China in the 14th and 15th centuries

Ming Dynasty: government and society

Chinese civilisation stretches from at least 2000BC. China was ruled by a series of dynasties until 1911. From 1368 to 1644, the Ming Dynasty was in power. The Emperor was an autocratic ruler who had absolute power over all aspects of life in his Empire. He ruled with officials, and with eunuchs. Eunuchs could have no family of their own and so were more loyal to the Emperor.

Chinese technology was far in advance of anything in Europe at the time. Chinese inventions included the magnetic compass, paper, the wheelbarrow, suspension bridges, gunpowder, movable type and the mechanical clock.

The Great Wall of China was originally built two centuries BC. It was rebuilt during the Ming dynasty.

There were many cities in China at this time with populations of over 1 million. The city of Beijing was laid out under the Ming rulers. At the centre of Beijing is the Forbidden City, a sacred palace where the emperors liv

Exploration of the world flourished during the rule of Ming Emperor Zhu Di Some historians believe that the Chinese sailed around the world in 1492. The Ming Empire had a great navy and sent representatives to other countries to ask for tribute in money or goods to show that they recognised the power of the Chinese Empire. They discouraged foreign ideas and thought that foreigners were stupid barbarians.

Trade and influence along the Asian sea routes

There was trade between Africa and China at this time. For example, a giraffe was sent from east Africa to the Ming Emperor as tribute.

After the Ming, the Chinese withdrew from sea travel and overseas trade. They became more inward looking and concerned about things only in China. This happened just as the countries of Western Europe were beginning to be interested in other parts of the world and were starting to trade and make conquests overseas. World history might possibly have been different if the Chinese had continued to be a great seafaring nation.

    - Women in China - Rights of women and children - Contact with Europeans

In 1368 a rebel peasant leader, Zhu Yuanzhang, defeated the Mogul emperor of China and took the throne himself. He announced a new dynasty, the Ming dynasty, and took the title Hong Wu. Hong Wu ruled for 30 years and was one of the greatest emperors ever to rule China.

China became the most powerful, wealthiest and most technologically advanced empire in the world during Hong Wu’s reign.

He reorganised the government into a centralised state.

  • 70 000 eunuchs (= castrated government officials) ran the country honestly and efficiently.
  • Hong Wu introduced a code of laws.
  • He collected taxes efficiently.
  • He grouped the people into 3 hereditary classes: soldiers, craftspeople and peasants.

The role of women

A woman’s social status and position within the family system determined her status and rights.

  • Women living in rural areas had to work hard to survive.
  • Some women who lived in urban areas were free to go out in public.
  • Wealthy women were often kept at home – their deformed feet, which had been bound up since they were babies – were a symbol of wealth and leisure.

Shipbuilding

Chinese shipbuilding began over 2 000 years ago. By the 16th century, Chinese ships were the most advanced in the world.

  • They had hulls with watertight holds for buoyancy, nine masts and 12 massive bamboo slat sails.
  • The slats could be adjusted – this made it possible for the ships to sail against the wind.

Navigation and map-making

The Chinese invented the magnetic compass. They had a long tradition of map-making.

On one of the most important maps of the Ming dynasty, the Nile River and the Drakensberg Mountains can be clearly seen – this is evidence of contact with Africa long before the European explorers.

Trade and influence along the Asian sea routes

When the Ming dynasty came to power in 1368, the silk route overland from Asia to Europe was blocked to China.

This resulted in finding new trade routes in the Indian Ocean. By the 16th century, China was trading with: East Asia — Southeast Asia — southern India — Ceylon — the Persian Gulf — Africa — Portugal — Holland.

China traded silk, cotton and porcelain in return for Spanish silver and firearms, and

American sugar, potatoes and tobacco.

Admiral Zheng He made seven voyages between 1405 and 1433, to more than 30 countries in Southeast Asia, the Middle East and the east coast of Africa.

  • On his first voyage he set sail with 27 000 men on 317 ships, including treasure ships carrying trade and tribute goods. The ships brought back treasurers for the emperor, such as a giraffe, spices, wool, precious stones and Arabian horses.
  • Zheng He’s ships were six times larger than the ships that Columbus used in 1492.

The stability and prosperity in the Ming period led to great scientific achievements in science, technology and culture, such as:

  • fine porcelain and silk – major exports
  • writing paper and printing
  • explosive bombs filled with gunpowder, the fire cannon, rockets, missiles and fireballs
  • blast furnaces for casting iron, the water clock, the abacus, and sophisticated textile weaving equipment.

The Grand Canal and the Great Wall of China were restored – this improved communications and defence.

The Forbidden City was built in Beijing and became the home of emperors from 1420 to 1911.


Zheng He’s last voyage of 1431–1433 marked the end of the Chinese age of exploration – he died during this voyage.

At that time, Emperor Hong XI had taken power and decided to end the voyages. This was because of the advice of conservative Confucian officials.

The emperor destroyed the ships and maps, and China became isolated from the rest of the world.

The belief that the world outside China was filled with barbarians was another reason for the Chinese to isolate themselves.

Fighting among ministers and corruption at court all contributed to the end of the Ming dynasty – and to the end of China being the greatest power in the world.

The old Chinese trade routes in the Indian Ocean were then taken over by the Portuguese.


West Africa is home to many of Africa's oldest kingdoms. These kingdoms played an important role in the development of trade and economic growth of the region. As old kingdoms came to be replaced by new smaller ones many changes were experienced. The transformations were influenced by conquest and warfare along with patterns of trade. West African societies were shaped by competition for wealth and the search for independence from more powerful kingdoms.

The earliest African civilizations south of the Sahara desert were in West Africa. These civilisations developed at a time when most of Europe was experiencing the Dark Age, after the fall of the Western half of the Roman Empire around 476 A.D. the people of West Africa could already smelt iron ore to make tools for warfare and agriculture. Iron farming tools made agricultural methods far more efficient. This led to improvements in agriculture and greater productivity of the land, as prosperity grew the population expanded giving rise to larger towns. Broad rivers linked people in these larger towns by way of canoe travel. These rivers also maintained the fertility of the soil all year round.

At the same time kingdoms were developing in this region. One of the earliest kingdoms to emerge here was ancient Ghana to the far West. By the year 300 A.D, this kingdom had been ruled by about 40 kings, showing that its political administration was well developed to allow new kings to take office without destroying the kingdom by fighting destructive civil wars. The economy of Ghana was based on iron and gold mining along with agriculture. Products were traded with Berber societies north of the Sahara desert. At the same time (1230-1300) the Mali kingdom of the Mande people, to the east of Ghana, was growing and increasing its control of trade in the region. This brought the two kingdoms into conflict. Finally, the Ghana kingdom was taken over by the Mali kingdom. The Mali kingdom was able to establish its influence with ease due to the surrounding savannah terrain. This enabled the easy and speedy dispatch of soldiers across the region to conquer neighbours. The adoption of the Islamic faith by the Mali people in about the 1500s during the rule of Kankan Musa, created a point of unity for this kingdom.

Quarrels over who should succeed the throne and rebellion by the Fulani people in Senegambia and the Songhai people in Gao led to the collapse of the Mali kingdom in the 16th century. Songhai became independent of Mali, and rivalled it as the leading power in West Africa.

Culture, Religion and Monarchy

The Songhai had settled on both banks of the middle Niger River. They established a state in the 15th century, which unified a large part of the western Sudan and developed into a brilliant civilisation. It was ruled by the dynasty or royal family of Sonni from the thirteenth century to the late fifteenth century. The capital was at Gao, a city surrounded by a wall. It was a great cosmopolitan market place where kola nuts, gold, ivory, slaves, spices, palm oil and precious woods were traded in exchange for salt, cloth, arms, horses and copper.

Islam had been introduced to the royal court of Songhai in 1019, but most people remained faithful to their traditional religion.

Sonni Ali reorganised the army, which was equipped with a fleet on the Niger River. The commander of the fleet was known as the ‘Master of the Water’. Foot soldiers captured the best men of the defeated armies. An elite cavalry was fast and tough. They wore iron breastplates underneath their battle tunics.

The foot soldiers were armed with spears, arrows and leather or copper shields. Military music as produced by a group of trumpeters. The total army comprised 30 000 infantry and 10 000 horsemen. The Songhai defence system was the largest organised force in the western Sudan; not only was a political instrument, but also an economic weapon by virtue of the booty it brought in. They conquered the cities of Timbuktu and Jenne.

Muslim scholars at Timbuktu called Sonni Ali ‘tyrannical, cruel and impious’. The Sonni’s were driven from power by the Muslim Askiya dynasty.

The new monarchy based at Gao had centralised and absolute and sacred power. It was possible to approach him only in a prostate position. He sat on a raised platform surrounded by 700 eunuchs. People paid taxes to the king in return for internal and external security. The royal court was responsible for the administration and the army. Large estates belonged to nobles. They were worked by servile labour that did the fishing, animal raising for milk, meat and skins, and the agricultural work.

The Songhai kingdom was the last major one in the region. Its fall did not bring an end to kingdoms in West Africa. Kingdoms that survived were Guinea, Benin in Nigeria, Ashanti in present day Ghana and Dahomey, north of Benin. These kingdoms continued the Trans Saharan trade with the Arab states in North Africa. The Trans Saharan trade was complex. It was not limited to trade and the exchange of gold, copper, iron, kola nuts, cloth, and salt. It was also about close co-operation and interdependence between kingdoms south of the Sahara and kingdoms north of the Sahara. Salt from the Sahara desert was just as important to the economies and kingdoms south of the Sahara as gold was for those in the north. Therefore, the exchange of these commodities was vital for the economic and political stability of the region.

Travel and trade in Songhai

Trade significantly influenced the course of history in West Africa. The wealth made through trade was used to build larger kingdoms and empires. To protect their trade interests, these kingdoms built strong armies. Kingdoms that desired more control of the trade also developed strong armies to expand their kingdoms and protect them from competition.

Long distance trade helped the local economy and supported internal trade. Merchants travelling between towns across the Sahara needed places to rest and stock up with food for the journey across the Sahara desert. Food would be provided by local markets that relied on local farms for supplies. This practice allowed merchants to plan long trips knowing that local markets would provide food and shelter. For this reason, many kingdoms in West Africa encouraged agricultural improvements to meet this need. Often this meant uniting smaller farmers, traders and societies into stronger trading blocs. For example, the Kuba kingdom in present day Congo brought together different cultures under a single authority and used the Congo River as a main transport link to other distant kingdoms. As a result, smaller traders joined with each other like the Chokwe and Lunda kingdoms under a single broad-based trade. This led to the increase of ivory and rubber trade between these kingdoms and with Portuguese traders.

The Songhai kingdom had existed in West Africa since the 11th century in the region of the city of Gao.

