A possible later stone age painting of a dicynodont (Synapsida) from the South African Karoo

Abstract

The Horned Serpent panel at La Belle France (Free State Province, South Africa) was painted by the San at least two hundred years ago. It pictures, among many other elements, a tusked animal with a head that resembles that of a dicynodont, the fossils of which are abundant and conspicuous in the Karoo Basin. This picture also seemingly relates to a local San myth about large animals that once roamed southern Africa and are now extinct. This suggests the existence of a San geomyth about dicynodonts. Here, the La Belle France site has been visited, the existence of the painted tusked animal is confirmed, and the presence of tetrapod fossils in its immediate vicinity is supported. Altogether, they suggest a case of indigenous palaeontology. The painting is dated between 1821 and 1835, or older, making it at least ten years older than the formal scientific description of the first dicynodont, Dicynodon lacerticeps, in 1845. The painting of a dicynodont by the San would also suggest that they integrated (at least some) fossils into their belief system.