The ancient village of Limpopo

If you are over landing from Johannesburg to Limpopo, the first town you will come across is the capital city of the province, Polokwane, I have never seen a city as unpleasing to the eye as this one. In terms of being unclean, it competes with downtown Joburg. Fortunately, you don’t have to look hard or too far to find beautiful and interesting places. One such place is Bakone Malapa, an ancient village that has been remodeled into an open-air museum.

Gertrude the rock-star

I had the pleasure of being guided around the village by a rock-star of a woman named Gertrude Kgwale. She took me through the history of the Pedi people, particularly those of the Matlala tribe. It was this tribe that occupied the village over two-hundred-years ago. Their totem was Bakone Malapa, hence the name of the museum.

Mam’ Gertrude was so amazing. I found her storytelling reverting.

The tools of the ancient ones

Before Gertrude took me around the village, she showed me some ancient cooking utensils and other tools that were used by the Bakone Malapa people in the olden days. These included clay pots which were mostly used to cook porridge, fetch water, store milk or traditional beer.

For me this bit wasn’t necessarily mind-blowing — we still use clay pots in the remote areas of South Africa — for drinking mqombothi ( African traditional beer) during traditional ceremonies.

Colorful cow dung pots

What was new to me though, was the cow dung pot that comes in all shapes, sizes and stunning colour patterns. This kind of pot was used to store seeds and morogo (dried spinach). After it was stuffed with these goodies, the Matlala people would then dig a hole in the middle of the kraal and bury these pots to preserve the food.

Gertrude Matlala carrying a morogo pot

A basket fit for kings and queens

Gertrude showed me two massive grass baskets. These baskets store grains, the bigger ones double up as coffins to bury kings, queens and rich people of the village.

Burial baskets.

Modern and ancient village

The modern village is one that has corrugated roofs, windows and many other foreign features that the villagers adopted from the westerners upon their arrival in Africa. In this homestead, I saw a lone plant (bushmen poison) situated right at the corner of the mud fencing. This plant connects the Bakone to their ancestors, than then pass their messages to their God.

A modern (rural style) flat reserved for guests.

A traditional African hut.

Ancestral worship spot

The man cave

In the olden days men and women didn’t hang out together as we do today. Men spent their days in lapas crafting wooden stools, weaving winnowing baskets (a traditional sieve). Perhaps, their favourite past time was making weapons out of the horns of the animals they hunted, like the gemsbok and kudu. They also fashioned various clothing items out of animal skin. Only the king could wear a hat made of animal skin.

I couldn’t resist but to step into the king’s shoes.

The ancient village

The ancient village is not like anything I’ve ever seen. The structures are incredibly small, the doors are mere holes that would force you to wiggle in undignified ways to get in. Gertrude tells me that the purpose of making the doors small was to protect the dwellers from lions. It also gave them an upper hand against their enemies.

One of the huts had three doors, a home for the queen of the village. She slept in the middle and her guards slept on the sides.

A hut with three doors. The guards slept on the side doors.

A secluded hut built for a young woman who fell pregnant out of wedlock.