Sonni Ali became king of Songhai in 1464. During his reign, Songhai became the largest empire in Africa. The heart of the empire lay along the middle Niger River, southeast of the city of Gao.

Sonni Ali was a great military general. His army had a fleet of canoes; foot soldiers with leather and copper shields; a cavalry with iron breastplates under their tunics, lances, swords, and arrows with poisoned tips.

This army became the top force in the region. They occupied the city of Timbuktu with the famous University of Sankore in 1468, and in 1475 they took the most important trading city of Jenne (also known as Djenne).

Sonni Ali now had control over the three greatest trading cities on the Niger River: Gao, Timbuktu and Jenne.

he slave trade was also important for the economic development of West Africa. For a very long time, West African kingdoms had relied on slaves to carry out heavy work. The Songhai kingdom under the rule of Askia Mohammed used slaves as soldiers. Slaves were trusted not to overthrow their rulers. Slaves were also given important positions as royal advisers. Songhai rulers believed that slaves could be trusted to provide unbiased advice unlike other citizens who held a personal stake in the outcome of decisions. Another group of slaves was known as palace slaves or the Arbi. The Arbi slaves served mainly as craftspersons, potters, woodworkers, and musician. Slaves also worked on village farms to help produce enough food to supply the growing population in towns.

The Asante kingdom of the Akan people grew in about the 15th and 16th century into a powerful kingdom in the most southern parts of West Africa, present day Ghana. This growth was made possible by the rich gold mines found in the kingdom. The Akan people used their gold to buy slaves from the Portuguese. Since 1482, the Portuguese who were interested in obtaining Asante gold, had opened a trading port at El Mina. As a result, their first slave trade in West Africa was with the Akan people. The Portuguese bought the slaves from the kingdom of Benin, near the Niger Delta in Nigeria. Slave labour made it easy for the Akan people to shift from small scale agriculture to large scale agriculture (Giblin 1992). The shift transformed the Asante kingdom and it developed a wealthy agricultural and mining economy.

The Akan people needed slaves to work their gold mines and farms. Passing traders and a growing population in the Asante towns demanded increasing supplies of food. The slave trade with the Portuguese continued until the early 1700s. The Akan people supplied the Portuguese with slaves to work on sugar plantations in Brazil. A small number of slaves were kept in the Asante kingdom. However, by this period, the Atlantic slave trade dominated trade with West Africa. Kingdoms like the Asante and Dahomey used their power to raid societies like the Bambara, Mende, and Fulanis for slaves. The kingdom of Benin is the only known kingdom in West Africa to abolish slave trading in Benin. The slave trade ban was succesful and forced the Portuguese to search for slaves elsewhere in West Africa. However, Dutch traders took over the role. From the 1600s the Dutch dominated the West african and Atlantic Slave trade.

The Portuguese and Dutch governments were unable to colonise West African kingdoms because they were too strong and well organised. As a result, the slave and ivory, rubber and gold trades remained under the control of Asante, Fon, and Kongo kingdoms. In 1807, the British government abolished the slave trade. Because West African kingdoms did not co-operate with the British, the slave trade across the Atlantic Ocean continued. However, the slave trade declined in areas where the British had influence, for example the Gold Coast.

Industrial development in Britain led to increasing trade with West Africa in agricultural products like palm oil, rubber, and cocoa. To supply Britain with these products, the Asante kingdom kept the slaves they had captured for the Atlantic slave trade and used them as farm workers instead. This led to the growth of slavery in West Africa because each kingdom wanted to profit from this new trade. West African slavery came to a slow end towards the end of the 19th century when many of these kingdoms were colonised by the French and British. Former slaves became the landless lower classes.

Kingdoms

The states of the Niger Delta extend for about three hundred miles along the Gulf of Guinea from the Benin River on the West to the Cross River on the East. Due to the many rivers, which cross over each other, the main source of transport was by canoe. Societies found in this area include the Ibo, Ijaw, Jekiri Efik and Calabari.

Unlike other West African states, Niger ones were different in character. They were small states that maintained contact through war, trade and migrations. The Atlantic trade brought about great prosperity in this region. These states were known for their skill in politics and for their “middleman” skills in commerce. Their long history of internal trade had brought these small states together and led to economic growth of Bonny (also known as Igbani) and Warri states.

The Kingdom of Dahomey (also known as the Fon Kingdom of Dahomey) was the southern part of the Republic of Benin, a country that divides the dense forest of Nigeria from those of modern Ghana. Dahomey was the most prominent coastal state in the region. It was ruled by a king on the authority of the queen mother who held the power to appoint an heir. The king and queen mother ruled Dahomey from their capital Abomey. Dahomey began emerging as a great power in the early 18th century because of the slave trade. It also managed to overtake other coastal states competing for control of both the slave and inland trade. The Fon army was unusual in West Africa because its soldiers were women feared by other neighbouring coastal states.

In about 1650 there was a great demand from the West Indies sugar plantations for African slaves. The Fon people used their position as sea-merchants to ensure that they held a monopoly of the slave trade. The Dahomey kingdom also relied on its strong military to dominate weaker inland states and to conquer coastal states. States looking to trade in the region were expected to pay a fixed amount of tax and fixed prices for slaves. Custom duties were paid in respect of each ship as well.

By the 18th century the Fon king had absolute power and under his rule Dahomey became strong enough to capture neighbouring coastal states. The Fon were still paying tribute to the Oyo kingdom and this meant that they had to appease the Oyo with guns and other goods each year. In 1725, Dahomey conquered the Oyo kingdom, and three years later they pushed south to Savi and Whyad, Jakin was taken in 1732 but it was only in 1740 that the Fon won complete control when Whydah became a Fon colony. This ushered in control of the coast and even visiting Europeans had to gain prior permission to go ashore.

Atlantic System, Contact with Europeans

The arrival of the Portuguese in the 15th century in search of new trading opportunities changed the trade networks in West Africa. An important change was the new direction of the slave trade across the Atlantic Ocean instead of the Sahara desert. This increased the power of small West African kingdoms like the Asante and Dahomey kingdoms. It also contributed to the fall of the Songhai Empire, because the slave and gold trade were no longer going through the Songhai kingdom. As a result, the Songhai rulers could not claim tribute and taxes from these kingdoms.

The other change came from the growing slave trade. African slaves were captured from Africa to work as slaves in the Americas in the early 1500’s. Portugal, Spain, France and Britain were the key players in this slave trade, which lasted for more than 400 years. Because Portugal was the first to establish itself in the region and to enter treaties with West African kingdoms, it had the monopoly on the slave and gold trade. As a result, Portugal was responsible for transporting over 4.5 million Africans, approximately 40 percent of the slaves taken from the continent before the 1700s. During the 18th century however, Britain was responsible for almost 2.5 million of the 6 million African slaves traded. Due to expanding market opportunities in Europe and the Mediterranean, they increased trade across the Sahara and later gained access to the interior using the Senegal and Gambia River, which bisected long-standing trans-Saharan routes. The Portuguese brought in copper ware, cloth, tools, wine and horses and later included guns, in exchange for gold, pepper, slaves, and ivory. The growing trade across the Atlantic came to be called the triangular trade system.

The Triangular Trade System

The Atlantic Slave Trade (also known as the triangular trade) was a system of trade that revolved around three areas. The first point of the triangle would begin in Africa, where large shipments of people were taken across the Atlantic Ocean to the Americas (The Caribbean, North and South America) to be sold to work in colonies on plantations as slaves. Once the slaves were offloaded in the Americas, the same ships would then load products from plantations such as sugar, cotton and tobacco. These products would be sold in Europe. From Europe the ships would carry manufactured goods such as cloth, iron, rum and guns, which they would use in exchange for slaves and gold.

Most captured slaves were taken between 1450 and 1500, from the West African interior with the co-operation of African kings and merchants. There were occasional military campaigns organised by Europeans to capture slaves, especially by the Portuguese in what is now Angola. This accounts for only a small percentage of the total. In return, the African kings and merchants received various trade goods including beads, cowry shells (used as money), textiles, brandy, horses, and perhaps most importantly, guns. These guns became a very important trade commodity when West African kingdoms were increasingly organising their militaries into professional armies. During this period England sold close to 100 000 muskets a year to West African kingdoms.

Slaves crossing the Atlantic Ocean endured inhumane conditions aboard the ships transporting them. They would travel naked and cramped into the hold of the ship chained together at the ankles and packed together side-by-side in holds which were about 1.5 m high with hardly any light and fresh air. They were provided with buckets, which they had to use as toilets. This resulted in many slaves becoming sick and dying. Cases of fevers and small pox were common during the voyages. The health of slaves on board was made worse by the lack of medical attention. Slaves would be regularly hosed down with water each morning and those that had died overnight, would be thrown overboard.

The slave trade was abolished in 1807 by the British government. The French only abolished their slave trade in 1848. The continued Atlantic slave trade forced the British government to take responsibility to end slave trading. They captured European ships and released slaves on board. This was made more difficult by the unwillingness of West african kingdoms to give up the slave trade. The British government tried to influence the Asante rulers to stop practising slavery in their kingdom with no success. As a result, from the 1870s, the British government began to colonise the Asante people in order to prevent the use of slave labour, but also as an excuse to take control of the rich gold mines of the Asante and to protect British commercial interests against French expansion in the region. Click here to read a lesson about colonial rule and African responses.

Religion

The Songhai royal house in Gao had converted to Islam in the 11th century. Being a Muslim was important for gaining access to the major trade routes.

But Sonni Ali was a Muslim in name only. Most of his people also had not converted to Islam, but still followed their traditional religion and communicated with their ancestors.

This meant that women were much freer than women in strict Muslim societies. They mixed with the men and did not have to cover their faces.

Government and power

Sonni Ali was a brilliant administrator who created a centralised administration.

He replaced the traditional rulers with men who were his trusted servants or members of the royal family.

Each province had a governor with his own army, which collected tribute (taxes) from the farmers in the province.

Economy

The most common occupations were metalwork, fishing and carpentry. Sonni Ali developed new farming methods — he introduced slave-based farms.

  • Each slave-village had to produce a certain amount of grain for the king.
  • Any surplus grain could be used by the village.

Mohammed Ture

In 1492 Sonni Ali died. A year later, his son was overthrown by Mohammad Ture.

  • Mohammed Ture strengthened the administration of the empire and consolidated Sonni Ali’s conquests.
  • He was a Muslim and used Islam to enforce his authority throughout the empire and to extend trade

Timeline

800 - Gao was established

1110 - Timbuktu was established

1290 - Empire of Mali established and conquered Timbuktu and Gao

1375 - Timbuktu appeared for the first time on a European map

1400 - Gold trade flourished - from west Africa, through Timbuktu and Gao, to Europe

1450 - Large settlement of scholars and traders in Timbuktu

1468 - Songhay Empire established by Sunni Ali. Took over Timbuktu and Gao

1493 - Muhammed Ture, a Muslim, founded the Askia dynasty and took over Songhay Empire.

