History of South Africa podcast

Episode 45 – The ancient people of the Orange River islands, the Namaqualand Korana and the “Bastaards”

This is episode 45 and it’s time to turn our attention to Namaqualand. This is an area which is not spoken of very often, the wild northern frontier where bandits rode oxen and escaped slaves, white ex-soldiers and black clans joined forces – or fought each other. The brigands and…

19 Dec 2021 19 min

Episode 44 – Trekboer Coenraad de Buys marries amaXhosa Queen Nojoli aka Yese and Barrow exacts a confounded promise

This is episode 44 and we continue to travel about the Zuurveld and beyond with Englishman John Barrow. Remember he’d arrived in Graaff-Reinet with landdrost FR Bressler and their entry into the mud and daub village marked the restoration of Cape control after an interval of two and a half…

12 Dec 2021 19 min

Episode 43 – Lady Anne throws dinner parties as John Barrow and the Dragoons take a trip to Graaff-Reinet

This is episode 43 and we’re dealing with the arrival of the English at the Cape. As you know, the Peninsular had become more important in the eyes of the English as they fought a lengthy war against France at the end of the 18th Century – a war that…

5 Dec 2021 17 min

Episode 42 – Lady Anne Barnard, Earl Macartney and the van Reenen meat bank of the 1790s

This is episode 42 and the English have just seized the Cape. Remember at the time they were in a world war with the French and revolutionary fervour had swept the world with its populist refrain, its’ berets of southern France and Liberte Equalite Fraternite narrative. This had swept the…

25 Nov 2021 20 min

Episode 41 – The English take Cape Town, Americans flee and trekboer rebels tear down a flag

This is episode 41 and we’re dealing with two main things – firstly the shift in power amongst the Xhosa at the end of the 18th Century, then the arrival of the English in South Africa. Remember we’ve been focusing on the Zuurveld as the trekboers and the amaXhosa both…

21 Nov 2021 23 min

Episode 40 – The Second Frontier War and the Graaff-Reinet rebellion

This is episode 40 and we’re dealing with the Second Frontier War. The Zuurveld Boers were indignant at the reluctance of the distant government of the Cape to come to their aid as the amaGqunukhwebe swept onto their farms. Remember Xhosa king Ndlambe was trying to bring them to heel…

14 Nov 2021 22 min

Episode 39 – Rebel Coenraad de Buys, lover of Xhosa chief Ngqika’s mother and a preamble to the Second Frontier War

This is episode 39 and we’re going to meet one of the country’s most incredible characters who’s activities on the frontier in the late 1700s were to be forgotten. Coenraad de Buys was probably one of the most African of all trekboers as you’re going to hear and the saga…

7 Nov 2021 21 min

Episode 38 – The First Frontier War of 1781 and why the survivors of the Grosvenor were attacked by the amaXhosa

This is episode 38 and we’re focusing on the first war between the isiXhosa and the settlers which took place in 1781. Rharhabe had proposed an alliance between himself and the Colony – in return for Boer assistance against the imiDange clan who he had represented as rebels. Rharhabe framed…

31 Oct 2021 21 min

Episode 37 – How the amaXhosa waged war and Governor Van Plettenberg takes a trip to the Great Fish River

This is episode 37 and we’re continuing the saga of late 18th Century Xhosa kingdoms. By late in the 18th Century, the Zuurveld was home to small groups of San, some khoekhoe chieftans, several Xhosa chiefdoms and the trekboers. They were mixing up together in a fairly confined territory and…

24 Oct 2021 20 min

Episode 36 – The French and British fight over the Cape as bounty hunter Willem Prinsloo crosses the Fish River

This is episode 36 and its time to return to Xhosaland. Before we do that, let’s step back a little and consider the effect of action beyond Africa that was having an influence on the continent, particularly the southern reaches. Adam Smith may have been somewhat bemused, as American historian…

17 Oct 2021 23 min

Episode 35 – The Mthethwa and Ndwandwe flex their muscles in what eventually will become known as Zululand

This is episode 35 and we’re going to focus on the forerunners of the Zulu – the Mthethwa and Ndwandwe, the Qwabe and how they emerged in the region between the Tugela and Pongola rivers in northern KwaZulu Natal or what became known as Zululand. By the first few centuries…

10 Oct 2021 21 min

Episode 34 – Trading and raiding, American whalers and the emergence of pre-Zulu chiefdoms in the East

This is episode 34 and we’re going to take a close look at what was going on in the region bounded by the Orange River, the Kalahari Desert and the Indian Ocean. This is where the Zulu emerged but the story is not the simple tale most of us know…

3 Oct 2021 19 min

Episode 33 – By 1771 Cape Town has a name and explorers begin arriving in droves

This is episode 33 and we’re focusing on the Cape after spending last episode partly in Xhosaland. By 1771 the inn on the sea – the town in Table Bay – was being referred to as Cape Town for the first time by travellers. It appears there was not even…

26 Sep 2021 19 min

Episode 32 – An intermingling on the frontiers begins in earnest and a wide-angle view of the mid-to-late 18th C

This is episode 32 and we’re swinging back to the Cape frontier through the last few decades of the 18th Century. I am going to thoroughly probe this period because so many crucial things were unfolding across southern Africa such as the development of new centralized powerful kingdoms in the…

19 Sep 2021 23 min

Episode 31 – Trade increases between Delagoa Bay and the Tswana and the Dutch Reformed Church makes its mark in the Cape

This is episode 31 and we’ll now take a broader look at what was going on across southern Africa after a few episodes peering closely at the northern Cape. We’ll also take a closer look at how the Cape government was expanding. Sleeping giants were to awaken by the last…

10 Sep 2021 19 min

Episode 30 – Shipwrecked women and their Xhosa clan, the art of making amasi and the amatakati

This is episode 30 and we’re covering the mid-18th Century, including tales of shipwrecked sailors, the art of making amasi and dealing with the amatakati or witches. We’ve heard much about the developments in the north of the Cape, the bokkeveld and the Roodezand up to 1740. Now we’ll swing…

5 Sep 2021 18 min

Episode 29 – Murder, massacre and pacification of the Roodezand Khoi while settler rebel Barbier meets a grisly end.

This is episode 29 and we’re dealing with the pacification of the Khoisan in 1739. The Bushman War of that year had broken out as we’ve heard over repeated incursions into Khoi territory by settlers who’d abused the hospitality of Captain Gal of the Great Namaqua – then shot him…

29 Aug 2021 19 min

Episode 28 – The Bushman War of 1739 and the role of French outlaw Estienne Barbier

This is episode 28, the Bushman War of 1739. Last episode we heard about the growing number of clashes reported in the run up to this full-scale war that did not last long – but extended in a great arc from the Piketberg in the north-west to the valley of…

22 Aug 2021 18 min

Episode 27 – The slaughtering in the Sandveld and the causes of the 1739 frontier war

This is episode 27 and we’re dealing with the period in the first half of 1700 – give or take a decade. Last episode we heard how the TrekBoer economy had developed and a new farmer had emerged on the landscape called the Boer. The descendents of Dutch and French…

15 Aug 2021 17 min

Episode 26 – The Boers begin expanding across the Cape frontier

As we heard last episode, the direction of trekker expansion was largely a function of the nature of the terrain, along with the availability of water and the quality of pasture. What was to take place through the 18th century was a steady growth of loan farms that extended northwards…

8 Aug 2021 16 min