HOTTENTOTS, hot'en-tots, an African race, the aboriginal occupants of the south end of that continent, near the Cape of Good Hope.
The name now given to the whole race was that of the tribe in the immediate vicinity of the Cape of Good Hope, with which the Dutch settlers first became acquainted. The origin of the name is unknown. They are, when young, of remarkable symmetry; but their faces are ugly, and this ugliness increases with age. The complexion is a pale olive, the cheek-bones project, the chin is narrow and pointed and the face consequently is triangular. The lips are thick, the nose flat, the nostrils wide, the ears large and lobeless, the hair woolly and the beard scanty. The women in early life are often models of proportion, and their gait by no means deficient in grace. Their bloom, how ever, is transient, for, marrying at 12 or 13, after the first child they lose their grace and proportion, and soon become hideous. Both sexes are distinguished by excessive incurvation of the spine. When the Dutch first settled at the Cape the Hottentots were a numerous na tion, and occupied a territory of 100.000 square miles. They had abundance of horned cattle and sheep; and it is supposed that the seven tribes into which they were divided made up to gether a population of over 100,000. At the present day this race is much degenerated and mixed within the wide territory which formerly belonged to it. They may amount to about 50,000. They are believed to be descendants of an ancient cross between the Bantu negroes (who are Hamitic) and the Bushmen. The cranial capacity is little above that of the Bush men, and the yellowish, leathery color also shows relationship. They are short in stature (16.3 centimeters), and many of the women have a tendency to be over fat. They are of a happy-go-lucky, friendly disposition, like many of the plantation negroes of the southern United States. In their native state they wore loin-cloths and a cloak of skin (kaross). The
women added fringed girdles and often a skin cap and were fond of ivory arm-rings. When in full dress they daubed themselves freely with a sooty fat. They raised cattle and lived co the plentiful African game in small villages or kraals. They were not over-fond of work and much given to feasting and dancing. The tri bal government was patriarchal, chiefs beng hereditary, and kraals having each a cant" who was a member of his chief's council. A tax of a portion of the products of the chase belonged to the chief. The councils held court at times, tried cases and disposed of criminals. Murderers were stoned or beaten to death. Adultery was also often punished by death at the hands of the aggrieved husband. Thieves were beaten, starved or banished. Duelling was common, dubs or spears being the weap ons. They evidently imbibed some religious ideas from the East, for they were given to an cestor worship, and oriented their huts and graves. Their language possesses much inter est, and Hottentot grammars have been pub lished in both English and German. They pos sess a great fund of myths and legends. The Koras or Korannas (shoe-wearers), south of the Kalahari Desert, still remain a favorable specimen of the Hottentot race. They are taller, stronger and more cleanly than some of the other tribes. Most of them possess cattle; those who do not soon degenerate into Bush men. On the eastern frontier of the colony are still some remnants of the Gona or Gonaqua tribe; but they have nowhere pre served their ancient usages and purity of blood, but are much mixed with the Amakosa Kafirs. The Namas, who are the purest type of Hot tentots now existing, dwell in Namaqualand, in German Southwest Africa. The Namas are a pastoral people, almost exclusively. Many of them have been Christianized. Consult Stow, 'Native Races of South Africa' (1907); 'South African Natives' (1900).