa's last 500 years mandates a rearticulation of traditionally discrete sub-disciplines within archaeology and the forging of new kinds of partnerships and co-operations with sister disciplines, particularly history and anthropology. Local understandings and practice are poised for change in a collective effort that will recontour the landscape of enquiry. At the outset it is perhaps important to note that such collaborative endeavours do not require the surrender of specific strengths, only a more expansive and contemplative intellectual positioning. Historical archaeological practitioners typically must navigate between and within different kinds of sources, including written and oral accounts and pictorial representations, but we remain ultimately grounded in the materiality of primary source materials that encompass cultural landscapes, the built environment, spatial organisation, artefacts, ecofacts, and the ways in which these change over space and through time (Hicks 2003: 315). Archaeology does not, therefore, play a supplementary role in the larger project of ‘history’. Indeed, as Sarah Tarlow (2007) has pointed out, the study of the material world has as much to offer to understandings of the past as a study of texts – a fact admirably demonstrated by generations of architectural and art historians (who, after all, are seldom moved to justify their enquiries).

  • 9 - The Mpumalanga Escarpment settlements: some answers, many questions

  • from Section 2 - Material Identities
    • By T. Maggs, Department of Archaeology University of Cape Town Rondebosch 7701
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 169-182

  • Summary

    Introduction

    A dense area of precolonial stone ruins extends in a broad band along the escarpment which separates Lowveld from Highveld in Mpumalanga Province (formerly the eastern Transvaal). Although these ruins have been known archaeologically for many decades they have received relatively little sustained attention. The intention of this paper is therefore to draw attention to the enormous research potential of these settlements, and to propose some as yet untried lines of enquiry that could be followed in future projects. I have adopted this approach because, on the one hand, these settlements arguably provide the most detailed and interesting archaeological footprint of any precolonial farming society in South Africa, and on the other, they have seen surprisingly little serious research. In view of the current renewed interest in the period of the last 500 years, with its multidisciplinary initiative, now is an appropriate moment for a reassessment.

    The paper consists of three components. The first is a summary of the existing published information which provides a broad, though rather shallow, context for these settlements. The second allows me to place on record some bits of previously unpublished work arising out of my own interest in the area over several decades, though never amounting to a full research project. These two provide the ‘some answers’ of the title. Arising out of them I put forward some ideas towards a different framework of interpretation, which poses possible questions for future research. Hence the answers before the questions, as signalled in the title.

    What to call these settlements?

    In his thesis, Collett (1982) proposed the name Marateng for the style of pottery associated with these settlements. Marateng is the local name for a mountain in the Badfontein area and is therefore entirely appropriate. I therefore adopted it for my work on the Mpumalanga Escarpment sites, extending its usage to cover not just the ceramics but the whole cultural package including the buildings. Used in this sense, Marateng is already in the literature (e.g. Maggs 1995b; Widgren 2004). However, at the 500 Year Research Group conference in May 2007 I became aware that the almost identical name, Maroteng, applies to the ruling lineage of the Pedi people.

  • 5 - Metals beyond frontiers: exploring the production, distribution and use of metals in the Free State grasslands, South Africa

  • from Section 1 - Disciplinary Identities: Methodological Considerations
    • By S. Chirikure, Department of Archaeology University of Cape Town Rondebosch 7701, S. Hall, Department of Archaeology University of Cape Town Rondebosch 7701, T. Maggs, Department of Archaeology University of Cape Town Rondebosch 7701
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Phil Bonner, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Book:
    Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008, pp 87-102