1530 - Portuguese came to Timbuktu in search of wealth. Only one man survived.

1591 - Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire conquered by Moroccans.


The Songhai Empire controlled the gold and salt trade across the Sahara to Europe.

  • The army protected the trade routes.
  • The three main trading centres were Gao, Timbuktu and Jenne on the Niger River.
  • The main source of government income was tribute from the provinces and the slave farms, and from taxes on trade.
  • The internal currency was salt.
  • The external currency was cowrie shells.
  • Gold and slaves were the main items of trade across the Sahara

Arab, Italian and Jewish merchants

For hundreds of years, Muslims, Christians and Jews inhabited Timbuktu. It was a centre of racial and religious tolerance. But after 1492 Mohammad Ture told the Jews to convert to Islam or leave


Mohammad Ture revived Timbuktu as a great centre of Islamic learning. He did not force the Songhai people to convert – most of them carried on with their traditional religious beliefs.

Scholars and students came from as far away as Cairo, Baghdad and Persia to study in Timbuktu and to consult with the learned historians and writers. Those who taught were known as ‘ambassadors of peace’.

Students and scholars studied grammar, law and surgery at the University of Sankore. Some of the great mosques, the university, and schools and libraries built at that time still stand today.

Leo Africanus has left us a firsthand account of the trade and learning in Timbuktu in the early 1500s.


In 1538 Muhammad Ture died.

The empire began to lose its strength and control of its vast territory. In the late 16th century civil war broke out. Droughts and disease also caused the empire to become less wealthy and less powerful.

In 1591 Morocco, equipped with European firearms, attacked Songhai’s main commercial centres – they wanted to get control of the wealth from the gold trade.

The Moroccan army plundered Timbuktu. The 500-year-old university was destroyed and the lecturers were exiled to Morocco.

One of those exiled was the great scholar Ahmed Baba, who had written 40 books. His library of 1 600 books was lost when he was exiled.

Although the Moroccans were not able to conquer Songhai, the invasion did lead to the decline of the empire.


The Moghuls were a powerful Muslim family who came from lands that are today part of Afghanistan and Uzbekistan. The Moghuls conquered almost all of south Asia in the 16th century. The Emperors ruled over a population that mostly practised the Hindu religion.

The first Moghul Emperor was called Babur. He conquered much of north India. Here is an account of a decisive battle:

"Babur had new light field guns and muskets, and combined them with more traditional horsemen and archers. Baburs' army consisted of about 12 000 men, including skilled horsemen and expert musketmen and artillerymen. He faced his ememy' army of 100 000 men and 1000 elephants. Before the battle, Babur place his light field artillery behind smaller ramparts and tied the guns together with leather thongs so that his enemy could not easily storm them. When the enemy's army came to a halt in from of these defences, Babur send his archers on horseback to the back of the enemy so that they were caught between gunfire and showers of arrows. Most of them died on the battlefield." - Adapted from India, Moghul Empire to British Raj, Paul Gaolen, CUP, 1992, page 8.

Babur described this battle in his memoirs:

"God made this victory easy for us! The battle was over in half a day; 6000 men were killed. Those who fled the battlefield were pursued; our men captured nobles of every rank. During the afternoon the leader's body was found on a heap of the dead; his head was brought to my court."

Defeated enemies' heads were made into a tower of victory for the Moghal emperor.

A Moghul emperor in memory of his wife, Mumtaz Mahal, who died while giving birth to their fourteenth child, built the magnificent building called the Taj Mahal. It took 22 years to build and was completed in 1648.

Government

The Mughals were Muslim rulers from the Uzbekistan region in Central Asia who invaded India in 1526.

By 1600, much of the Indian sub-continent became part of the largest empire in Indian history – the Mughal Empire. Babur, the founder of the empire:

  • was a brilliant military strategist
  • was a gifted writer and poet
  • had elegant gardens at his palace
  • lived according to strict personal rules.

The Mughals brought many changes to India:

  • Many small kingdoms were brought together under one government.
  • Anyone could see the emperor about complaints.
  • There was religious tolerance.
  • Excellent government brought political stability, which led to economic growth.
  • Urdu was the new dialect made up of Persian, Arabic and Hindi.

Society

The Mughals were a minority Muslim dynasty ruling over a Hindu majority. Society was organised on a feudal basis:

  • Under the emperor were the nobles.
  • The nobles had titles like Maharaja or Raja, which means ‘king’.
  • They owned large pieces of land, had their own armies.
  • They ruled over the peasants and collected taxes.

The Hindu society had a caste system (a system of four social groups) which a person was born into. This system determined who you would marry and what work you would do:

  • teachers – scholars – priests
  • rulers and warriors
  • skilled traders – merchants – minor officials
  • unskilled workers – peasants – service providers – artisans

The people outside the system were known as ‘untouchables’ – they were very poor; they worked in unhealthy, unpleasant and polluting jobs; they were not allowed to mix with the rest of society.

Women in India

In ancient times in India, women were equal in status to men. But, by the time of the Mughal Empire, women had become lower in status than men.

  • They had to cover their faces.
  • Child marriage was allowed.
  • Widows were burned (later this practice was stopped).

But women could own land and do business. Noble women got a better education than the majority of women – they learned to paint, write poetry and play music.


The Mughal Empire’s centralised government brought about political stability. It was also economically unified and strong because of:

  • a very good tax collecting system
  • a well-developed internal trade network:
    • the ports along the Indian coasts were very important for long-distance trade in the Indian Ocean
    • there were important river-borne trade routes along the Ganges River, and overland trade routes to Afghanistan, the Middle East and Central Asia
    • India traded with Europe, the Middle East and southeast Asia.

A major observatory was built near Deli.

One of the most remarkable astronomical instruments was invented in Mughal India: a seamless celestial globe using a secret wax casting method.

Military weapons at this time were far better than those made in Europe. By the 16th century, the Indians were manufacturing a variety of firearms:

  • large bronze guns
  • rapid-firing guns
  • war rockets with a range of more than a kilometre.

Persian artists were brought to India to share their art, culture and architecture.

Some Persians became the emperor’s scribes – illustrating manuscripts with scenes of court celebrations, battles and cheetahs being used for hunting.

Persian architects inspired two monuments which are today world heritage sites:

  • Emperor Humayun’s tomb
  • The Taj Mahal –
    • starting in 1632, Shah Jahan took 16 years to build a memorial for his wife who had died after the birth of their 14th child
    • today it is still known as one of the most beautiful symbols of love in the world.

By the end of the 17th century, India became the main trading destination of the English East India Company (EEIC). Trading posts were set up in some Indian provinces for cotton textile exports.

In 1757, Britain took over the very rich Bengal province after a battle, led by Commander Robert Clive.

Over the next 100 years, by 1857, Britain had annexed 60% of the Indian subcontinent.

In 1877 the British Queen Victoria was crowned Empress of India. At the time when the Chinese, Indian and Songhai emperors ruled wealthy and powerful empires, Europe was divided into many small states each with their own kings or princes.

There was a European empire, known as the Holy Roman Empire, which lasted from 800 until 1806 – it was not a powerful, centralised state but made up of many smaller states, which were often at war with each other. The Holy Roman Emperor was elected to office and had very little real power.

Trade and commerce expanded in Europe in the 12th and 13th centuries: the main longdistance trade routes were from the Baltic and the eastern Mediterranean to central and northern Europe.

In 1347, the bubonic plague (the Black Death) reached European cities along the trade routes. By 1400, half of the European population had died.

The economy and trade revived in the 1400s, which led to a period called the Renaissance. This was a time of renewed interest in art, and a spirit of enquiry developed which led to voyages of exploration.


The kings, nobles, and bishops of the Catholic Church controlled huge areas of land – so they had all the wealth and power.

  • The nobles gave land to the knights and manor lords.
  • They had to provide the king and nobles with soldiers.
  • These soldiers were peasants and serfs (like slaves) who lived on the land of the nobles.
  • The nobles protected the peasants but they had to pay many feudal dues to them.
  • The bishops and abbots were very wealthy and powerful – they were in charge of the large abbeys and monasteries. Abbeys were places of agricultural production and trade.
  • The monks, nuns and priests did everything for the community:
    • They married and buried the people.
    • They looked after the orphans, sick, disabled, old and poor.
    • They controlled the education.

      Wealthy women had legal and social rights – they could own land and some managed the accounts of the manors. But peasant women had a hard life working in the fields.


In 1347 the first wave of deaths from the bubonic plague swept across Europe.

  • It was found along the trade routes from China – brought by ship rats that came ashore full of disease-carrying fleas.
  • Symptoms were:
    • swellings in the armpit and groin
    • skin became covered in black blotches – reason it was called the Black Death.
    • It affected mainly poor people as their resistance to disease was low – they were often sick and weak from starvation caused by floods and bad harvests.

Flagellants were groups of people who whipped themselves to show God that they were taking the punishment and He must then stop the plague.

In England, the plague ended in 1666 when the Great Fire of London killed all the rats.

There were many consequences of this Black Death:

  • an economic decline because of the thousands of deaths
  • a shortage of labour
  • survivors lost faith in the government leaders and in the church
  • artists became obsessed with images of death in their paintings.

The centre of trade was in Italy, on the crossroads between the East and the West.

  • Important ports were Genoa and Venice.
  • Important towns were Florence in Italy, and towns in Flanders in present-day Belgium.
  • A new middle class of wealthy merchants and traders developed.
  • Kings taxed trade and increased their own wealth and power.
  • A new capitalistic spirit developed – you could become wealthy no matter what class you belonged to.
  • A banking system was started.
  • The Baltic Sea played an important part in linking all the trade routes of the European countries
    • transported goods such as timber, furs and metal.

As trade increased in the 14th century, Italy became very rich and powerful. Because of this wealth, there was a growing interest in art, literature and science.

  • This period from the 14th to the 17th century is known as the Renaissance.
  • Florence was one of the greatest centres of art and literature, because its ruler – Lorenzo de Medici – sponsored the artists and scientists.
  • Leonardo da Vinci is still admired as one of the greatest artists in the world.
    • He was a brilliant painter, sculptor, engineer and scientist.
    • One of his most famous paintings is the Mona Lisa.
  • Michelangelo was another great artist.
    • He was a painter, sculptor and architect.
    • He painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican in Rome.
  • The Renaissance in England was a period of great literature. William Shakespeare wrote many plays, for example Romeo and Juliet.
  • Copernicus made the startling discovery that the Sun, and not the Earth, was the centre of the solar system – this went against the teaching of the Catholic Church.
  • This time of inquiry led to the voyages of discovery of Columbus, Dias and Vasco da Gama.

Trade changed the economies of Europe – new towns and cities grew.

