| 3 000 000 BP |
(Before Present, calculated backwards from the date AD 1950) |
The discovery of the oldest complete fossilised hominid or human-like skeleton in South Africa, announced on 9 December 1998, proves that Australopithecus africanus roamed the area much further back than was estimated before. The skeleton has been dated at between 3.22 and 3.58 million years old by the Geomagnetism Laboratory at the University of Liverpool.  |
| 2 000 000 BP |
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The skull of 'Mrs Ples' and the Sts 14 skeleton, belonging to the species Australopithecus africanus and discovered at the Sterkfontein Caves in 1947, indicate that distant relatives of mankind inhabited the area at the time. The age of the fossils are estimated to be 2.6 to 2.8 million years. These fossils support the theory that mankind evolved from Africa. |
| 15 000 BP |
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Dated rock paintings reveal that San hunter-gatherers are widely distributed in Southern Africa. |
| 2200 BP |
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It is estimated that some San groups in present-day northern Botswana acquire domesticated livestock. They move south, and their new socio-economic order leads them to be anthropologically described as Khoikhoi hunter-herders. |
| c. AD 200 |
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Farming communities acquainted with the use of iron, and regarded as the forebears of Bantu-speaking people, establish themselves south of what becomes known as the Limpopo River.
Start of the southern African Iron Age period. |
| c. AD 500 |
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Early Iron Age people develop a new form of pottery. This form is best represented in pottery fragments that have been assembled and subsequently become known as the Lydenburg Heads. |
| c. AD 600 |
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Iron Age people settle along the south-eastern seaboard as far as Mpame, in the region later to be known as the Transkei. |
| c. AD 600 |
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Beginnings of the Late Iron Age in the southern Africa region lead to a greater concentration of settlement on the central Highveld of Southern Africa. |
| c. AD 800 – 1400 |
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Larger farming communities of the Iron Age settle in the Limpopo River area. |
| c. 1030 |
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Kingdom of Mapungubwe. The Southern Terrace below Mapungubwe hilltop is inhabited from around AD 1030 to 1290. |
| c. 1220 |
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The Mapungubwe hilltop is inhabited for about 70 years from AD 1220 to 1290. |
| c. 1300 – c. 1500 |
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The Highveld interior becomes populated by political entities speaking SeSotho-SeTswana.
Nguni-speaking communities settle along the south-eastern seaboard and in the Drakensberg interior.
The Khoisan are established as the dominant power in the southern and south-western Cape regions. |
| 1460 |
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Portuguese navigators, representing the interests of the Portuguese Royal House and merchants eager to find a sea-route to India around the south coast of Africa, reach the coast of Guinea, West Africa. |
| 1483 |
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Diogo Câo, a navigator acting under the instruction of the Portuguese King John II, reaches the mouth of the Congo River. |
| 1485 |
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Câo puts ashore at Cape Cross, north of present-day Walvis Bay. |
| 1487 |
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The Portuguese explorer Batholemeu Dias sails down the coast to reach southern Angola. He later lands at present-day Walvis Bay and soon after at Lüderitz Bay. |
| 1488 |
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Dias succeeds in circumnavigating the Cape, naming it “Cabo de Bõa Esperança” or the Cape of Good Hope. This is a major breakthrough in the search for discovering a sea-route to India. |
| 1495 |
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With the ascension of Manuel I to the Portuguese throne, the Royal House of Portugal strengthens its support of the scientific maritime investigation into finding a sea trade route to India. |
| 1497 |
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Vasco da Gama is mandated to expand on Dias' discoveries. Da Gama departs from Targus on 8 July 1497, heading an expedition consisting of two ships, São Rafael and São Gabriel . They sail along the southern African coast on the way to India.
They put foot on South African soil for the first time on 8 November at present-day St. Helena Bay on the west coast and encounter the first Khoi-Khoi. Da Gama gives the following description of them in his diary: ‘ The inhabitants of this country are tawny-coloured. Their food is confined to the flesh of seals, whales and gazelles, and the roots of herbs. They are dressed in skins, and wear sheaths over their virile members. They are armed with poles of olive wood to which a horn, browned in the fire, is attached … '
Further east Da Gama and his crew sight the Natal coast on Christmas Day and name it “Terra do Natal”, which is Portuguese for “Land of Birth” (Christmas). |
| 1498 |
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Da Gama reaches the mouth of the Limpopo River during the first weeks and lands 85km north of it, where he meets the first Black people, probably a Tsonga society living north of the Limpopo. Next, he goes ashore at the northern branch of the Zambezi delta, where he encounters Moslems. He crosses the Indian Ocean with the help of the famous Arabian pilot, Ahmad ibn-Mayid, and reaches India via the Cape of Malabar, thereby establishing the Portuguese monopoly of the sea trade route to India.
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