  • Summary

    Introduction

    The grasslands of the Free State area (Fig. 5.1) are part of the southern Highveld of South Africa. This region is mainly composed of an elevated grassy plain which inclines smoothly from an elevation of 1 200 metres in the west to over 1 800 metres along its eastern margin (Wilson & Anhaeusser 1998; Maggs 1976; Mucina & Rutherford 2006). The area is roughly delimited by prominent natural features: the Vaal River on the northern and western frontiers, the Drakensberg escarpment at the eastern boundary, with the Caledon Valley and its confluence with the Orange River forming the southern limit (Maggs 1976, 1980). Historical and archaeological work has revealed that various peoples continuously occupied this area in the last 500 years (Arbousset & Daumas 1852; Breutz 1953; Legassick 1969; Maggs 1976; Huffman 2002). Their activities on the landscape left behind clearly defined settlements and items of material culture which enable the reconstruction of their life ways and time of initial occupation in this area (see Maggs 1976).

    So far, the archaeology indicates that the first Iron Age groups settled in this region around the 15th century. Maggs (1976) suggested that these early settlers may have been ancestors of the Sotho-Tswana who radiated from the so-called Bankenveld axis. Recent thinking has, however, added another dimension. Huffman (2007), for instance, has argued for a Nguni identity for the so-called Fokeng peoples. Whatever the case may be, it is clear that this region was an open frontier through which different groups trickled in and out of over time (Maggs 1976; Huffman 2007). This set the stage for the interaction of groups such as the Sotho-Tswana, Nguni, and hunter-gatherers living on the south-western margins.

    When compared to the northern Highveld and the KwaZulu-Natal area, the southern Highveld and in particular the grasslands of the Free State were occupied at a fairly late stage by Iron Age farmers (Huffman 2007; Boeyens 2003; Maggs 1976, 1980). The former have long sequences of Iron Age occupation dating back to the first millennium AD whereas the initial occupation of the Free State grasslands did not take place until the 15th century (Maggs 1976).

Five Hundred Years Rediscovered
  • Southern African Precedents and Prospects
  • Edited by Amanda Esterhuysen, Phil Bonner, Natalie Swanepoel
  • Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    30 May 2019
    Print publication:
    01 August 2008
  • In the age of the African Renaissance, southern Africa has needed to reinterpret the past in fresh and more appropriate ways. The last 500 years represent a strikingly unexplored and misrepresented period which remains disfigured by colonial/apartheid assumptions, most notably in the way that African societies are depicted as fixed, passive, isolated, unenterprising and unenlightened. This period is one the most formative in relation to southern Africa’s past while remaining, in many ways, the least known. Key cultural contours of the subcontinent took shape, while in a jagged and uneven fashion some of the features of modern identities emerged. Enormous internal economic innovation and political experimentation was taking place at the same time as expanding European mercantile forces started to press upon southern African shores and its hinterlands. This suggests that interaction, flux and mixing were a strong feature of the period, rather than the homogeneity and fixity proposed in standard historical and archaeological writings. Five Hundred Years Rediscovered represents the first step, taken by a group of archaeologists and historians, to collectively reframe, revitalise and reexamine the last 500 years. By integrating research and developing transfrontier research networks, the group hopes to challenge thinking about the region’s expanding internal and colonial frontiers, and to broaden current perceptions about southern Africa’s colonial past.

  • Chapter 9 - Ethical considerations in elephant management

  • Edited by Robert J. Scholes, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Kathleen G. Mennell, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
  • Book:
    Elephant Management
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    04 June 2019
    Print publication:
    01 March 2008, pp 406-445

  • Summary

    PURPOSE OF THE CHAPTER

    THE FATE of the half a million or so free-ranging elephants in Africa depends on the choices people will make. What ‘moral standing’ do elephants deserve, and thus what constraints should we impose on our behaviour towards them? These are ethical questions. In general terms, ethics tells us what is good and bad behaviour, which human actions are right or wrong. Usually theories of ethics indicate a range of moral duties we owe to human beings; either generally or to those with whom we have specific relationships. In some cases our ethics also alerts us to duties we have towards non-human living beings or things. Thus, in our ethical theories we attempt to indicate to what extent we should restrain our actions so as to avoid negative impacts on other humans and living beings as well. We also consider what duties or actions we have to perform that will be beneficial and helpful to other people or species.