New social classes formed – merchants and artisans. Old feudal ties were broken.

Merchant guilds were used to protect trading interests.

Kings taxed the trade, which began to replace feudal dues as their source of income.


The Middle Ages in Europe, a feudal society

The Middle Ages in Europe are the years between about 410 AD and 1500 AD. At the time that the other empires you read about in this section were at their height, Europe was quite isolated from the rest of the world, and was divided into many small states.

Europeans were ignorant of the rest of the world. Most Europeans believed that the world was flat and that is was dangerous to sail close to the edge. They believed in sea monsters and that strange and weird people lived in other parts of the world.

People’s religious beliefs were more important to them than the country that they lived in. The Roman Catholic Church was a very rich and powerful social institution in Europe. At its head was the Pope, who lived in the Vatican City in Rome. The Church owned land, and people had to pay some of their wages as taxes to the Church. It influenced what people believed about the world. The Church taught people that life on earth was not important. Almost everyone in Europe belonged to the Catholic Church and believed in God and the devil. The teachings of the Church were based on very strict rules. People were punished severely for breaking these rules. Priests also told people that they could make sure of a place in Heaven if they did not break these rules.

Universities were also important social institutions at the time. The reason universities had an important influence was that learning took place there. Only a small number of men had enough money to go to university. Very few people in Europe could read or write. Books were very expensive and scarce. Most books were written in Latin, a language not spoken by most people, but used in the universities and the Church.

The most powerful and wealthy group of people in Europe were called the aristocracy or the nobility. They were made up of a few hundred families who owned most of the land in Europe. They lived in big castles and had hundreds of people working for them and living on their land. Most members of the aristocracy did not work for a living. The aristocracy did not see themselves as ordinary people; rather they believed they had special or ‘noble’ blood. You could only become a member of the aristocracy if you were born into a noble family. There were many revolts by peasants against the harsh conditions under which they lived and worked, but these revolts were crushed without mercy.

The death penalty was used for major crimes such as murder, treason, counterfeiting and arson as well as for theft in the Middle Ages. Each year hundreds on people were hanged. Executions were always in public. The rulers of the time believed that if you wanted to stop people from committing a crime, the punishment should be as harsh as possible.

A new era: changes in Europe bring about changes all over the world

After the Middle Ages in Europe, the European Renaissance began to take place in the 15th and 16th centuries. During that time there was a re-birth of learning, and new developments took place in many areas of life. During the Renaissance, people at universities started asking some very good questions about the world around them. Some of their ideas led to important changes in science, art, language and education and also led to some challenges to the power of the Church.

The European Renaissance was going to change the way Europe interacted with the rest of the world, as feudalism was changing and we see a new middle class emerging. European trade led to the establishment of fortified trading stations and eventually permanent European settlements in the Americas, Africa and India.


The world after 1600 was very different from the world before that time. The voyages of discovery changed the global power structure. It was the beginning of the domination of the world by the West.

Did you notice that there was a common theme running through the story of the wealthy and powerful empires?

Trade → wealth → power

Good rulers → efficient collection of taxes → wealth

Political stability – no war – religious toleration → unity

Wealth and time to sponsor art, learning, culture, science and new inventions such as better ships or guns to control trade routes

The Songhai and the Mughal empires fell because they were invaded. The Ming dynasty came to an end because it stopped trading.

European conquest: 15th to 18th centuries

Colonisation

When? 1453 to 1500s

Why? Power – wealth – land – raw materials – labour Spread Christianity

Where? Cape – East coast of Africa – America – South America

Who? Portuguese (East Africa) Spanish (South America and America)

How? Kings and church supported New technology Voyages of discovery Stock exchange gave capital Powerful companies Soldiers – conquistadors

What? Violent – forceful – bloody conquest Indigenous people got killed, diseases Forced labour – enslaved

Result? Colonies – exploited raw materials – wealthy colonists

Significance? Indigenous cultures wiped out Racial arrogance and discrimination European dominated economic globalism Slavery widespread

How did European expansion change the world?

When the land trade route to the riches of the East was blocked, countries needed to find a sea route. The Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and British were able to invent new technology that enabled them to sail to unknown faraway places. Their kings and churches supported them.

Colonisation resulted as the indigenous people were forced into submission and robbed of their land. Raw materials were obtained from the farms and mines in the colonies. A new way of life developed as slavery became part of the economies of the new colonies.

Technology

Until 1453, the Europeans were dependent on Arab overland traders to get gold, silk and spices from the East.

  • In 1453, the Turks captured Constantinople and this trade was disrupted.
  • The kings of Spain and Portugal looked for a sea route to the East.
  • They used the navigational experience of the Arabs to design new technology:
    • caravels = better ships for long voyages + large cargoes with cannons and muskets
    • astrolabe = could predict positions of the planets and determine local time
    • quadrant = could plot positions accurately.

The Portuguese

  • In 1486, the king of Portugal sent Bartholomew Dias to find a route to the East.
    • Dias sailed south along the west coast of Africa and rounded the Cape.
    • He then made contact with Arab-Swahili trading settlements on the east coast of Africa.
  • In 1498, Vasco da Gama used the experience of Dias and found the route to the East.
    • The Portuguese eventually destroyed the Arab-Swahili trading stations and gained control of the spice trade.
    • Spices were essential for preserving food and were probably more valuable than gold at that time

The Spanish

  • In 1492, the king of Spain sent the Italian, Christopher Columbus, on a voyage west to find a route to the East.
    • After 70 days, Columbus landed on the coast of South America.
    • He defeated the indigenous people and took many of them back to Spain as slaves.
    • Later the Spanish colonised all the land they conquered.
  • For the next 100 years, the Portuguese and Spanish dominated overseas trade.
    • They were supported by the Catholic Church to convert the ‘heathen’.
    • In 1493 the Pope divided the world between Spain and Portugal by the Treaty of Tordesillas.
    • Based on this treaty, a north-south line was drawn on the world map.
    • Spain could exploit all land west of the line.
    • Portugal could conquer all the land east of the line.

The Dutch

The Dutch tried to break the Portuguese and Spanish control of the trade with new technology and the establishment of the Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie (VOC; known in English as the Dutch East India Company or the DEIC).

In 1648, the Dutch won their independence from Spanish rule. This led to religious, intellectual and commercial freedom.

Scientists, artists and merchants from many parts in Europe came to settle in Amsterdam, which became the centre for international trade because of two things:

  • The VOC became the world’s first stock exchange – shareholders invested in the company; this capital was used to go exploring for colonies and riches.
  • For 100 years the VOC had a virtual monopoly of the spice trade; it became the richest and most powerful company in the world.

The English

The English built light, fast-moving, well-equipped warships. These ships were able to defeat and plunder the Spanish ships filled with gold and silver from America = pirates.

England formed the Royal East India Company. But they were unable to challenge the Dutch control of the Pacific Spice Islands.

  • In 1588 the British defeated the main Spanish Armada (= navy).
  • This was the beginning of England’s supremacy at sea and opened the way for their colonisation of America.

Conclusion

European expansion and conquest was made possible by:

  • sponsorship of kings
  • support of the Catholic Church
  • new technology
  • companies
  • stock exchange.

The balance of world power was affected as European powers began competing over trade routes and colonies. European expansion laid the foundation for modern-day globalisation.


The consequences of slavery

Wealth from trading and slavery changed the Western powers.

  • Cities and ports became wealthy and larger, e.g. Amsterdam, Bristol and Liverpool.
  • Stock companies invested in buying slaves for plantations.
  • Banks lent money to new businesses trading overseas.
  • A new middle class of entrepreneurs emerged from trading.
  • Science and technology developed – new weapons and methods of production.
  • A new consumer market of ordinary people, who wanted things such as sugar, cotton, tobacco and tea, developed.

Ideas of racial superiority

Europeans felt they were more educated and civilised than the ‘heathen’ indigenous people. This made Europeans feel they were justified in exploiting the indigenous populations.

Portugal and the destruction of Indian Ocean trade

  • Vasco da Gama made four voyages to India.
    • With his superior cannons he attacked Muslim trade routes and settlements.
    • With brutal violence he took any goods he could find.
    • Within a few years the Portuguese had destroyed the Arab-Swahili trading towns, but taking control of the trade was very difficult. This was mainly because small Arab trading vessels, called dhows, easily avoided the Portuguese gunboats.
  • Munhu Mutapa was king of the land we now call Zimbabwe.
    • He traded with the Swahili traders on the east coast of Africa.
    • In 1569, the king of Portugal sent an army to invade Munhu Mutapa’s kingdom and other kingdoms to get gold.
    • The African king did not want war – he wanted to be friendly and trade.
    • The Portuguese brought three demands from the king of Portugal:
      • expel all Arabs from the settlement
      • accept Christianity
      • hand over the gold mines to Portugal.
    • Munhu Mutapa saw the military power of Portugal and agreed to the terms.
    • He became a Christian.
  • As a result, Portugal dominated the area, including chiefdoms stretching the east coast (present-day Mozambique).
    • This occupation was a failure as many Portuguese settlers died from malaria and wars, and it was too hard to get the gold out of the rock.
    • The Portuguese king lost interest in the area and ‘gave’ the land to a Portuguese viceroy who, in turn, gave it to settlers.
    • They formed private armies of about 5 000 and forced the local chiefs to pay them taxes.
    • By 1800 they were only trading around Delagoa Bay.
    • The Gaza kingdom of Soshangane grew powerful as they traded slaves and ivory with the Portuguese.
    • The results of the Portuguese invasion were:
      • destruction of the Swahili trading settlements
      • destabilisation of African kingdoms
      • destruction of trade in gold.

The Dutch East India Company in South Africa

  • During the 1600s, the VOC (or DEIC) was the richest and most powerful trading company in the world.
  • It had 150 ships and 40 giant warships.
  • The Cape had provided fresh water for all passing ships.
  • By 1650 the Dutch had competition from England, France and Portugal.
    • Therefore, in 1652, the VOC established a military station at the Cape to protect their refreshment station from rivals.
      • After five years of working for the company, the Dutch were free to find their own farms in the interior of South Africa.
      • As the local Khoekhoe did not want to work for the Dutch, Malay slaves were imported to work on the wheat, vegetable, cattle and wine farms.
      • For 143 years the VOC did not want to expand, and they could not control the burghers in the interior.
      • During this time, there were many hundreds of raids and counter-raids between these trekboers and the Khoekhoe.
      • The trekboers were taking more and more of the Khoekhoe’s land as the following towns grew: Stellenbosch, Paarl, Genadendal, Worcester, Swellendam and Graaff-Reinet.
      • By 1800, war and smallpox had virtually destroyed the Khoekhoe communities.
      • Some went north and became the mixed-race tribe of the Griquas. Others became servants and farm workers.

Colonialism and slavery

Slaves in the Cape came from all over the world, but the majority were Malay people.

