Suid Afrikaanse Geskiedenis Suid Afrikaanse geskiedenis
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Pre-historiese Suid-Afrikaanse geskiedenis Argeologiese opgrawings dui daarop dat die "moderne" mens meer as 50 000 jaar gelede reeds in die teenswoordige Suid-Afrika aanwesig was. Die landstreek is moontlik nagenoeg 30 000 jaar gelede die eerste keer deur San-groepe (Boesmans) beset.
Die jongste argeologiese navorsing dui daarop dat die voorvaders van die Suider-Afrikaanse swartmense landbouers was wat van verder noord op die vasteland gekom het. Van nagenoeg die eerste of tweede eeu nC het hulle hulle in klein gemeenskappe langs die kus van die teenswoordige KwaZulu-Natal gevestig. Hulle sou later opwaarts versprei in die riviervalleie van die streek en nog later tot in die hoërliggende graslande.
Die eerste Europeërs
Vroee ontdekkers en seevaarders ontdek die seeroete na Indie. Portugese seevaarders Vasco De Gama gaan aan land in 1480.
Spaanse seevaarders ......
Die Oos Indiese Kompanje, 'n private besigheidsonderneming vanuit Nederland, stig 'n basis on hul skepe van vars voedsel te voorsien.
Die eerste Europeërs wat hulle hier gevestig het, kom in 1652 onder leiding van die Nederlandse kommandeur Jan van Riebeeck na die Kaap. Die handels nedersetting word beman met kontrak landbouers om voedsel te voorsien. Nadat hulle hul kontrak voltooi het, bly hulle agter in die Kaap as vry burgers en boer vir hul eie gewin. Die woord "Boer" is Nederlands vir landbouer. Die Vryburgers is boere van nering en as groepering onstaan die saan van 'n nuwe volk - Die Boere van Suid Afrika. Die Afrikanerbevolking ("Boere") ontwikkel daarna grotendeels uit nasate van Nederlandse, Duitse en Franse immigrante.
Brittanje beset die Kaap in 1806 en baie Britse immigrante kom in 1820 na Suid-Afrika.
In die middel-1820's heers Shaka, grondlegger van die Zoeloevolk, reeds oor 100 000 mense en het hy ’n leër van 40 000 manskappe. Talle misnoegde Boere trek van 1836 af noordwaarts onder die Britse gesag uit (die "Groot Trek") en stig hul eie republieke in die noorde: die Oranje-Vrijstaat en Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek of Transvaal. Daar is verskillende botsings tussen die Boere en die swart volkere, ook die Zoeloes onder aanvoering van Shaka se moordenaar, Dingane.
Die ontdekking van diamante (1867) en goud (1886) in die noorde lei tot ’n toestroming van Europeërs, maar intensifiseer die onderwerping van die swartmense. Die Boere verset hulle teen Britse pogings om hul onafhanklikheid van hulle weg te neem, dog hulle word in die Anglo-Boereoorlog (1899-1902) verslaan.
In 1910 verenig die Kaapkolonie, Natal, die Oranjerivierkolonie en Transvaal om die Unie van Suid-Afrika te vorm -- ’n dominium of susterstaat van Brittanje in die Britse Gemenebes.
In 1914 tree Suid-Afrika, te midde van groot kritiek binnelands, aan die kant van Brittanje toe tot die Eerste Wêreldoorlog. Rebellerende Afrikaners word vasgevat
In Oktober 1960 besluit die Unie se stemgeregtigdes, almal blankes, dat Suid-Afrika ’n republiek moet word en op 31 Mei 1961 word die land amptelik die Republiek van Suid-Afrika. Die land onttrek hom ook uit die Statebond.
Die blanke regering van die Republiek swig in die begin van die laaste dekade van die twintigste eeu, veral toe die einde van die Koue Oorlog en die verbrokkeling van die eens magtige Sowjet-Unie die moontlikheid van ’n Kommunistiese oorname in Suid-Afrika laat vervaag. Die ANC word deur pres. F.W. de Klerk ontban en Nelson Mandela, ’n voorste ANC-gevangene, word in Februarie 1990 ná 27 jaar in die gevangenis vrygelaat.
