aDNA of prehistoric cattle in southern Africa

This application seeks permission to sample cattle teeth from the archaeological Zulu royal amakhanda, uMgungundlovu, and KwaBulawayo for ancient DNA analysis. These cattle derived from herds that belonged to local Zulu people who resided at the royal amakhanda. In the longer term, if we extract intact DNA from these historic sites, we may be able to extend this project into the deeper past, exploring the genetic relationships between cattle kept by different cultural groups and urban centres in deeper time of southern Africa.