The opinion which was formerly held, that the Bushmen were only degenerate Hottentots forced by poverty to become robbers, must be set aside as erroneous; though it is true that some scattered Hottentots or Caffirs have united with the Bushmen and have been compelled to lead a similar life.
Tribal Divisions. —The Bushmen are divided into many individual tribes, all of which figure among the Hottentots by the common name of son or sagua, both plurals of the masculine singular comprising both men and women, and sagua, which is an emphatic form, only the men. The form gua or qua is generally used to designate individual tribes, as Nama-qua, Gona-qna, etc. The Ubiqua and Susaqua men tioned by early authors are Bushmen, and the names Sonqua or Soaqua are equivalent to Saqua (sagua), which term we frequently find applied to the hordes of the Bushmen. Kolbe, the first German describer of the Cape (about the year 1700), relates of these Sonqua, whom he mentions as a single tribe living on the Broad (Breede) River, that they are brave soldiers who serve everywhere as mercenaries, and that they also possess some stock, which they kill only with great reluctance.
Livingstone found tribes of Bushmen on the Chobe River (a tributary of the Zambesi north of Lake Ngami) who were a large, dark-brown, cheerful people in good circumstances. Furthermore, the name mu probably meant originally only "the dwelling," sedentary people. Hence we come to the conclusion that the Bushmen originally occupied a higher rank than at present—that they were a courageous hunting people, who at some places had attained possession of herds and were established settlers, until they gradually succumbed under unfavorable circumstances. The individual tribes of the Bushmen speak unlike languages, thought their deviations may have been originally only of a dialectic kind. This phe nomenon is easily explained by the complete separation of the tribes.
The Hottentots were formerly divided into very many tribes: for instance, the Goring (Caepmanns), the the Cochoquo, Grigriqua, from the Cape northward; still farther north along the western coast the Lift/a Xama horde; more to the interior and west of the Lilt lc .Vainaqua (Nama and Namaqua are plural forms) the Grew/ JVamaqua, to Nrhom belong the Bundek.warts, the Orlam, and (the most northern) the Tiq5 naar; to the south the Hessaqua, and the Jnqua (Heikom) as far as Algoa Bay. Still farther to the east were the powerful Gonaqua, of whom but
few remains are left on account of their fierce wars with the Caffirs; in the interior, among many other tribes, the Griqua. The present Griqua have only retained an ancient name; they are a mixture of Hottentots, whites, Negroes, Caffirs, etc., and were formerly called Bastaards. They now live much farther to the west on the !Gariep and Vaal Rivers. The Orlam, who migrated from the south to the north-west in the beginning of this century, and who became very troublesome to the Topnaar by their hos tile encroachments, are also a mixed tribe of the Namaqua and elements of Cape Colony, but they have retained their language and more of their nationality than the Bastaard-Griqua. The Nana and the Korana or Koraqua on the middle !Gariep, and more to the north (sing. masc., !Kora-p, plur. !Kora-n, or !Kora-qu, !Kora-qua), are the only other pure Hottentots, but both are unmixed only where they have not come in contact with the whites or with Bantu nations.
Pkysiail Characteristics: the beginning of the last cen tury the Hottentots were described by travellers as middle-sized or large —from five to six feet tall, according to Kolbe, who saw thousands of them. The now extinct Cochoqua of Saldanha Bay were formerly, and the Griqua and other mixed races are at present, mentioned as extraordi narily large; the rest are now generally less than middle-sized, the men sometimes even below 16o centimetres (63 inches), the women below 140 centimetres (55 inches). The Bushmen are particularly small, their height going as low as 125 centimetres (49.2 inches, Barrow), but on an average attaining 140 centimetres (55 inches). In proportion, the men are even smaller than the women.
figure is by no means good. The pelvis is narrow and much curved toward the front, and in consequence the spinal column is deeply bent in (pl. 82, fig. 7), and the hips do not project at the sides. As the lower ribs are frequently drawn up by a development of the belly, the rump presents an oblong-square, clumsy appearance. The muscles are but poorly developed, and consequently the limbs are thin and the joints prominent.