Paternoster Midden is a megamidden on the west coast of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

. This megamidden has particular value, as it is one of the few megamiddens in existence that has such a rich and diverse faunal and artefactual content.

Significance

Most of the shell middens along the west coast of the

Western Cape The Western Cape is a province of South Africa, situated on the south-western coast of the country. It is the fourth largest of the nine provinces with an area of , and the third most populous, with an estimated 7 million inhabitants in 2020 ...

are small in size, and their content consists mainly of large amounts of marine shells and only very modest amounts of fauna vertebrae and artefactual remains such as

ostrich Ostriches are large flightless birds of the genus ''Struthio'' in the order Struthioniformes, part of the infra-class Palaeognathae, a diverse group of flightless birds also known as ratites that includes the emus, rheas, and kiwis. There ...

eggshell beads. Several middens have been found at Paternoster. One of these midden sites is known as PNNA, and is now referred to as "Paternoster Midden". This is a megamidden, with a unique content compared to other middens on the same coast. Paternoster Midden is a large site, long and wide. It contains a large percentage of faunal remains made up of small animals such as tortoises, marine birds, snakes, and Cape fur seals, as well as small and large bovids, such as steenbok, grysbok, eland, buffalo and even an extra-large bovid with elephant remains. The megamidden also contains cultural items which are rarely found in middens; ostrich eggshell beads (OES) are among the most notable of these finds. Other cultural items found were stone artefacts and unworked OES fragments that are likely to be the remnants of food or water containers.

Provincial heritage site

Paternoster Midden was declared a provincial heritage site by

Heritage Western Cape Heritage Western Cape (HWC) is a provincial heritage resources authority established by the Minister of Cultural Affairs and Sport of the government of the Western Cape province in South Africa. It is a public entity set up under the terms of ...

on 9 April 2009, in terms of Section 27 of the National Heritage Resources Act.SHARA site finds. http://www.sahra.org.za/sites/pnna This gives the site Grade II status, and provides the site with protection under South African heritage law.

Mussel Point Mussel Point also known as Mike Taylor's Midden (MTM) is possibly the largest of 13 megamiddens found along the South African West Coast. MTM is the only open site with remains from the early pottery period (3000 and 2000 years before present) in ...

is another megamidden that has recently been declared a provincial heritage site.

References

{{Reflist Protected areas of South Africa Archaeological sites in South Africa Buildings and structures in the Western Cape Shell middens Archaeological sites of Southern Africa