indigenous African societies, European, and Asian. To understand indigenous African cuisine, it is important to understand the various native peoples of southern Africa. The indigenous Africans of Southern Africa were roughly divided into two groups and several subgroups. The largest group consisted of the Bantu-speakers, whose descendants today may identify themselves by various subgroup names such as Ndebele (northern and southern), Shona, Venda, Zulu, Xhosa, Swazi, Sotho, Tswana, Pedi and Tsonga. They arrived in the region around 2,000 years ago, bringing crop cultivation, animal husbandry, and iron toolmaking with them. Hence the Bantu-speakers grew grain crops extensively and raised cattle, sheep and goats. They also grew and continue to grow pumpkins, beans, and leafy greens as vegetables. A smaller group were the primeval residents of the region, the Khoisan, who some archaeologists believe had lived in the region for at least 10,000 years. Many descendants of the Khoisan people have now been incorporated into the population of South Africa. The Khoisan originally were hunter-gatherers (who came to be known as "San" by the Bantu-speakers and as "bushmen" by Europeans). After the arrival of the Bantu-speakers, however, some Khoisan adopted the Bantu-speakers' raising of cattle but did not grow crops. The Khoisan who raised cattle called themselves "Khoi-Khoi" and came to be known by Europeans as "Hottentots." People were, in other words, defined to some extent by the kinds of food they ate. The Bantu-speakers ate dishes of grain, meat, milk and vegetables, as well as fermented grain and fermented milk products. While the Khoi-Khoi ate meat and milk and the San hunted wild animals and gathered wild tubers and vegetables. In many ways, the daily food of native South African families can be traced to the indigenous foods that their native African ancestors ate. The Khoisan and Bantu traditionally ate roasted meat, and they also dried meat for later use. The influence of their diet is reflected in the universal Southern African love of barbecue (generally called in South Africa by its Afrikaans name, a "braai") and biltong (dried preserved meat). The traditional beer was ubiquitous in the southern African diet, and the fermentation added additional nutrients to the diet. It was a traditional obligation for any family to be able to offer a visitor copious amounts of beer. Beer brewing was done by women, and the status of a housewife in pre-colonial southern Africa depended significantly on her skill