    To assess the state of our knowledge about ethics and elephants is no easy affair. Different views on the moral standing of elephants and thus the obligations humans owe elephants, are not really a matter of scientific knowledge, although such knowledge might deeply influence our chosen ethics. At stake are human value choices that are developed through argument and discussion into ethical positions that suggest, prescribe, or legislate acceptable behaviour, and proscribe or discourage unacceptable treatment of elephants. The point of this assessment is thus to determine which ethical positions have been developed on various matters concerning the management of elephants and have been justified through reasoning. In open societies the diversity of views that arise about controversial moral issues generates intense debate. Since the early 1990s, world views that were once silent or repressed in South Africa have gained ascendancy and voice. These world views need careful consideration to determine from which to choose our ethical values.

    This chapter portrays the different ethical views relevant to the management of elephants that are present in some or other form in the public domain. In some cases ethical views can be found in detailed academic reports, in other cases ethical views will be reconstructed from other sources, like presentations at public meetings, official documents, and research reports. The emphasis will be on showing the strengths and weaknesses of each view.

  • Chapter 6 - Reproductive control of elephants

  • Edited by Robert J. Scholes, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Kathleen G. Mennell, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
  • Book:
    Elephant Management
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    04 June 2019
    Print publication:
    01 March 2008, pp 257-328

  • Summary

    INTRODUCTION

    CHAPTER 6 deals specifically with fertility control as a possible means of population management of free-ranging African elephants. Because methods that are described here for elephants function by preventing cows from conceiving, fertility control cannot immediately reduce the population. This will only happen once mortality rates exceed birth rates. Considering, however, that elephants given the necessary resources can double their numbers every 15 years, fertility control may have an important role to play in population management.

    The first part of the chapter is devoted to the reproductive physiology of elephants in order to provide the reader with information and understanding which relate to fertility control. This is followed by examples of contraceptive methods that have been used in mammals, and a description of past and ongoing research specifically carried out in elephants. Finally guidelines for a contraception programme are provided, followed by a list of key research issues and gaps in our knowledge of elephants pertaining to reproduction and fertility control.

    In this chapter we will also attempt to answer the following questions in regard to reproductive control of African elephants:

  • • Do antibodies to the porcine zona pellucida (pZP) proteins recognise elephant zona pellucida (eZP) proteins or is the vaccine likely to work in African elephant cows?

  • • Is it possible to implement a contraceptive programme using the pZP vaccine?

  • • Is it practical to implement such a programme?

  • • What contraceptive efficacy can one expect?

  • • Is the method safe, reversible and ethical?

  • • What effect does the implementation have on the behaviour of a population?

  • • What are the effects of contraception on behaviour?

  • • What are the proximate and ultimate effects of contraception?

  • • Given the current technology, what population sizes can be tackled?

  • • What are the costs involved?

  • • Are there alternatives to pZP for contraception of elephants?

  • • What developments are in the pipeline that could facilitate implementation?

    • ASPECTS OF ELEPHANT REPRODUCTION THAT RELATE TO REPRODUCTIVE CONTROL

    Social organization

    Elephants live in female-dominated herds comprising an old female referred to as the matriarch together with her mature daughters and their offspring, including sexually immature male calves (Owen-Smith, 1988). Female elephants remain in their natal herds their whole lives; male elephants leave their natal groups at approximately 12–14 years or when they reach sexual maturity (Poole, 1996a & b).

