tional character. He is more than a workman, he is the ngaka ea tsepe,the
doctor of iron."35Casalis described and illustrated the Sotho blacksmith's
techniques and his products: spears, hatchets, two-edged knives, hoes,
awls, and spatulas.V
Outcrops of iron were spread unevenly in Southern Africa, however.
There were gaps in their incidence in the areas occupied by Bantu-speaking
farmers-for
example, toward the southern end of the territory of the
Nguni-speaking people. Iron was thus a major trade commodity. Most
farmers managed to possess iron-tipped spears, but some were obliged to
use wooden digging tools.
Copper, too, was available on and near the surface in numerous lo-
calities in northern Botswana and the northern Transvaal. The people
exploited this resource extensively. At Lolwe Hill in the northern Trans-
vaal, "It has been estimated that over the centuries more than 10,000
tons
of rock containing the ores were dug from its shafts and galleries, to be
smelted in the myriad furnaces of the surrounding plain."37 Throughout
the region-and
indeed throughout all of tropical Africa to the north-
copper was in great demand. People used it almost exclusively for deco-
rative purposes. "Copper adorned the body from head to foot and laterally