African Window
Encyclopedia
Pretoria
Pretoria is a city located in the northern part of Gauteng Province, South Africa. It is one of the country's three capital cities, serving as the executive and de facto national capital; the others are Cape Town, the legislative capital, and Bloemfontein, the judicial capital.Pretoria is...
, Gauteng
Gauteng
Gauteng is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. It was formed from part of the old Transvaal Province after South Africa's first all-race elections on 27 April 1994...
, which houses the Ditsong National Museum
Museum
A museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...
of Cultural History
Cultural history
The term cultural history refers both to an academic discipline and to its subject matter.Cultural history, as a discipline, at least in its common definition since the 1970s, often combines the approaches of anthropology and history to look at popular cultural traditions and cultural...
(DNMCH) of South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
. The DNMCH was amalgamated with the Pretoria-based Transvaal Museum
Transvaal Museum
""The Ditsong National Museum of Natural History, formerly Transvaal Museum, is a natural history museum situated in Pretoria, South Africa....
for Natural History (now the Ditsong National Museum of Natural History and the South African National Museum of Military History
South African National Museum of Military History
The South African National War Museum in Johannesburg was officially opened by Prime Minister Jan Smuts on 29 August 1947 to preserve the history of South Africa's involvement in the Second World War. In 1975 the museum was renamed the South African National Museum of Military History and its...
(situated in Johannesburg
Johannesburg
Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...
) (now the Ditsong National Museum of Military History on 1 April 1999 to form the Northern Flagship Institution. In April 2010 the new name was launched, and the NFI became Ditsong Museums of South Africa. Ditsong is managed by a chief executive officer and a board, which replaced the three separate previous museum boards.
The collection of the museum includes objects such as excavated archaeological material and artworks, historical documents, archives, various current and historical audiovisuals, Stone Age
Stone Age
The Stone Age is a broad prehistoric period, lasting about 2.5 million years , during which humans and their predecessor species in the genus Homo, as well as the earlier partly contemporary genera Australopithecus and Paranthropus, widely used exclusively stone as their hard material in the...
, Iron Age
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the archaeological period generally occurring after the Bronze Age, marked by the prevalent use of iron. The early period of the age is characterized by the widespread use of iron or steel. The adoption of such material coincided with other changes in society, including differing...
and historic archaeology sites, historical buildings, and early domesticated animals.