Indringende samesprekings word hierna gevoer om ’n sterk nuwe grondwet uit te beitel. Die onderhandelinge dreig plek-plek om te ontspoor, maar die wedersydse besef dat daar geen vreedsame alternatief vir ’n onderhandelde ooreenkoms is nie, laat die onderhandelaars vasbyt. Uiteindelik is daar so minlike skikking dat die Nobelprys vir Vrede in 1993 saam aan Mandela en De Klerk toegeken word.
In April 1994 word die eerste vrye verkiesing in Suid-Afrika gehou. Ná meer as drie eeue van wit oorheersing word die beheer aan ’n regering van nasionale eenheid oorgedra. Suid-Afrika word ingedeel in nege provinsies, tans bekend as Gauteng, Limpopo, Mpumalanga, Noordwes, Vrystaat, KwaZulu-Natal, Wes-Kaap, Oos-Kaap en Noord-Kaap. Mandela word president en in Mei 1994 ingehuldig. Hy dra in 1999 die presidentskap aan Thabo Mbeki oor.
Text from http://www.saveyourheritage.com/history_of_south_africa.htm visited on 20 November 2010
South Africa. Other than Germany probably the most misunderstood White country in the world. A country that has now degenerated into anarchy. Let's take an unbiased look at their noble history.
After the British decided against establishing a colony at the Cape of Good Hope, the Dutch realized it had strategic and economic importance. On commission for the Dutch East India Trading Company (VOC) the merchant Jan van Riebeeck anchored in the bay at the foot of Table Mountain on April 6, 1652. Remember, this was just a few years after the Dutch had established their colony in America! The first settlement was Cape Town, which is still called the Mother City to this day.
Jan van Riebeeck Frau van Riebeeck
Van Riebeeck had with him 82 men and 8 women, including his wife. His job was to establish a base to provide the Company's ships with fresh groceries including meat and vegetables for their journey from Europe to Asia.
The first thing van Riebeek and his men did was erect the "Fort de Goede Hoop" for their protection. Then they laid out a garden and started to grow fruit and vegetables. They tried to obtain meat provisions through trade with the natives, the Khoikhoi. They're a historical division of the Khoisan ethnic group, who were the native Black Africans of southwestern Africa, closely related to the Bushmen. They had lived in southern Africa since the 5th century AD and, at the time of the arrival of Riebeek and his men practiced extensive pastoral agriculture.
"Old Cape" Khoikhoi Male
The relationship with the Khoikhoi wasn't friendly and the company authorities made deliberate attempts to restrict contact. Partly as a consequence, VOC employees found themselves faced with a labor shortage. To remedy this, they released a small number of Dutch from their contracts and permitted them to establish farms, with which they would supply the VOC settlement. This arrangement proved highly successful, producing abundant supplies of fruit, vegetables, wheat and wine; they also later raised livestock. The small initial group of free burghers, as these farmers were known, steadily increased in number and began to expand their farms further north and east into the territory of the Khoikhoi.
During the first winter 20 of Riebeeck's men died. Yet the settlement started to flourish. The number of sailors who anchored at the Cape to stock up on milk, meat and vegetables grew steadily. The construction of a pier rendered the bay safer and even more attractive. Soon there were workshops to repair ships and a hospital for the ill.
1683 painting of Table Bay by Smit
With the rapid development of the port the need for labor increased dramatically. Firstly slaves and politically banned people were imported from Indonesia (Java and Sumatra). These slaves and their descendants, including the ones who intermarried with the Dutch, became known as the Cape Coloureds and Cape Malays. Over time, the Khoisan, their European overseers, and the imported slaves mixed, with the offspring of these unions forming the basis for today's Colored population.
