page_title: Bantu peoples in South Africa
section_title: Historical food acquisition
hierarchical_section_title: Bantu peoples in South Africa / Historical food acquisition
context_page_description: The Indigenous and Black people of South Africa were at times officially called Bantu by the Apartheid regime. The term Bantu is derived from the word for "people" common to many of the Bantu languages. The Oxford Dictionary of South African English describes its contemporary usage in a racial context as "obsolescent and offensive" because of its strong association with white minority rule and their apartheid system. However, Bantu is used without pejorative connotations in other parts of Africa and is still used in South Africa as the group term for the languages South Africans speak.
context_section_description: Food acquisition was primarily limited to types of subsistence agriculture (slash and burn and Intensive subsistence farming), pastoral farming and engaging in hunting. Generally women were responsible for crop agriculture and men went to herd and hunt except for the Tsonga (and partially the Mpondo). Fishing was relatively of little importance. All Bantu-speaking communities commonly had clear separation between women's and men's tasks.
  Essentially they consumed meat (primarily from Nguni cattle, Nguni sheep (Zulu sheep, Pedi sheep, Swazi sheep), pigs/boars and wild game hunts), vegetables, fruits, cattle and sheep milk, water, and grain beer on occasion. They began to eat the staple product of maize mid-18th century (introduced from the Americas by Portuguese in the late 17th century via the East African coast), it became favoured for its productiveness which was more than the grains of South African native grasses. There were a number of taboos regarding the consumption of meat. The well known, no meat of dogs, apes, crocodiles or snakes could be eaten. Likewise taboo was the meat of some birds, like owls, crows and vultures, as well as the flesh of certain totem animals. The mopane worms are traditionally popular amongst the Tswana, Venda, Southern Ndebele, Northern Sotho and Tsonga people, though they have been successfully commercialized.
  South African Bantu language speaking peoples' modern diet is largely still similar to that of their ancestors, but significant difference being in the systems of production and consumption of their food. They do take interest to innovations in foods that come their way while still practicing their very own unique food cuisine popular amongst themselves and those curious alike.
caption: Nguni cattle roaming and resting on a beach, South Africa.
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