Aonin

The ǂAonin, also called Topnaar, are Nama people of the Kuiseb River and the coast around Walvis Bay. The river cuts through the Namib Desert, sustaining a ribbon of vegetation in a land of sand and gravel. Among its most valuable plants is the thorny ǃnara, whose fruit and seeds have long provided food. Archaeological evidence suggests that people harvested ǃnara along the lower Kuiseb for centuries, alongside the keeping of livestock.

In the early nineteenth century, ǂAonin communities lived near the Swakop mouth and moved south towards Walvis Bay and the Kuiseb. Some also travelled upriver, where struggles with the Red Nation forced a group to withdraw to Rooibank. The river joined the coast to the interior and remained central to their livelihood.