  • In 1692 there were 337 slaves and 799 freemen.
  • By 1810 there were 30 421 slaves and 30 937 freemen.
  • The Malay slaves were involved in various occupations – there were coachmen, tailors, painters, shoemakers, carpenters, fishermen, blacksmiths, domestic workers and farm labourers.
  • The Dutch believed that their Christian civilisation entitled them to treat the slaves as the lowest of the low.
    • There was racial discrimination against the slaves.
    • They were treated as property or animals, rather than human beings.
    • Adults were called ‘boy’ and ‘girl’.
    • Historians have recorded many incidents of the Dutch cruelly punishing the slaves: whipped until dead; branded with a hot iron; both ears cut off.

Columbus in America

In 1492 Columbus landed on one of the Caribbean islands, thinking it was India.

  • He called the local Arawak people Indians.
  • The Spanish king and bankers were sponsoring Columbus – he would get 10% of the profits.
  • Columbus made four voyages to the land they called the ‘New World’ (= America).
  • His aim was to take land and riches for the king and Catholic Church.
  • He once captured 500 Arawak and shipped them back to Spain as slaves.
  • In the land we call Haiti today, virtually all the indigenous people were killed off by forced labour, disease and starvation.
    • In 1493 the population was about 100 000; by 1570 it was 300 – the result of conquest and exploitation.

The Spanish conquest of the Aztec

After Columbus, commercial companies financed expeditions of exploration. These expeditions were organised on military lines led by conquistadors (= soldiers).

One area colonised = the Aztec Empire occupied the area we now call Mexico.

  • The Aztecs had a developed culture.
    • There was a class system consisting of nobles, travelling merchants, commoners, peasants and slaves.
    • Education was compulsory – they taught history, religion, war, trade, crafts, civic duties, music, drama and poetry.
    • But the Aztecs had human sacrifices which they believed caused the sun to rise, crops to grow and favourable weather.
  • In 1519 the Spanish king sent Cortés with 500 men, 17 horses and 10 cannons to subdue the Aztecs and take their gold.
    • Cortés was welcomed by Emperor Moctezuma II at his palace in the capital city of Tenochtitlan, and they exchanged gifts.
    • Spanish troops massacred an unarmed crowd at a religious ceremony and held the emperor hostage.
    • In a later battle, the emperor was killed but the Aztecs continued to fight fiercely.
    • Eventually, after three years, the Aztec Empire collapsed, its people destroyed by disease and starvation.
    • Mexico City was built on the ruins of the old capital and the colony was called the New Spain.

The Spanish conquest of the Inca

  • Incas = about 12 million people, speaking 20 different languages, lived on 4 000 km2 of land along the Andes Mountain range on the west coast of South America.
    • The Incas were advanced in their engineering and architectural skills.
    • They had 14 000 km of well-built roads for efficient and fast transport.
  • 10 years after Cortés the Spanish king sent Pizarro to defeat the Inca.
    • When Pizarro arrived in 1532, Atahualpa had just been made emperor after a civil war which had ravaged Inca cities and destroyed its economy.
    • Pizarro invited the Inca emperor to a feast and then captured him while the conquistadors slaughtered thousands of Incas.
    • The emperor offered enormous amounts of gold and silver for his release.
    • When the ransom was paid, the Spaniards killed the emperor.
    • Guerrilla campaigns continued for the next few years.
    • Internal fighting and jealousy weakened the Spanish. Pizarro was assassinated.
    • Eventually the Inca Empire ended in 1572 and today we know it as Peru.

Slavery and forced labour

  • The Spanish king gave a grant to the first settlers of the new colonies who then:
    • protected a certain part of the indigenous population
    • taught them Spanish
    • taught them about the Catholic faith.
  • In return, the local people had to give the settlers labour, corn, wheat, chickens or gold. But, in reality, this forced labour was like slavery.
  • Previous owners of mines were forced to be labourers in the mines.
  • The Spaniards became very rich and the world’s leading supplier of silver taken from the Aztecs and Incas.
  • Between 1496 and 1820, 10 to 15 million Africans were forcibly brought to the New World as slaves.
  • They worked in mines and on coffee, sugar, tobacco and cotton plantations.

Conclusion

  • Colonisation changed the world economy:
    • Europe provided the capital, the market and the technology.
    • Africa provided the slaves.
    • The New World provided the raw materials and products from the plantations.
  • In the 16th century, the colonists believed in the natural order of the supremacy of race and they used this belief to justify their control of the colonies.
  • All the colonies had societies that were constructed around race:
    • The white settlers had all the wealth and power.
    • At the bottom of the ladder were the indigenous labourers and then the slaves.

The countries of Europe expanded their power by conquering and taking over colonies, their resources, and their people during the 15th to 18th centuries.

This was made possible by the development of military technology and naval advances.

Slavery changed the way the Western European powers functioned and also drastically changed the lives of the colonised people.

The Portuguese in Africa and the Indian Ocean, and the development of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), as well as the Spanish conquest in South America led to colonialism, slavery and forced labour, which had a huge impact on indigenous societies and in the rest of the world.


How did the French Revolution lay the foundations for modern democracies?

A revolution is a dramatic change in society. This happened in France in 1789. Discontented ordinary citizens revolted against the Old Order of government, known as the Ancien Régime. After six bloody years of protests, a new constitution was adopted in 1795. The French people had achieved ‘liberty, equality and fraternity’. Then Napoleon Bonaparte ruled France from 1799 to 1815. He put the nation through a series of devastating wars. However, the ideals of the French Revolution spread throughout the world. Ordinary people were inspired to protest against their oppressive rulers. The French Revolution laid the foundations of our modern democracies.


Social causes

The French people had many complaints:

  • The Third Estate was heavily taxed – 80% of their income could be taken from them. But the rich First and Second Estates were not taxed.
  • The factory workers were cruelly treated. They were poor and lived in dreadful conditions in the towns.
  • The peasants on the farms hated the feudal system.
    • In return for the protection of a noble, the peasants had to work for him, pay to use his mill, oven, slaughterhouse and winepress.
    • The peasants could not hunt on the farm.
    • The noble would often ride all over the peasants’ precious vegetable gardens.
  • The wealthy professionals, called the bourgeoisie, were angry because:
    • they had no say in the government and no freedom of speech
    • they could never be promoted because the nobles got all the top positions, even though many were not suited to these positions.

Political causes – how the French were governed

  • King Louis XVI, from the Bourbon family, had a weak personality.
  • His Austrian wife, Queen Marie Antoinette, dominated him.
  • The King had absolute power – what he said was law. The Estate-General, the French parliament, had not met since 1614.
  • With a lettre de cachet (= a letter bearing the King’s seal), anyone could be sent to prison without a trial.

It is interesting to note that at this time the monarchies in Britain and Russia had introduced some social and labour reforms. Therefore, there was no need for their people to revolt.

Economic causes – bankruptcy

  • People were starving in France in 1789 because of a severe drought, which had caused a lack of food, making food prices too high for them to afford.
  • The rich First and Second Estates were not taxed, as the King did not want to lose their support.
  • Louis XVl demanded heavy taxes from the Third Estate because France was almost bankrupt as a result of:
    • past wars, e.g. the American War of Independence
    • debt because Louis XV had spent a fortune on his Versailles palace
    • Marie Antoinette’s extravagant lifestyle, spending huge amounts of money on clothes and court entertainment.

The philosophers – inspired the people to protest

The thinkers or intellectuals of that time were called philosophers.

  • They wrote articles that encouraged the French people to question the Divine Right of Kings, which meant that a king’s authority came from God and no one could ever criticise the king.
  • Voltaire
    • openly attacked the abuses in the church and the political tyranny of the Ancien Régime (Old Order).
  • Rousseau wrote
    • The Social Contract, which said that all citizens should submit themselves to the General Will of the people (= democracy).
  • Montesquieu promoted the radical and unheard-of idea of the separation of government powers:
    • some people make the laws = legislative powers
    • some people carry out the laws = executive powers
    • some people judge the lawbreakers = judicial powers.

Conclusion

  • The French people were oppressed, hungry and angry in 1789.
    • They blamed King Louis XVI for their problems.
    • The philosophers inspired them to protest and fight for their rights.
    • The revolutionary motto was:
    • ‘Liberty, Equality and Fraternity’
    • = freedom, no social classes, brotherhood.

The Estate-General

  • The King called the Estate-General together to discuss the economic crisis.
  • A deadlock (5 May 1789) when the deputies of the three estates met at Versailles.
    • All the decisions were to be made by a vote of the estates – each estate had one vote. This, however, would mean that the privileged clergy and nobles would always vote together against reforms and they would beat the Third Estate two to one each time.
    • The Third Estate refused to accept this voting method and declared themselves a National Assembly.
      • They were then locked out of the meeting place and so they met on a nearby indoor tennis court.
      • They swore that they would not separate until France had a new constitution.
      • This was known as the Tennis Court Oath (20 June 1789).
      • The lesser nobility and the lower clergy supported them and soon the King ordered them all to join the Assembly. Individual voting (= one vote per member) would take place. This was a victory for the Third Estate.

The ordinary people protest

  • Meanwhile, tempers were flaring up in Paris because of the dismissal of Necker, the King’s financial advisor.
  • The King had fired Necker after Necker had suggested that the nobles and clergy should also pay taxes.
  • On 14 July 1789, a starving, lawless mob equipped with pikes stormed the Bastille.
  • The Bastille was a prison and therefore a visible symbol of the royal tyranny.
  • The mob paraded through the city with some of the prison guards’ heads on their pikes, as proof of their victory.
  • The 14th of July is now celebrated as a public holiday in France.

Louis XVI started to lose his power

  • Citizens set up a local government and recruited a National Guard under La Fayette, a hero from the American War of Independence.
  • A humiliated Louis XVI was forced to wear a tri-colour cockade – the red, white and blue revolutionary badge.
  • Bread riots spread through all the towns.
  • The peasants rose up and burned their hated nobles’ castles.
  • The terrified nobles fled to foreign countries to get help. They became known as the émigrés.

Women played their part

  • In October 1789, about 7 000 hungry, angry women marched 22 km to Versailles.
    • They had heard that the queen was giving a banquet to their Flemish guards.
    • With the help of La Fayette and the National Guard, they forced the royal family to return as virtual prisoners to the Tuileries palace in Paris.
  • Charlotte Corday was passionate about stopping the violence, which she felt Marat was stirring up with his newspaper articles. (Marat was a radical journalist who criticised the conservative revolutionary leaders.)
    • She went to his house and found him in his bath where he was working because of an irritating skin disorder.
    • She stabbed him to death with a large knife that she had hidden under her dress.
    • This scene is today remembered in a painting that has become very famous.

