History and language enthusiasts from various universities recently gathered at the University of Pretoria’s (UP) Hatfield Campus to celebrate the Ancestral Voices Project – a treasure trove of indigenous manuscripts describing various South African histories, traditions and ways of life.

The project is an enormous, collaborative undertaking by the Special Collections Unit at UP’s Department of Library Services, South African Heritage Publishers, the Department of Sport, Arts, and Culture in Limpopo, the South African National Lexicography Units and the South African High Commission to the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland. It involves transcribing and translating of over 800 manuscripts of the Van Warmelo Collection, a large collection of indigenous histories, traditions and culture.

“Although the Van Warmelo collection was donated to the University of Pretoria Library in 1989, it is still a little-known collection, which has only really been accessible to researchers fluent in the languages represented in the collection,” said Department of Library Services Coordinator for Special Collections, Nikki Haw. “Thanks to the translation work being done by SA Heritage Publishers, the treasure trove of traditional information preserved in this collection is being uncovered, showcased, and made more widely accessible.”  

“It is impossible to overstate the significance of this collection. Recorded South African history is overwhelmingly white and colonialist, and this collection goes some way to correct this imbalance,” Haw said.

Professor Themba Mosia, UP Vice-Principal, gave the keynote address to a gathering of history and language enthusiasts from various universities at the at the celebration of the Ancestral Voices Project.

The Ancestral Voices Project is a long-term project aimed at strengthening and preserving South Africa’s official indigenous languages and cultures by making local histories known, understood and appreciated. Among other things, this is being done through the translation of the indigenous language writings into current orthography. These texts will then be translated into English to make the information accessible to people with different mother tongues. The content will then be published in a way that will allow its use in language, social and history studies with the hope it contributes towards creating a more multilingual and culturally aware society.

History of many rural areas and villages featured in collection

Beyond this, the project seeks to trace descendants of the authors to establish their professions, backgrounds, and place of burial to produce brief biographies of them for future generations. In addition, some of the authors will be recommended to the Presidency for acknowledgement and National Orders for their work in preserving the language and heritage of their people.

The Van Warmelo Collection has 891 indigenous language writings, written between the late 1920s and the 1950s by 186 authors on 19 000 typewriter-written A4 pages, containing an estimated six million words. The collection was digitised between 2020 and 2022 and made available to UP researchers after SA Heritage Publishers processed and scanned the original documents. 

The collection is considered to be an important, unique and national heritage treasure because, currently, no other collection of heritage writings in South Africa’s official indigenous languages of this age, scope, and scale, by mother tongue speakers, exists. For the first time in the country’s history, speakers of official indigenous languages will be able to read about the history and cultural practices of their people in their mother tongue, recorded by their ancestors. The history of many rural areas and their villages is included in these works which will allow young learners and readers of all ages to read about the history of their own home areas and villages.

As there are 186 different authors, and the early focus of work has been on establishing the scale of the project as well as doing transcriptions and translations, only a small number of descendants have been traced so far. The majority of authors were teachers, ministers of religion, often both, or traditional leaders. Many were the first among their people to be literate in their mother tongue.