{"id":216242,"date":"2025-12-10T10:13:30","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T08:13:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/southern-africa\/lesotho\/lesotho-fossil-science-owes-a-debt-to-indigenous-knowledge-lesotho-missionarys-notes-tell-the-story\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T10:13:30","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T08:13:30","slug":"lesotho-fossil-science-owes-a-debt-to-indigenous-knowledge-lesotho-missionarys-notes-tell-the-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/southern-africa\/lesotho\/lesotho-fossil-science-owes-a-debt-to-indigenous-knowledge-lesotho-missionarys-notes-tell-the-story\/","title":{"rendered":"Lesotho: Fossil Science Owes a Debt to Indigenous Knowledge &#8211; Lesotho Missionary&#8217;s Notes Tell the Story"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"story-body-text\" data-para-word-count=\"24\">For over a century, the scientific literature has credited western missionaries with &#8220;discovering&#8221; fossils in <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/place\/Lesotho\" rel=\"noopener\">Lesotho<\/a>, the small, mountainous country surrounded by South Africa.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text\" data-para-word-count=\"43\">The narrative typically begins with figures like the French missionary <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/primarysources.brillonline.com\/browse\/missionary-archives-from-lesotho-1832-2006\/lettres-hd-no-2-list-of-hermann-dieterlen-letters-of-1878-with-specific-dates-and-brief-summaries-mainly-corresponding-with-ellenberger-brutsch-mabille-coillard-his-own-family;mmalesothoboxess011409\" rel=\"noopener\">Hermann Dieterlen<\/a>, who, in 1885, reported unusual &#8220;petrified bird tracks&#8221; near the settlement of <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.morijamuseum.org\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Morija<\/a>. This account implies that <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/science\/Earth-sciences\" rel=\"noopener\">earth sciences<\/a> like the study of rocks and fossils arrived in Lesotho from Europe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-body-text\" data-para-word-count=\"42\">In contrast, our <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/s12371-025-01191-5\" rel=\"noopener\">research<\/a> supports the&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/allafrica.com\/stories\/202512100001.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read more on AllAfrica.com<\/a><br \/>\n<br \/>South Africa Today Africa \u2013 Southern Africa <a title=\"Lesotho\" href=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/category\/southern-africa\/lesotho\/\">Lesotho<\/a> News<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For over a century, the scientific literature has credited western missionaries with &#8220;discovering&#8221; fossils in Lesotho, the small, mountainous country surrounded by South Africa. The narrative typically begins with figures like the French missionary Hermann Dieterlen, who, in 1885, reported unusual &#8220;petrified bird tracks&#8221; near the settlement of Morija. This account implies that earth sciences [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":216243,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cdn.allafrica.com\/static\/images\/structure\/aa-logo-rgba-no-text-square.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1406],"tags":[258,256,6861,32742,7855,8400,4717,1407,24994,257,7295,14099,6208,254,12231],"class_list":["post-216242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lesotho","tag-africa","tag-africa-news","tag-debt","tag-fossil","tag-indigenous","tag-knowledge","tag-lesotho","tag-lesotho-news","tag-missionarys","tag-news","tag-notes","tag-owes","tag-science","tag-south-africa-today","tag-story"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cdn.allafrica.com\/static\/images\/structure\/aa-logo-rgba-no-text-square.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216242\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/africa-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}