88-year-old Chief Ouma Katrina Esau is the last remaining South African who can speak the ancient San language, N|uu. The language is 25,000 years old.
Ouma Katrina was born in 1933, at a time when the centuries-long suppression of her people and their heritage was accelerating.
Also Read: Florence Masebe accuses soapies of butchering African languages
She recently published a book in N|uu titled Skilpad en Volstruis Tortoise and Ostrich in May 2021.
Ouma Katrina Esau, author of ‘Tortoise and Ostrich’, demystifying the myth that Africans are a people without writing. pic.twitter.com/iRjmVWdhIF
— National Library of South Africa (@NLSA1) May 24, 2021
Also Read: Calls for sign language to be considered South Africa’s 12th official language
In 2014 Ouma Katrina was awarded the National Order of the Baobab in Silver for her efforts, and she is the recipient of several more honours; her community also named her queen of the Western Nǁnǂe tribe in 2015.
This has led to her language school, ǂAqe ǁX’oqe – meaning “Gaze at the Stars” – languishing in recent years for lack of funding, frustrating her desire to teach N|uu to children.