Revolutionary reforms

  • The National Assembly now controlled the King, the administration and the army.
  • By 1791 a document was drawn up which gave all citizens liberty, equality, justice and a say in the government.
  • It was called ‘The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen’.
  • The evils of centuries were swept away. A limited monarchy was created together with a parliament. This is known as a constitutional monarchy.
  • The privileges of the nobles and clergy were abolished
  • The clergy became civil servants paid by the government.

The reaction to the reforms

  • Bitter opposition came from the royalists, nobles and clergy who were angry at their loss of power and privileges. They turned to foreign countries for help.
  • The poverty-stricken town workers and peasants were furious that their economic grievances were not sorted out.
  • In June 1791, the royal family disguised themselves and tried to flee to Marie Antoinette’s family in Austria.
  • However, they were recognised and arrested at Varennes near the border, and brought back to Paris, humiliated.

The violent and radical phase of the revolution

  • In October 1791 a group of extremists, called the Jacobins, managed to get control of the new Assembly.
  • Prussia and Austria were desperate to prevent a revolution in their countries. They invaded France in April 1792 to rescue the monarchy.
  • Panic and wild rumours spread. The Tuileries palace was stormed and the royal family became prisoners. About 600 of the Swiss guards, who have been recruited to safeguard the royal family, were massacred by the mob.
  • The Jacobins, led by Danton and Robespierre, hunted out nobles and priests. More than 1 000 people were killed. This time became known as the September Massacre.
  • The monarchy was abolished and France was declared a republic.
  • Patriotic soldiers filled with a nationalistic spirit marched to the borders singing the new national anthem, the Marseillaise.
  • In January 1793 the King was guillotined. The revolutionaries were fighting the enemy inside and outside the country.

The terror continued – the end of the Revolution

A feeling of utter horror spread through the monarchies of Europe. Britain, Holland, Austria, Prussia, Spain and Sardinia joined together in a coalition and declared war on France.

  • The Jacobins formed a Committee of Public Safety. They began a Reign of Terror in September 1793, which lasted for 10 months.
  • Fanatical Robespierre aimed to get rid of all traitors. About 40 000 suspects were brutally butchered or guillotined, including Marie Antoinette.
  • Robespierre guillotined his friend Danton, who had wanted the terror to stop.
  • Soon Robespierre himself was overthrown by his own friends and guillotined. This ended the terror.
  • In 1795 a new moderate middle-class body of five members was formed to govern France.
    • It was called the Directory.
    • The Directory ruled the country for four years.
    • But it was corrupt, inefficient and it could not solve France’s financial problems.

Conclusion

To grasp the events of the revolution, learn the above eight headings. Then tell the story under each heading. Notice the part played by the various groups of people. They each wished to achieve something different through the revolution.

  • The professionals in the Third Estate were not hungry or violent like the mobs. These educated people were influenced by the philosophers and they started the revolution because they wanted freedom and democracy.
  • But the majority of the population were suffering from hunger and were being treated cruelly, and their anger caused violent rioting as the revolution progressed.
  • Notice the role that women and individuals played.
  • Another unexpected factor of the revolution was the invasion of the foreign powers.
  • You can form your own opinion on why Robespierre, the leader of the Reign of Terror, was himself guillotined.

Napoleon’s rise to power

Napoleon was noticed by the Directory for his excellent strategies as a soldier against the invading countries.

  • He was put in charge of one section of the French army. He became a hero when he conquered the Italians and brought back many looted treasures.
  • In Egypt he beat the Egyptians at the Battle of the Pyramids. But the famous British Admiral Lord Nelson destroyed all the French ships at the Battle of the Nile. [Bod]Napoleon heard that the Directory was very unpopular.
  • He managed to get himself back to France where he staged a coup d’état (= a forceful overthrowing of the government).
  • Napoleon made himself First Consul in 1799.

The Napoleonic wars

About 13 years of warfare followed. Napoleon conquered the monarchs of Europe and liberated the people through his brilliant military tactics.

  • He spread the ideals of the French Revolution of equality and fraternity, but not of liberty.
  • He put his own family on the thrones he had conquered.
  • At first Napoleon was the ‘liberator’. But slowly a nationalistic spirit began to rise and the people turned against him as an ‘oppressor’.
  • In 1804 Napoleon crowned himself Emperor.
    • He ruled autocratically with no parliament.
    • But he made sure that all the officials he chose were efficient and responsible to him.

Napoleon’s reforms

  • Napoleon modernised France and ran the country efficiently.
  • He established the Bank of France.
  • The streets of Paris were widened and beautified.
  • The peasants were given the church lands.
  • The bourgeoisie were given high positions in the army and navy.
  • A Legion of Honour was introduced to reward the achievements of ordinary people.
  • Freedom of worship was restored with an agreement with the Pope. It was called the Concordat. But Napoleon chose the bishops.
  • The education system was improved.
  • The legal system was reformed and simplified through the Code Napoleon

The end of the Napoleonic era

  • After the famous Battle of Waterloo in 1815, the British captured Napoleon and sent him to the island of St Helena, where he died, supposedly of stomach cancer, in 1821.
  • Napoleon has become known as one of the most famous generals of all time.
  • He was called ‘The Son of the Revolution’. If it had not been for the revolution, he would not have had the opportunity to rise to power.
  • He got rid of the Old Order in Europe but he replaced it with his own type of absolute power.
  • He spread the ideals of equality and fraternity throughout, Europe but he did not give people democracy or freedom of speech.
  • As the wars went on, year after year, thousands of soldiers died. Napoleon then became known as the ‘bloody tyrant’ and the ‘disturber of the world’s peace’. The people that he had liberated turned their nationalistic protest against him.
  • When the coalition armies of Europe captured Paris in 1814, King Louis XVIII was restored to the throne.

Toussaint L’Ouverture and the slave revolts

In 1791, Toussaint brilliantly led a successful slave revolt against the French soldiers in the French colony of Haiti.

  • Toussaint had been a slave who could read. He read some articles by the enlightened French philosophers about individual rights and equality.
  • He then became a general in the Spanish army fighting the French.
  • When slavery was abolished on the French side of the island, Napoleon asked him to come back to the French side.
  • He agreed to help the French. He ejected the invading British and Spanish armies in seven brilliant battles in seven days.
  • Toussaint was made Commander-in-Chief of the colony and he ensured liberty and equality for all, regardless of race.

Toussaint is remembered

  • Napoleon was persuaded by the wealthy plantation owners in Haiti to reinstate slavery.
  • There was such an uproar from the slaves that Napoleon eventually came to an agreement with Toussaint. Haiti’s independence would be recognised if Toussaint agreed to retire from public life.
  • A few months later Napoleon betrayed Toussaint and sent him to prison, where he died.
  • But his friends carried on the fight for freedom and eventually Haiti became independent.
  • Toussaint, influenced by the French Revolution, had changed an entire society of slaves into a free, self-governing people.
  • Today the legacy of Toussaint is remembered by the world through statues, monuments, plays, poems, books, paintings, songs and even an opera.

The French Revolution had a huge impact on the world.

  • It started the modern age as it destroyed the foundations of the Old Order:
    • absolutist politics
    • legal inequality
    • a feudal economy
    • an alliance of church and state.
  • ‘The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen’ of 1789 became an important document for the whole world.
  • It created a new vision in the world:
    • that sovereignty resides in nations
    • that a constitution and the rule of law govern politics
    • that people are equal and enjoy inalienable rights
    • that the church and state should be separate.
  • The separation of government powers (into legislative, executive and judicial) by countries all over the world today, was first promoted by Montesquieu.
  • The French Revolution helped to introduce male voting rights – even if a man did not own property.
  • Women realised that they too could protest for their rights.
  • The French revolution also showed that states could be overthrown by mass action:
    • it became an inspiration and guideline for revolutionaries throughout the world, including South Africa.

Summary of Topic

The conditions prevailing from 1614 under the old order laid fertile ground for the outbreak of the revolution in 1789.

  • The harsh economic crisis of 1788–1789 adding to the mounting social and political inequalities, served as the immediate cause of the revolution.
  • The Enlightenment era produced philosophers (such as Montesquieu, Rousseau, Voltaire and Marat) whose writings played a crucial role in influencing ideas as to why the masses should revolt against the old order.
  • The course of the revolution, starting from the meeting of the Estate-General (May 1789), the establishment of the National Assembly and the Tennis Court Oath sworn in June 1789, signified the commitment of the masses to destroying the old order and putting a new one in place, based on equality.
  • The storming of the Bastille (July 1789), which was seen as a symbol of the power of the monarchist dynasty, signified the breakdown of this power.
  • The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (August 1789), a month after the fall of the Bastille, ushered in a new order.
  • The women of France, though not real beneficiaries of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, played an important role in pressurising the royal family through their march (October 1789) to leave their expensive palace in Versailles outside Paris and move back to the Tuileries.
  • The King was executed in January 1793 and this meant the end of absolute monarchy in France.
  • The Revolution became very aggressive in the Reign of Terror waged against sympathisers to the royal family and those labelled anti-revolutionary by the Jacobins, the violent Republicanists under Robespierre between 1793 and 1794.
  • The rule by the Directory (1795-1799) of elected representatives was characterised by conflict, corruption and a chaotic atmosphere. The people were still not happy with the government and the way the country was being run.
  • The general discontent against the Directory paved the way for the coup d’état of Brumaire in November 1799 by Napoleon Bonaparte. Immediately after taking over, Napoleon centralised power again and declared himself Emperor with hereditary privileges.
  • The general discontent that continued after the execution of the King and Queen and the taking over of power by Napoleon Bonaparte raised questions as to what the Revolution had actually achieved.

How and why did transformation occur in southern Africa between 1750 and 1835?

Like France, South Africa had its own political revolution after 1750. The Tswana and the Ndwandwe were powerful tribes in the interior of South Africa. They relied on the amabutho to fight for them. A dynamic military leader, called Shaka, suddenly rose to power. He brought in new military tactics and beat or absorbed all the tribes around him. This period, which is known as the Mfecane (in Nguni) or the Difaqane (in Sotho) resulted in other new, strong tribes being formed from the people who had run away from Shaka. Mzilikazi formed the powerful Ndebele nation. Moshoeshoe was a great leader of his Sotho nation. In just a few years, the political face of South Africa had been transformed.


The San

For hundreds of years these Stone Age hunter-gathers had lived undisturbed in the interior of South Africa. But, by 1750, their numbers were getting smaller as they clashed with the white farmers and the more powerful Nguni tribes.

The Khoekhoe

The Khoekhoe were pastoralists who lived in the southern Cape. They had a number of conflicts with the white farmers over land and cattle grazing.

The ‘Bantu’ speakers

The Nguni, Sotho-Tswana and many other tribes came from northern Africa.

  • They settled all over South Africa from about 300 to 700 AD.
  • Before 1750, there was plenty of grazing land, so the tribes were divided up into small independent chiefdoms.