  • Preface

  • Edited by Robert J. Scholes, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Kathleen G. Mennell, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
  • Book:
    Elephant Management
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    04 June 2019
    Print publication:
    01 March 2008, pp xxx-xxxvi

  • Summary

    AS A CONSEQUENCE of the rising number of elephants in protected areas in South Africa, the ecosystems that contain elephants and the people that live adjacent to elephant populations are perceived to be coming under increasing threat. The control of elephant populations by culling has been under a moratorium since the mid-1990s. Attempts to resolve differences of opinion between the authorities responsible for elephant management in the country, private elephant owners, animal rights and biodiversity conservation organisations in South Africa and abroad, and representatives of local communities, have to date not led to a widely agreed future course of action. In 2006, the Minister for Environment Affairs and Tourism convened a Science Round Table to advise on the issue. The Round Table recommended that a Scientific Assessment of Elephant Management be undertaken.

    This book is the result of that Assessment, undertaken during 2007, on the authority of the Minister. The Assessment is the first activity in a proposed elephant research programme, which aims to reduce the uncertainties regarding the consequences of various elephant management strategies. The purpose of this Assessment is to:

  • • document what is known, unknown, and disputed on the topic of elephant–ecosystem–human interactions in South Africa

  • • synthesise and communicate the information in such a way that decision making and the reaching of social consensus is facilitated.

    • Note that the Assessment itself does not constitute policy at any level, although it is hoped that it is relevant to the process of policy making at all levels, from the individual protected area through provincial, local, national, regional and international policy.

    The Assessment of South African Elephant Management focuses on the interactions between elephants, humans and the ecosystems in which they occur and, in particular, on the possible way elephants could be managed based on their ecology, biology and social significance.

    The Assessment addresses more-or-less wild elephants of the species Loxodonta africana, in South Africa. Some of these elephant populations are shared with neighbouring countries. Elephants in captive environments, as defined by the Norms and Standards (DEAT, 2008), are not discussed – that is, elephants that require intensive human intervention in the form of food, water, artificial housing and veterinary care, and which are kept in an area of less than 2000 ha designed to prevent escape.

  • Chapter 11 - National and international law

  • Edited by Robert J. Scholes, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Kathleen G. Mennell, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
  • Book:
    Elephant Management
    Published by:
    Wits University Press
    Published online:
    04 June 2019
    Print publication:
    01 March 2008, pp 477-536

  • Summary

    PREFACE

    THIS CHAPTER provides a synopsis of the law relevant to elephant management in South Africa. The authors provide an assessment of the law as a subset of the broader enquiry undertaken in the Assessment of Elephant Management in South Africa (‘the Assessment’), and in so doing, highlight shortcomings that impact on the efficacy of elephant management practices and strategies.

    The Assessment is intended to inform the Authorising Body (policy makers) by way of the provision of high level expert advice in order to develop policy and law to regulate the management of elephants in all of its facets in South Africa. This chapter assesses the current status of elephant-related law in order to assist management and limit the risks associated with policy formulation or promulgation of legislation and regulations.

    In making policy decisions, the Authorising Body is often presented with differing interpretations of the law that appear to present options or alternative approaches. This chapter is intended to help policy makers act in accordance with the law, or where the law is seen to be lacking, they are given a sound legal basis for departing from conventional approaches or are able to consider legislative intervention. The authors accordingly base their conclusions on judicial interpretations of the law, state the law as it is generally accepted to be, and indicate where compliance is mandatory. The opinions of the authors have been clearly distinguished from statements of existing law.

    THE AUTHORS’ RESPONSE TO THE BRIEF

    In giving effect to the requirements of the Assessment, the authors have adopted the following approach:

    Methodology

    An accurate statement of the law is provided. This is based on conventional legal principles and is as far as possible free of the authors’ personal opinions or analyses, except where this is required by the context. Where reference is made to legal texts, the wording of the relevant statute or court judgement is used as far as practicable. Paraphrasing that may lose the import of the statements made is avoided unless the syntax otherwise requires.

    The authors provide a summary of their conclusions and analysis of the law (strengths and weaknesses) in so far as it relates to elephant management and wildlife management generally. The conclusions of the authors are presented in such a way as to ensure that these are distinguishable from the legal texts themselves.

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