Soon Dutch Calvinists began arriving by the thousands. In 1688, a large group of French Huguenots who were fleeing religious persecution at home, settled at the Cape. Also arriving were smaller numbers of Frisians, Germans, Flemish and Walloons. This group made up what was to become the Trekboers that expanded and settled South Africa. They spoke Afrikaans, a language derived from the 17th century Dutch. Today Afrikaans is one of the official languages of South Africa but it is also spoken in Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho, and Swaziland. There are significant groups in Argentina who speak Afrikaans and over 100,000 in Great Britain. Those who speak Dutch and Afrikaans can easily understand each other.
Like their Khoikhoi counterparts, the Afrikaners, too, continued to expand into the rugged hinterlands of the north and east. Many began to take up a semi-nomadic pastoralist lifestyle, in some ways not far removed from that of the Khoikhoi they displaced. In addition to its herds, a family might have a wagon, tent, Bible, and a few guns. As they became more settled, they would build a mud-walled cottage, frequently located, by choice, days of travel from the nearest European settlement. These were the first of the Trekboers (wandering Farmers, later shortened to Boers and then called Afrikaners), completely independent of official controls, extraordinarily self-sufficient, and isolated. Their harsh lifestyle produced individualists who were well acquainted with the land. Like many pioneers with Christian backgrounds, the burghers attempted to live their lives based on teachings from the Bible.
Trek Boer crossing the Karoo - 1898 painting Trek Boers on the Karoo Map of Trek Boer Expansion
From the beginning of the 18th century the Cape settlers expanded their territory towards the north and the east. These settling movements were led by the Trek Boers who penetrated the hinterland looking for grazing land for their cattle.
The historical events in 19th century South Africa are marked by the "Groot Trek". Starting in 1835, more than 10,000 Boers, the Voortrekkers (Pioneers), left the Cape Colony with their families and went north and north-east. The reasons for this mass exodus were their economic problems, the threatening danger of conflict with the Xhosa, who settled on the other side of the Fish River, and primarily, discontent with the English colonial authorities who didn't provide sufficient protection and had forbidden the slave trade and postulated the equality of whites and non-whites
The Great Trek was organized in resistance to the politics of the Cape government. In 1835, the first groups set out. Under the leadership of Louis Trichardt and Hans van Rensburg, they opened up the north of today's Mpumalanga. Other groups, under the command of Andries Pretorius, Gert Maritz and Piet Retief followed. In the area around ThabaNchu in what would become the Orange Free State, a huge Boer camp of 5,000 Voortrekkers eventually gathered where the trekkers established a republic. Following disagreements among their leadership, the various Voortrekker groups split apart. While some headed north, most crossed the Drakensberg into Natal with the idea of establishing a republic there.
They thought they had found their promised land, vast tracts of apparently uninhabited grazing lands. There was space enough for their cattle to graze and their culture of anti-urban independence to flourish. Little did they know that what they found was disorganized bands of black refugees who had been pushed out of earlier lands.
Since the Zulus controlled this territory, the Voortrekker leader Piet Retief, paid a visit to King Dingaan. Dingaan promised them land in payment for a favor. A neighboring tribe had stolen cattle from Dingaan and he wanted it back. Retief went to the neighboring tribe and bartered with the king who returned the cattle. After receiving the specified cattle, Dingaan invited Retief and his men into his kraal, where they were given all the land between the Zimvubu and Tugela rivers up to the Drakensberg. The treaty between the two men currently sits in a museum in The Netherlands. As a celebration, Dingaan invited Retief and all his men to come and drink Tswala (Traditional Zulu Beer) in his kraal. While drinking and being entertained by Zulu dancers, Dingaan cried out "Bulala amatakati" (Kill the wizards), as Dingaan couldn't conceive how it would be possible for Retief to obtain his cattle without using magic. Dingaan's men, having taken Retief's men by surprised, dragged the men to a hill "Hloma Mabuto" where, one by one, they were all slaughtered, leaving Retief for last so that he could watch. After the massacre, they went back to the encampment where Retief and his fellow farmers had left their wives, children and livestock. Taken by surprise 500 of the women, children and remaining farmers were also raped and slaughtered. Those that managed to get away did so without many of their guns and animals. A missionary, Rev. Owen, had seen all of this take place and approached Dingaan in order to give the dead an appropriate burial. While the reverend and a helper of his were burying the dead and reading them their last rights, they happened to come across Retief's rucksack, still containing the treaty and a few personal belongings.