Portuguese explorers and traders

After 1486, the above three groups had some contact with Portuguese shipwreck survivors along the east coast.

  • Portuguese traders, mainly from Mozambique, bartered with various tribes.
  • Sometimes there would be aggressive attacks with fatalities on both sides.

The Dutch settlers

In 1652, the Dutch East India Company started a halfway-station vegetable garden at the Cape with Jan van Riebeeck in charge. After 5 years the workers were made ‘free burghers’ and given land in the interior to farm. Over the years, the number of these ‘free burghers’ (who began developing their own language and culture and became known as Boers or trekboers) increased:

  • They took more and more of the Khoekhoe’s land.
  • By 1750, Cape Town was a growing, bustling settlement with taverns, inns and shops to trade with the passing ships.
  • Many fights over land occurred between the trekboers, the San and the Khoekhoe.

Interior: expansion of southern Tswana chiefdoms

  • After 1750, the southern Tswana expanded and settled south of the Vaal River.
  • Large social and political changes started to take place because of fierce competition over land, cattle and trade with the Cape and Mozambique.
  • Chiefs who had imported goods like guns, and who had control of trading goods like cattle, ivory and animal skins, became more powerful.
  • These chiefs could use their wealth to buy the loyalty of smaller chiefs.
    • One of the largest of these communities was the Hurutshe.
    • The southern Tswana claim to be descended from their royal line.
    • By 1800, some Tswana communities adopted a raiding lifestyle with horses and guns in defence of other raiders.
    • They were called the Kora or the Koranna.

In the east: the rise of the Ndwandwe under Zwide

Zwide aimed to expand his borders and to defeat his enemy, the Mthethwa.

  • A serious drought in 1790 caused widespread warfare as tribes competed for land.
  • Smaller clans joined with stronger chiefdoms.
    • Armies were formed according to age groups.
    • These were called amabutho.
  • The tribe became more united and more efficient in:
    • taking land from other groups
    • raiding neighbours
    • controlling trade routes.
  • When Zwide came to power in 1805, the Ndwandwe clan, in the north of what we now call Zululand, was growing in military power.
    • After many violent raids and counter-raids, the Ndwandwe defeated the Mthethwa.
    • Zwide invited Dingiswayo, the chief of the Mthethwa, to come to him for peace talks, but instead Zwide killed him.
    • The Ndwandwe set out to dominate Zululand.

The break-up of the Ndwandwe kingdom

  • After Dingiswayo’s death, Shaka joined the Mthethwa with the Zulu.
  • The Ndwandwe-Zulu wars went on for about four years.
  • Shaka’s new military tactics – the ‘horns of the bull’ attack formation and the short stabbing spear – beat the greater numbers of the Ndwandwe.
  • On one occasion, Shaka pretended that he was retreating. For nearly a week he drew his hungry and exhausted enemy into his territory and then attacked and beat them. Zwide lost five of his sons that day.
  • Zwide adopted Shaka’s military tactics and weapons.
  • After much fighting, the Zulu warriors reached Zwide’s headquarters at Nongoma. They sang the Ndwandwe victory songs and tricked the guards to let them in.
  • One source says that Zwide was killed; another source says that he fled to the Pedi where he later died.
  • Some of the Ndwandwe abandoned their lands and fled to Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique. Some joined other kingdoms that rose up, e.g. the Shangane in Gaza and the Swazis. The majority submitted to Shaka.

The rise of the Zulu state and its consolidation under Dingane

The story about Shaka is based on oral tradition and on accounts of white traders. There is a debate on whether it is a myth or a legend. This is how the story goes:

Shaka was the illegitimate son of Senzangakhona, heir to the small Zulu chiefdom. His mother, Nandi, was made the chief’s wife. Later Nandi and her two children were kicked out of the tribe and eventually found a place to live with the Mthethwa. Chief Dingiswayo was very impressed with the young Shaka and allowed him to play a leading role in reorganising the fighting methods of the Mthethwa. In 1815, Shaka became the leader of the Zulu when his father died. Three years later, when Zwide murdered Dingiswayo, Shaka joined the two tribes together. With thousands of soldiers under him, Shaka began to organise his army into a highly efficient and deadly military machine. For the next few years a series of bloody conquests resulted, which are called the Mfecane in Nguni and the Difaqane in Sotho.

  • The Mfecane both united and divided the northern Nguni population in Natal.
    • Clan after clan joined the growing Zulu nation.
    • But thousands fled and scattered to other regions of South Africa.
    • Towards the end of his rule, Shaka had to use force and terror to ensure loyalty, to frighten his enemies and impress the British traders.
    • In 1828, Shaka was stabbed by his half-brother Dingane and died.
    • Dingane consolidated the Zulu state by continuing with many wars over the next few years, e.g. against the Ndebele, the Mpondo and the Voortrekkers.

Northern interior: the rise of the Ndebele kingdom under Mzilikazi

Shaka had welcomed all newcomers to his tribe. One was Mzilikazi, a petty chieftan and Zwide’s grandson. He had fled when Zwide killed his father. Mzilikazi was one of Shaka’s favourite indunas. But one day, Mzilikazi disobeyed Shaka – not for the first time – and an impi was sent after him.

  • Mzilikazi fled north with about 300 warriors causing a huge amount of destruction on the Highveld.
  • He formed the Ndebele tribe out of his Zulus and all the Sotho clans that joined him.
  • In 1829, after attacking the Tswana chiefdoms, the Ndebele numbered about 8 000.
  • Mzilikazi got guns from traders. His strict set of rules managed to unite the various clan members into a stable state.
  • Numerous fights and raids took place over 20 years, e.g. in 1836 the Ndebele attacked the Voortrekkers at Vegkop.
  • In 1837 the Zulu and the Voortrekkers attacked Mzilikazi. He then took his tribe across the Limpopo River, where they built a new capital called Bulawayo and became a powerful nation in Zimbabwe.

Southern interior: the emergence of Moshoeshoe and the Sotho kingdom

Moshoeshoe, chief of the Sotho, started life as a simple herdsman.

  • Because of the Mfecane, he moved his people to the slopes of the Butha Buthe Mountain in 1820.
  • He stood firm against all the raids against him and sometimes avoided confrontation by offers of cattle.
  • In 1824, Moshoeshoe and his followers were besieged and they fled to another mountain, Thaba Bosiu, which was like a fortress.
  • They were constantly involved in conflicts over the next years. Moshoeshoe offered displaced leaders and their followers protection and a place to live.
  • By 1840 his followers numbered about 40 000.
  • Moshoshoe tried to be friendly with the British missionaries.
  • Eventually, in 1868, his land was annexed and made a British Protectorate.
  • Today it is the independent nation of Lesotho.
  • Moshoeshoe never drank or smoked. He had 30 to 40 wives and died at the age of 84 in 1870.

Boer, Kora and Griqua raiders

In the early 19th century there were only a few trekboers in the southern interior of South Africa. Then hundreds joined them once the Great Trek started after 1834.

  • They settled with their cattle and sheep on land that traditionally belonged to the southern Sotho.
  • There were continual clashes and raids between the trekboers and the Sotho until Moshoeshoe asked the British to protect him.
  • Some Tswana groups also had a raiding lifestyle with guns and horses. They were known as the Kora.
  • The Griquas were a mixed race of Khoekhoe, Europeans, Malay and African slaves.
  • They were divided into two groups under Waterboer and Adam Kok.
  • They frequently raided the Ndebele and Moshoeshoe for slaves and cattle which they sold to the Cape.

Other states and paramountcies

Gaza

  • In the present-day Mpumalanga and Limpopo provinces, Soshangane formed the Gaza kingdom, named after his grandfather.
  • He kept strict discipline in the amabutho system and used it to control all trade in ivory and slaves with Mozambique.
  • At its height, the Gaza kingdom had the largest area of land compared to the other kingdoms.
  • Soshangane died in 1856. The Gaza kingdom only lasted until 1897 because internal divisions weakened the Gaza.

Swazi

  • Sobhuza was chief of the Dlamini branch of the Ngwane.
  • They were forced to flee from Zwide into the area which today is Swaziland.
  • There they found themselves among small Sotho and Nguni groups which they defeated one by one, and then brought them into their tribe.
  • Because of his amabutho, Sobhuza was able to resist raids from Shaka and others.
  • Through conquest and diplomacy, he was able to expand his power and form the Swazi nation of today

Pedi

  • In the area now called Mpumalanga, Chief Sekwati built the Pedi kingdom by offering protection to many communities who were devastated by raids from the Zulu, Ndwandwe, Gaza and Swazi.
  • Sekwati restocked cattle herds through raids and ensured the loyalty of his subordinates by giving them a share of the spoils.
  • In 1828 he was the dominant power in his area.

Mpondo

  • They lived south of the Zulu across the Mzimkhulu River.
  • Chief Faku also strengthened his kingdom by absorbing refugees from the Mfecane.
  • He survived Zulu invasions in 1824 and 1828 and became a strong power in the area south of the Zulus.

Southern Tswana

  • Most of the southern Tswana groups were nearly completely destroyed in the raids of the 1820s.
  • Only after 1836 were they able to regroup under their traditional families.
  • Due to the presence of the missionary Robert Moffat some of the clans were able to survive the Ndebele raids.

Conclusion

It is very difficult to follow the history of each tribe in southern Africa from 1750 to 1835. But you have been given an overall picture of the political revolution that took place. You have seen that the authority of the rulers depended on their ability to provide their subjects with protection, land and cattle. The amabutho system was the key to power and wealth. The Mfecane was a disruptive time in South Africa when many political changes resulted. The main issue was competition for land. Trade was therefore very important as guns helped to make a tribe stronger. The transformation of South Africa, from a relatively peaceful place, where land was plentiful, to a place where there was fierce competition for land, did not come without a huge amount of bloodshed.


How has Shaka been remembered?

There are two important living monuments in KwaZulu-Natal in memory of Shaka:

  • the tourist attraction on the Durban beachfront, uShaka Marine World
  • the new King Shaka International Airport, 35 km north of Durban.

These are proof of the high esteem in which modern Zulus hold the founder of the Zulu nation.

Shaka’s portrayal in the past and in the present

If you Google the word ‘Shaka’ on the internet, you will find 9 160 000 sources of information. Historians have a problem trying to sort out which sources are reliable and which are myths or legends.

There are many points of view about who Shaka was.

  • They are all biased and subjective.
  • But it could be true to say that both admirer and enemy would agree that Shaka was the creator of a military revolution with his new warfare tactics.
  • Some writers have called him the ‘Black Napoleon’ and said that he is the greatest military commander to come out of Africa.

