The untold history of palaeontology
- Wits University
A new book, The untold History and Prehistory of African Indigenous Palaeontology, will be launched at 11am on Tue, 14 October 2025 at the Wits Origins Centre.
The book explores the deep-seated knowledge of palaeosciences amongst indigenous people of various African countries.
"This book is distinctive because it documents striking cases of awareness of fossils by local populations since the dawn of humankind and up until precolonial times, and how fossils were interpreted back then," says Prof. Julien Benoit, one of the authors of the book. “Some fossils inspired folklore, tales and legends, whilst others were used for medicine, storytelling, tool making, and aesthetic purposes. In some fascinating cases, fossils were better interpreted by local African people than by contemporary scientists in Europe.
Each chapter reports a case of indigenous knowledge from a different part of Africa, organised in chronological order.
The book is authored by Prof. Julien Benoit, Dr Cameron Penn-Clarke and Dr Charles Helm, and is beautifully illustrated by Sophie Vrard.
Julien Benoit is an Associate Professor in palaeontology at the Evolutionary Studies Institute based at Wits, where he studies the evolution of the mammalian nervous system and that of their ancestors, the Permo-Triassic therapsids. With Drs. Penn-Clarke and Helm, he co-created the field of study of the history of African Indigenous Palaeontology.
Dr Cameron Penn-Clarke is a senior researcher in sedimentology, stratigraphy and palaeontology at the Evolutionary Studies Institute. He has specialist interests in the evolution of Early-Middle Palaeozoic environments and ecosystems of West Gondwana in addition to brachiopod palaeobiology, palaeobiogeography and indigenous palaeontology.
Dr Charles Helm is an ichnologist (a palaeontologist who specialises in tracks and traces) and a family physician, with an interest in indigenous palaeontology. He is a Research Associate with the African Centre for Coastal Palaeoscience at Nelson Mandela University and lives in Canada.
Holder of two Masters degrees in biological sciences, Sophie Vrard is passionate about her work in nature conservation. She is also an accomplished artist. In between saving endangered species, she illustrates scientific papers and books.
The book can be ordered online.