Piet Retief, Boer leader killed by Zulus
Read a chilling first hand account of the slaughter at http://www.southafrica-travel.net/history/wood.htm.
After the Voortrekkers had failed to negotiate with the Zulus the secession of land for settling and grazing, and had endured a number of catastrophic assaults, they assembled at the Ncome River for a decisive battle. On December 16, 1838, 464 Boers under the command of Andries Pretorius defeated more than 10,000 Zulu warriors. There was so much bloodshed that the Ncome River reportedly ran red. Hence the name, blood river. The deeply religious Boers did not ascribe the military victory to their technically superior armaments, but interpreted it primarily as a sign of God. Before the battle, they had prayed and made a vow that if God would grant them victory over the Zulus, they would commemorate the event annually. With that battle behind them, they believed even more strongly that white predominance over blacks is God's own will.
Bronze cast wagon monument at Blood River
The White Boers, vastly outnumber 464 to 10,000 Zulu warriors, won a decisive victory on December 16, 1838.
Not one Boer died. 3000 Zulu Warriors died
Painting of the Battle of Blood River
Finally, in December 1998, a memorial for the 3,000 Zulu soldiers who died in the battle, was inaugurated by Zulu Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi across the river from the Afrikaner monument. The historic anniversary of the 'Day of the Vow' has been renamed 'Reconciliation Day' in the New South Africa.
The Portuguese sailor Vasco da Gama reached the bay of today’s Durban on Christmas Day 1497. He named it "Rio de Natal", Christmas River. From that time on, the bay was a frequent port-of-call for sailors and merchants, but not until 1823 did a real settlement start to develop. In 1835, Port Natal was renamed Durban after the then Governor of the Cape Colony, Sir Benjamin Durban. Life in the small harbor town was very precarious. The Zulus regarded Natal as their own territory and merely tolerated the white settlers, because the port was useful to them as a trading post.
When the Voortrekkers came to Natal in 1836, and fierce battles with the Zulus were on the daily agenda, Durban was also frequently threatened by attacks. After the defeat of the Zulus in the Battle of Blood River, there was peace for a while, but soon the British and the Voortrekkers started to fight for supremacy over Natal. Ultimately, the bitter conflicts were decided in favor of the British. In 1844, Natal became a Crown Colony and the Voortrekkers retreated.
In 1879, the British laid claims on the whole of Zululand and gave Zulu King Cetshwayo a practically unacceptable ultimatum. In the resulting Anglo-Zulu War, the British initially suffered a high number of casualties. The battle at the Isandlwana Mountain on 22 January, 1879 was particularly disastrous. About 20,000 Zulu soldiers overran the British army camp. Despite their superior armament, the British could not cope with the power of the attack. Many just covered their faces with their hands waiting to be stabbed through, others crept into their tents or tried to run away. Within a few hours, almost 2,000 soldiers were savagely killed. At first this victory for the Zulu King shocked and petrified the British. However, England decided to send more troops and the Anglo-Zulu War continued with heavy loss of lives, until it ended in victory for the British in 1887. KwaZulu was annexed by Natal. The northern border is the Tugela River.
Painting by Charles Fripp
The Boers meanwhile persevered with their search for land and freedom, ultimately establishing themselves in various Boer Republics, the Transvaal or South African Republic and the Orange Free State. For a while it seemed that these republics would develop into stable states, despite having thinly-spread populations of fiercely independent Boers, no industry, and minimal agriculture. Then the discovery of diamonds near Kimberley in 1869 changed everything and turned the Boers' world on its head. The first diamonds came from land belonging to the Griqua, but to which both the Transvaal and Orange Free State laid claim. Britain quickly stepped in and resolved the issue by annexing the area for itself.
The discovery of the Kimberley diamond mines unleashed a flood of European and black laborers into the area. Towns sprang up in which the inhabitants ignored the separation of whites and blacks. The Boers expressed anger that their impoverished republics had missed out on the economic benefits of the mines.
