24 Sep Welgevonden: A Heritage story

Before fences and farming Welgevonden, like the rest of the Waterberg, was Wilderness.

San rock art on the Reserve tells the story of the hunter-gatherers that once lived here in the stone age, but the regions habitation by early hominids can be traced back more than a million years. San rock art is tightly liked to shamanism and accessing the spiritual realm, the paintings themselves

The Waterberg was once the center of elephant country (© Tshwene Lodge)

depict healing, rainmaking, control of animal movements and more. The animals the Waterberg San iconically painted, such as elephant, rhino, kudu, eland and giraffe can be seen at the two rock art sites on the Reserve – a reflection of the natural life abounding at the time.

For thousands of years the San continued to live off the land taking only what they need, their stories told on faces of rock. With the onset of the iron age the San were eventually displaced by early Sotho-Tswana searching for iron ore, which along with an increase in rainfall about 1000 years ago created suitable farming conditions encouraging the subsistence farming Sotho-Tswana to move from the low lying areas into the Waterberg. As their herds of cattle grew bigger the sourveld proved too much for them and they retreated back to the lowlands. Recognising the spiritual portals painted by the San, the herders added their rock art to the San paintings in their own fingerpainting style begging for fertility and rain. These layers can also be seen at the Welgevonden rock art sites.

Fine-line San rock art left thousands of years ago line the rock walls at a painting site in the Taaibos valley.

It was only much later that modern humans came to the Waterberg initially driven by hunting and cattle ranching. An area of infinite contrasts, where rugged hills met sandy plains and broadleafed woodland interlaced with patchwork open grassland, the tapestried landscape provided sanctuary to a riot of diversity. When European travellers made their way into the area in the 1800s the Sotho speaking Tswana were well established, living in relative stability for centuries. As the Zulu king Shaka began pushing his armies north the Tswana became displaced, while simultaneously the British reclaimed the Cape pushing the farming community of expatriate Dutch into the interior. These “Afrikaners” began their Groot Trek, looking for independent lands braving the unchartered country in oxcarts and covered wagons. Upon arriving in the north, the followers scattered thinly across the Waterberg in the center of elephant country where ivory was the main source of income for the community.

Once all the elephant had been shot out the community resorted to farming to try and eke out a living. But the scenic allure of the area brought sport hunters to the area who plundered the diverse landscapes from which larger game populations never recovered.

By returning game to their previous rangelands, the wild heritage of the Waterberg was restored and preserved.

Not much changed in the Waterberg for awhile. At the turn of the century war between the British and the Afrikaner states (the Boers) broke out ending with the Boers facing defeat in the early 1900s, but functionally the land use for hunting and farming persisted with the last lion killed in the Waterberg in 1936.

As decades passed conservationists began to recognize the value of these “wild lands” and moved to preserve and protect it. Welgevonden Game Reserve was a vision of Pienkes du Plessis in 1987. As the original owner of the farm Welgevonden, he dreamed of returning the land to its previous wild state where game abounded freely. He envisaged extending the area by acquiring neighbouring farmland and establishing a nature conservancy where the land could be rehabilitated back to wilderness. In 1993 Rand Merchant Bank supported the development initiative of the, at the time 26 000 hectare, reserve.

As the wildlife was restored to their previous rangelands, a wilderness was reborn secluded in a landscape of haunting mountains and plentiful sweet waters. The sense of wilderness remains today with the sparsely populated area carrying with it a sense of mystery, the mountains beckoning to travellers to come and explore. The absence of human presence is notable when looking up at the Southern night sky, the same skies the San slept under telling tales on rock walls, these skies still untouched by the lights of modern life. It is in our rocks, and our waters and our skies that our heritage is preserved.

Renowned naturalist Eugene Marais so succinctly wrote of the Waterberg “The beauty and profusion of nature, which everyday we had to admire anew, simply cannot be described. Especially in these mountains nature exhibited all her treasures. Such a wealth of plants, so many birds of every kind, gathered within such limits I had never before seen equalled.”