From: poam@giraffe.ru.ac.za (AK MARQUARD)
Subject: Re: Shaka Zulu?
Keywords: Shaka Zulu
Organization: Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 14:14:29 GMT

In article <1992Oct11.183423.203061@uctvax.uct.ac.za> naturman@uctvax.uct.ac.za writes:
>From: naturman@uctvax.uct.ac.za
>Subject: Re: Shaka Zulu?
>Date: 11 Oct 92 18:34:23 +0200
>Keywords: Shaka Zulu
>> 
>> Not necessarily. The director of the series wnated to depict Tshaka as blood
>> thirsty megalomaniac. This is not necessarily true. Tshaka was a brilliant
>> man who recognized that only a strong united nation could halt the 
>> European invasion of the continent. He was a shrewd man who innovated brilli
>> ant millitary tactics. If the only the chinese had delayed the invention of
>> gun powder by  300 hundred years more.....
>
>
>This is absolute nonsense. The series does not depict Shaka as a blood thirsty
>megalomaniac. Shaka was a similar person to Julius Caesar, a born military man.
>He never united anybody to fight the Europeans. His unification of the clans
>took place before there was contact with the Europeans. He never perceived them
>as a threat. That came later under Dingaan.
>
>

In terms of Shaka et al: the whole debate about 19th century SA history has 
bee thrown wide open recently again, and the followingtrends seem to be 
emerging: historical research (i.e. looking carefully and critically at the 
original sources, mainly missionaries and traders) has revealed massive 
inconsistencies in the theory of the so-called "mfecane" (for instance the 
apparent discovery of the stabbing spear and the "horns" formation by shaka 
is pure myth - these both emerged much much earlier) - "classics" on which 
the television series is based (particully "shaka zulu" by E Ritter) have 
been shown to be mostly romantic rubbish by historians. although much of the 
new work is still contentious (see mainly the work of J.Cobbing in the 
Journal of African History, 1988+, and his critics), most historians have 
conceded the following: we do not actually know much about shaka, as many 
initial reports have been shown to be very unreliable from several 
perspectives; it appears that the so-called zulu state was a reactive state 
based on trading and the activities of the portuguese slavers in the late 
18th century and early 19th century in delagoa bay, as well as the 
activities of griqua slavers in the northern cape - more than this is not 
known. what is clear is that migration (or fleeing, if you like) of groups 
in the interior actually does not match with the "mfecane" theory, as many 
of them were fleeing the wrong way for a lot of the time. The whole shaka 
myth, and the mfecane myth seem to have come about in the following way:

- in literature of the time, shaka was demonised as a sort of black 
barbarian napoleon, thus the image of "zulu hordes" was popularised - this 
was before substantial contact with the "zulu" and thus was based on 
subliminal settler fears more than on actual events (see forthcoming 
doctorate on shaka in literature by D.Wylie, rhodes english dept), as well 
as a generation of SA historians beginning about 1900 (cory etc.) who 
cleansed SA history of slavery etc etc., basing their historical research 
uncritically on reports to the colonial govt, which had to conceal slavery 
in the colony as well as collaboration with the portuguese from the imperial 
authorities of the time. see also the work of Wright and Mare on "zulu-ness" 
and "zulu" history. In short, Shaka Zulu is mostly absolute crap.

(also, in terms of gavan's comments, the mfecane is only supposed to have 
happened in the 1820's to 40's by which time there were many raids on the 
interior - the portuguese had also been slaving along the east coast, 
possibly as far as durban, for about 3/4 of a century - see similar 
disruptive effects on social formations on west coast)

Andrew Marquard, Rhodes University, South Africa