In the meantime, the Cape Colony had spread further and all the land between the Vaal and Orange rivers was declared British territory in 1848. The English, however, had not taken into account the strong resistance of the Boers who had already settled there. Because the area was economically of little interest to them, they soon gave it up again. On the 23rd of February 1854, the contract of Bloemfontein was signed, which led to the foundation of the Orange Free State. The "Oranje Vrystaat" developed into a politically and economically successful republic. But this positive process was overshadowed by various negative events in the second Boer state, the South African Republic in Transvaal (today Mpumalanga). By now British sentiment was in favored of amalgamating their own colonies and the Boer republics into one union, with the primary purpose of gaining possession of the Transvaal gold mines.
Long-standing Boer resentment turned into full-blown rebellion in the Transvaal (under British control from 1877), and the first Anglo-Boer War, known to Afrikaners as the "War of Independence", broke out in 1880. The conflict ended almost as soon as it began with a crushing Boer victory at Battle of Majuba Hill February 27, 1881. The republic regained its independence as the Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek ("South African Republic"), or ZAR. Paul Kruger, one of the leaders of the uprising, became President of the ZAR in 1883. Meanwhile, the British, who viewed their defeat at Majuba as an aberration, forged ahead with their desire to federate the Southern African colonies and republics. They saw this as the best way to come to terms with the fact of a white Afrikaner majority, as well as to promote their larger strategic interests in the area.
In 1879 Zululand came under British control. Then in 1886 an Australian prospector discovered gold in the Witwatersrand, accelerating the federation process and dealing the Boers yet another blow. The population of Johannesburg exploded to around 100,000 by the mid 1890s and the ZAR suddenly found itself hosting thousands of uitlanders, outside migrants, both black and white, with the Boers squeezed to the sidelines. The influx of Black labor in particular worried the Boers, many of whom suffered economic hardship and resented the foreign wage-earners.
The enormous wealth of the mines, largely controlled by European "Randlords", outside entrepreneurs, soon became irresistible for the British. In 1895, a group of renegades led by Captain Leander Starr Jameson entered the ZAR with the intention of sparking an uprising on the Witwatersrand and installing a British administration. This incursion became known as the Jameson Raid. The scheme ended in fiasco, but it seemed obvious to Kruger that it had at least the tacit approval of the Cape Colony government, and that his republic faced danger. He reacted by forming an alliance with Orange Free State.
The British Premier of the Cape Colony, Sir Cecil Rhodes, tried to achieve union with the Boers but failed. The situation peaked in 1899 when the British demanded voting rights for the 60,000 foreign whites on the Witwatersrand. Kruger rejected the British demand and called for the withdrawal of British troops from the ZAR's borders. When the British refused, Kruger declared war. The war was between the two Boer Republics of The Orange Free State and the South African Republic and the two British colonies of Cape and Natal. This Second Anglo-Boer War lasted longer than the first, and the British preparedness surpassed that of Majuba Hill. By June 1900, Pretoria, the last of the major Boer towns, had surrendered.
British Soldiers during the Anglo-Boer War
Yet they underestimated Boer resistance and independence. Boer "bittereinders", those willing to fight to the "bitter end", continued for two more years with guerrilla-style battles. The British, under General Lord Kitchener responded with unequalled severity and brutality using scorched earth tactics. The Boer commandos were hunted systematically, the fields devastated, the harvests destroyed. The women and children, who were left destitute and homeless, were kept under horrific conditions in huge concentration camps. In total, more than 27,000 women and children died from famine, exhaustion and disease. This was 15 percent of the Boer population.
Afrikaner women and children
Eventually the Boers realized that any further resistance would demand more senseless sacrifices, and peace negotiations began. On May 31, 1902 a superficial peace came with the signing of the Treaty of Vereeniging. Under its terms, the Boer republics acknowledged British sovereignty, while the British in turn committed themselves to reconstruction of the areas under their control.
