John Irish, 'Karoo Lepismatidae', Navorsinge van die Nasionale Museum, Bloemfontein, Volume 12, Part 6, 1996
journal article · consulted 2026-08-10
- Type
- journal article
- Repository
- Sabinet Gateway under licence from the publisher. Supplied by
- Reference
- Collecting locality 384, 'Biesies'. Neighbouring localities 382 Daskop, 391 '3 km NW Williston', 392 Williston.
- Consulted
- 2026-08-10
The citation as it was given
AN ENTOMOLOGY PAPER THAT HAPPENS TO BE A GAZETTEER. Irish collected silverfish from ant nests across the Karoo in 1988-1994 and lists his sites by number. Number 384 is BIESIES, recorded with the ant Tetramorium rufescens. WHY IT COUNTS. This is a third independent attestation of a farm name no cadastre carries, from a source with no interest in this family whatever - after Frans's own knowledge, Janet Melville's report [SRC-374] and the IEC voting station list [SRC-375]. A collector writes down the name the farmer gives him at the gate. IT CORROBORATES THE DISTRICT AND DOES NOT GIVE A COORDINATE. Biesies sits in a run of localities that are plainly Williston country: 382 DASKOP, which the paper places in the WILLISTON DISTRICT at 30 deg 42' S, 21 deg 05' E, 1050 m, collected 21 January 1994; 391 '3 km NW Williston'; 392 Williston itself. NO COORDINATE IS GIVEN FOR BIESIES in this paper and none is interpolated from its neighbours - the numbering may be collecting order rather than geography, and 5 says an unresolved place gets no pin. THE COORDINATE EXISTS SOMEWHERE. Irish keys every locality to a numbered list that is not printed in this part. Finding that gazetteer would give Biesies a position to the minute, which is the one thing the family's own farm still lacks. LEAD-0156.
Kept verbatim. This project contradicts published genealogies and corrects a family's own oral tradition, so every claim has to be checkable by someone who was not in the room.