AAfrican Knowledge Atlas

Bakgalagadi

The first Sotho-Tswana speakers in the Kalahari — pushed into the desert by later arrivals, made clients of the Tswana states, and now caught between their own land claims and the eviction of the San from the Central Kalahari reserve they share.

IdentityClans & SectionsGalleryCultureGreetings & TableMedicine & DivinationKingdoms & WarSculpture & EpicStoriesProverbsMythologyGods & GoddessesSuperstitionsMusicArchitectureArtifactsMigrationTrade & IndustryTimelineWatchSources

Identity

Population: Around 50,000–100,000 in Botswana, with communities in South Africa and Namibia

Location: The Kgalagadi district and the Central Kalahari — Kang, Hukuntsi, Tshane and the reserve's margins

Language: Shekgalagadi, with several dialects; Setswana widely used

Language family: Niger-Congo → Bantu (S30, Sotho-Tswana)

Traditional governance: Historically clients (malata) of Tswana chiefdoms without their own recognised paramountcy; sub-chiefs under the Tswana system; Botswanan district administration today.

Clans, Sections & Sub-groups (3)

Most African peoples are federations of named sub-groups — clans, sections, chiefdoms or sub-tribes — each with its own dialect, territory and traditions.

Bangologa and Bakgwatheng

Major western and central divisions.

Baphaleng and Bashaga

Further divisions with distinct dialects.

Central Kalahari communities

Households sharing the reserve with San communities and affected by the same evictions.

Culture

Clothing: Skins and cloth historically; Western dress today; ceremonial dress at chiefly and initiation occasions.

Food: Sorghum and maize where rain allows, goats and cattle, melons, wild tubers and hunted game; water is the constraint on everything.

Ceremonies: Initiation ceremonies for boys and girls; rain-calling; funerals; the kgotla assembly at which disputes are heard in public.

Marriage customs: Bridewealth in cattle and goats; patrilineal descent; historically constrained by client status within the Tswana system.

Initiation rites: Bogwera and bojale initiation in the Sotho-Tswana pattern, with seclusion, instruction and public return.

Stories & Oral Literature

First In, Last RecognisedHistorical account

Bakgalagadi were the earliest Sotho-Tswana speakers in what is now Botswana, and were displaced into the drier west by later Tswana arrivals who then made them clients under the malata system, with restricted rights to cattle and land. Independence in 1966 recognised eight Tswana tribes and not the Bakgalagadi, and the campaign for equal standing has run since.

The Reserve CaseLegal account

Bakgalagadi and San residents were removed from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve from 1997 onward, with water supplies cut. In 2006 the High Court ruled the removals unlawful and the residents entitled to return; subsequent litigation over water access followed. Return has been partial, and the dispute over who may live in the reserve continues.

Proverbs

“Water is the chief in the Kalahari.”

The desert's real authority.

“The melon carries the traveller.”

Tsamma melons as water in a waterless country.

“A client's cattle graze on borrowed grass.”

The malata condition.

Mythology & Spiritual Beliefs

Creation: Modimo as the creator; ancestors (badimo) active in family and community affairs; rain-calling through specialists and through the chief.

Beliefs: Ancestor veneration; rain-making; divination with bones; Christianity widespread, with older practice retained.

Ancestors: Ancestral claims to land and water points underpin the community's contemporary legal arguments.

Gods, Goddesses & Spirits

Modimo

The creator of the Sotho-Tswana cosmology

Badimo

The ancestors, consulted in illness and difficulty

Rain powers

Addressed by chiefs and specialists in drought

Architecture

Traditional settlements: Villages at boreholes and pans of pole-and-mud houses with thatch; cattle posts scattered across the sandveld.

Building techniques: Pole and mud with grass thatch; thorn kraals; hand-dug and drilled wells as the settlements' basis.

Village layout: Village around the kgotla assembly ground and the water point; cattle posts dispersed across grazing.

Artifacts

Kgotla assembly ground

Institution

Public space where disputes are heard, shared across Sotho-Tswana societies.

Tsamma melons and water knowledge

Livelihood

Desert water sources known and used across the Kalahari.

Divining bones

Ritual

Sets used for consultation and diagnosis.

Central Kalahari Game Reserve

Heritage site

The reserve at the centre of two decades of litigation over residence.

Historical Timeline

  1. Pre-1600

    Bakgalagadi settle as the earliest Sotho-Tswana speakers in the region.

  2. 1700s–1800s

    Later Tswana arrivals displace them westward and impose client status.

  3. 1966

    Botswana's independence; the constitution recognises eight Tswana tribes and not the Bakgalagadi.

  4. 1997–2002

    Removals from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve.

  5. 2006–present

    High Court rules the removals unlawful; partial return and continuing disputes over water.

Sources & Further Reading

Open sources

Premium & scholarly sources