Afrikaner soldiers in the Boer War
During the immediate post-war years the British focused their attention on rebuilding the country, in particular the mining industry. By 1907 the mines of the Witwatersrand produced almost one-third of the world's annual gold production. But the peace brought by the treaty remained fragile and challenged on all sides. The Afrikaners found themselves in the ignominious position of poor farmers in a country where big mining ventures and foreign capital rendered them irrelevant. Britain's unsuccessful attempts to anglicize them, and to impose English as the official language in schools and the workplace particularly incensed them. Partly as a backlash to this, the Boers came to see Afrikaans as the volkstaal ("people's language") and as a symbol of Afrikaner nationhood. Several nationalist organizations sprang up.
The British moved ahead with their plans for union. After several years of negotiations, the South Africa Act of 1909 brought the colonies and republics - Cape Colony, Natal, Transvaal, and Orange Free State - together as the Union of South Africa. Under the provisions of the act, the Union remained British territory, but with home-rule for Afrikaners.
English and Dutch became the official languages. Afrikaans did not gain recognition as an official language until 1925. Despite a major campaign by Blacks and Coloreds, the voter franchise remained as in the pre-Union republics and colonies, and only whites could gain election to parliament.
At the time of white settlement of the Cape, Xhosa groups were living far inland, into the area between Bushman's River and the Kei River. Since around 1770, they had been confronted with the Trek Boers who approached from the west. Both the Boers and the Xhosa were stock-farmers. The competition for grazing land led first to quarrels between the two groups, and eventually it came to a number of wars.
The politics of the colonial government attempted to enforce the separation of white and black settlement areas with the Fish River as the border. But the more the colony developed into a modern state with a strong military organization, the more the whites tended towards a policy of land annexing and the subjugation of the black population. In the middle of the 19th century, all the land formerly inhabited by Xhosa was in the hands of white settlers.
With the founding of the South African Union in 1910, the British colony and the independent Boer Republics were united. A modern "democratic" state was formed. in which only the white population could execute the right to vote.
The black people were subjected to a policy of concealed expatriation. Through the Native-Land Law of 1913, first 7.5 percent, and later 13 percent of the land in South Africa was declared reservations for blacks. No white person was allowed to purchase land there and, vice versa, no black was allowed to buy land in the remaining 87 per cent of the territory of the Union. So the foundation of the disastrous policy of Apartheid was laid. In the sixties, the black settlement areas were declared autonomous Homelands. For the Xhosa people these were the Homelands of Ciskei and Transkei. Only after the first really free elections in South Africa in 1994 was the Homeland policy abolished, after which the areas were integrated into the new provinces.
Xhosa Women, Transkei (Eastern Cape)
Towards the end of the 18th century, all over southern Africa small tribal groups were amalgamating into larger communities. This was by no means a peaceful process, but the result of protracted wars. The rise of the Zulu Kingdom falls into this period. Through incredible atrocities and cruelties the infamous Zulu warrior Shaka gained control over a number of Zulu clans. He expanded his territory systematically. Shaka's warriors raided Zulu villages and burnt them down. Women and children were gored to death; young men were called up and chiefs tortured and forced into allegiance.
Shaka was the illegitimate son of the Zulu chief Senzangakhona and the young girl Nandi, a member of the Langeni clan. As a young man, Shaka joined the army of Dingiswayo and soon became its highest commander. With the support of Dingiswayo he gained supremacy over the Zulu clan, enforcing his claim against his opponents with the most ferocious brutality. Under Shaka the Zulu territory expanded phenomenally. All the clans had to subject themselves to the one leader. At the beginning of the 19th century, Shaka had created the most powerful kingdom in the whole of southern Africa.
Zulu warriors, late 1800s
Towards the end of his reign, Shaka used his power even more destructively. He chased his army from one battle to the next, and the cruelties against his enemies became more outrageous. Eventually Shaka was assassinated by his half-brother Dingane in 1828.
For southern Africa an irreversible process of restructuring came to an end with Shaka's death in 1828. Thousands of people had become refugees, fights between settlers and refugees broke out everywhere, and all these disturbances led to regroupings. At the end of this period, the small and widespread chief-led clans had disappeared and were replaced by bigger communities which had come together merely for reasons of safety and self-defense.