Eyewitness accounts were left by the white traders:

  • Farewell, Fynn and Isaacs.
    • Farewell’s diary was lost and rewritten from memory 20 years later. Therefore, the accuracy of his accounts is debatable.
    • The traders may have been accurate in their description of Shaka when they first had dealings with him. However, after they had acquired land, they wanted to make out that Shaka was very ‘bloodthirsty’ so that Natal could be annexed by the British and then their land would become very valuable.
    • Some of the ‘bloody atrocities’ that the traders described were the clubbing to death of people for crimes such as murder, rape, robbery, adultery, treason, cowardice and spying. (One must remember that in England at this time, there were 200 offences which resulted in hanging, e.g. cutting down a tree, a sailor begging, and stealing five shillings from a shop.)
  • However, these eyewitnesses and oral tradition seem to agree that in the last four years of his life Shaka was unstable and had some psychological problems which led to obsessive and abnormal behaviour.
  • For example, after Nandi’s death there was a period of terrible destruction. Shaka commanded the nation to mourn by prohibiting all sexual relations; no crops could be planted; no milk could be drunk; all pregnant women and their husbands were killed. Oral sources record that a man named Gala told Shaka to stop the destruction. Shaka listened and he rewarded Gala.
  • Isaacs was witness to Shaka’s abnormal behaviour on one occasion when he massacred 170 young men and women on suspicion of adultery.
  • Oral tradition has revealed that the army became very disgruntled with Shaka for not giving them a season of rest, and there were mass desertions.

There is no doubt that Shaka was a very forceful, authoritarian and controlling character who instilled fear into his enemies and followers alike.

It is said that over two million starving and homeless people wandered about during the Mfecane. However, it was not only Shaka’s enemies who suffered during his reign – his own people were under terrible strain from 10 years of war.

Conclusion

Legends and myths, eyewitness reports and oral tradition, authoritarian and abnormal behaviour, suffering and being killed – all these add up into the making of movies and the writing of books about Shaka, which have portrayed him in either a romantic and heroic role, or as a bloodthirsty tyrant. But nothing can take away Shaka’s role of forming a united Zulu people, who are proud of their heritage and the legacy that Shaka has left them.

Summary

  • Southern Africa by 1750 was not an ‘empty land’ as some claims stated. The migrations of societies in southern Africa started before Shaka came to power in 1818 with political changes that took place in the interior (migrations and expansion of the Sotho-Tswana chiefdoms) and the eastern parts of southern Africa (the rise of the Ndwandwe chiefdom) between 1750 and 1820.
  • The Mfecane/Difaqane resulted from the political revolutions in the rest of southern Africa between 1820 and 1835, giving rise to new states and new power blocs such as the Zulu kingdom under Shaka and Dingane, the rise of the Ndebele under Mzilikazi, the Basotho of Moshoeshoe, the the trekboers, the Pedi, Tswana, Griqua-Kora raiders, Soshangane’s Gaza and the Mpondo in the Mfecane/Difaqane.
  • The role of Shaka in transformation in southern Africa and his legacy need to be looked at in terms of his different portrayals from the past to the present, and from the Zulucentric (Zulu centred) perspectives to the multi-dimensional views. These show that many myths about Shaka and the Mfecane/Difaqane exist today.

How colonial expansion into the interior transformed South Africa

After 1750, Britain was in need of raw materials for their Industrial Revolution. They occupied the Cape in 1806. The Dutch had been there for 154 years. They were furious when British laws forced them to change their way of life. When slavery was abolished, the Dutch trekked into the interior in large numbers.

For the next few years, these Voortrekkers experienced many hardships and clashes with the various tribes. When they settled in Natal, Britain came and annexed that area. The Voortrekkers moved again, into the interior, and established two independent Boer Republics.

The British imported Indians to work on their sugar plantations in Natal. Britain took over Zululand after the bloody Anglo-Zulu War. They also took over the Swazi and the Sotho kingdoms as Protectorates. British colonial expansion had gone deep into the interior of South Africa.

Background

  • By 1750 Britain was the most advanced industrial nation in the world.
  • They controlled most of the trade with India and China.
  • In 1795 Napoleon overthrew the Dutch king.
  • Britain feared that Napoleon would take over the Dutch East India Company (DEIC also known as the VOC) and disrupt British trade with the East.
  • Britain sent warships and took the Cape from the DEIC.
  • They withdrew in 1802, but came back in 1806 when war broke out between Britain and France.
  • Being the greatest industrial country in the world, Britain needed raw materials for the factories.
  • Under colonial expansion, South Africa changed dramatically economically, socially and politically after 1750.

What happened to the indigenous population?

By 1806 the Dutch had been at the Cape for 154 years. The Khoekhoe and San communities had become smaller and smaller because of war, slavery and smallpox.

  • The survivors became herdsmen, servants and unskilled labourers.
  • Some, such as the mixed-race Griquas, left the Cape and settled along the Orange River.
  • Others settled along the Kat River in the Eastern Cape. They spoke Dutch.
    • They had guns and began to dominate small chiefdoms.
    • This contributed to conflict and instability in the area.
  • In 1809 the British passed an anti-squatting law
    • no blacks could farm on empty land within the Cape Colony.
  • In 1811 pass laws controlled movement of workers in the Colony.

Changing labour patterns

  • In Britain the slave trade ended in 1807 and slavery was abolished in 1834.
    • Rev. John Philip of the London Missionary Society played a big role in ending slavery at the Cape.
    • Ordinance 50 was a law which said that all black servants had equality before the law and freed them from doing forced labour.
  • Historians have debated the true reasons behind Britain abolishing slavery:
    • humanitarian = being kind
    • self-interests = wanting a free labour force – to be more productive
    • fear of a slave revolt (like the one in Haiti) = fear of lower profits.
  • But the slaves were not entirely free because of the laws – another law punished labourers for breaking contracts.
    • This is what happened to the freed slaves in the Colony:
    • Some remained as wage earners.
    • Some left the Colony – joined the Griquas.
    • Some rented land owned by missionaries.
    • Some became independent farmers
    • later they were given the vote.

These labour changes dramatically affected the whole way of life and the economy of the Dutch who had lived with slaves for the past 154 years.

The Boer response to British control

The Boers were angry

  • Many Dutch adapted to these changes – but some were furious with the abolition of slavery – especially farmers. Many had spent a lot of money buying their slaves.
  • The British said they could have compensation but only if they travelled to Britain to get it, which was not possible for most of them.
  • Piet Retief, one of the Dutch leaders, drew up a Manifesto, listing all their complaints and giving reasons why a huge group of Dutch had decided to leave the Cape Colony. Some of the reasons were:
    • they wanted to preserve proper relations between master and servant
    • they felt that there was no longer justice for burghers – only for blacks
    • they resented the government tax on their land
    • they disliked everything being made English.
  • About 15 000 Dutch left the Colony in small groups between 1834 and 1845.
  • The Great Trek was the first struggle of Afrikaner nationalism to get rid of British imperialism.

Trekking into the interior

  • The Dutch spread into the interior and were led by various trekker leaders.
    • A Xhosa chief, Hintsa, gave Trekker leader Louis Trichardt a large area of land.
    • Trekker leader Hendrik Potgieter settled near the Griqua. In a letter, he He said to their chief Adam Kok: ‘We are emigrants together with you...’
    • Trekker leader Andries Pretorious settled on land occupied by Chief Moshoeshoe. He tried to persuade the chief to form an alliance to stop British expansion.
  • The Voortrekkers supported Mpande in an internal power struggle. When he became king, he gave them land around Durban.
  • In 1843 the British annexed Natal. This resulted in a further Boer trek north.
    • The Dutch established their own two independent Boer Republics: the Orange Free State (OFS) and the South African Republic (ZAR).
    • Nine years later, in 1852, the British recognised the independence of the ZAR, and in 1854 that of the OFS.

Life in the Boer Republics

  • The Boers needed the support of the local African chiefs.
  • At first the local chiefs welcomed the Boers to help them drive out the Ndebele.
  • But later there were many clashes over land and the demand for labour.
  • Wealth in the Republics was land and cattle – officials were paid in land.
  • The Boers continued in their old ways of slavery and contract labour.
  • They depended on merchants from the Cape and Natal for manufactured goods such as cloth, pots, tools, guns and ammunition.
  • Large landowners collected rent from white and African tenant farmers

Expanding frontiers and trade

  • Important centres of trade developed:
    • Grahamstown
    • Port Elizabeth
    • Port Natal (modern-day Durban).
  • Ivory and game products were obtained from the chiefdoms in the interior.
  • The Griqua, Kora and Barolong raided communities inland for cattle and slaves.
  • Delagoa Bay (modern-day Maputo) was an important trading post where the Boers, Portuguese and Africans exported slaves up to the 1860s.
  • The interior chiefdoms sent men to Cape Town to buy guns and other goods in exchange for ivory, ostrich feathers and animal skins.

Missionaries

  • Trade and migrant labour gave the Africans an opportunity to break away from the control of the chief.
  • Mission stations were built all over the interior.
    • Missionaries were people from different churches who came to Africa to convert the ‘heathen’ to Christianity.
    • Some missionaries also aimed to extend the influence of the British Empire.
  • African families looking for security or new economic opportunities soon surrounded mission stations.
  • Schools were started which provided a European education.
  • The above resulted in the people challenging the authority of chiefs, undermining the unity of numerous Xhosa communities.

Xhosa responses: co-operation and conflict

Wars

  • Settlers occupied more and more land on the Eastern frontier:
    • Led to conflict.
  • By the 1800s, the Xhosa were divided into two main branches: west and east of the Kei River.
  • In 1811, 1819, 1835 and 1846 there were wars against the settlers.
  • After a war from 1851 to 1853, the British took over the Xhosa on the west of the Kei and called the area British Kaffraria.
    • The chiefs were still allowed their independence but
    • more land was given to settlers and missionaries.
  • Colonial forces raided the Xhosa on the east of the Kei –
    • they destroyed many crops and captured cattle.

The prophecy

  • In 1856 lung-sickness swept through the Xhosa’s cattle, rains destroyed most of their crops and there was widespread starvation.
  • Nongqawuse was a 16-year-old initiate traditional healer.
  • She saw two strangers in the bushes and called her uncle who was a diviner and religious leader.
  • They heard a message or prophecy:
    • If you slaughter all remaining cattle
    • And destroy all remaining crops
    • The ancestors will drive the whites into the sea
    • On that day the sun will rise and set in the East
    • New cattle and crops will be in abundance
  • Results:
    • 300 000 to 400 000 cattle were killed.
    • About 20 000 Xhosa died from famine.
    • About 30 000 Xhosa were forced to seek work on settler farms.
  • Xhosa resistance to the white settlers and British army was finally broken.
  • However, the Xhosa did not disappear as other kingdoms had:
    • Their populations continued to grow.
    • Some became Christians
    • Others became rich from trading with the Cape
      • wool and
      • wheat.
    • Others became rich from being tenant farmers.
      • White settlers took over their land.

The need for controlled labour

  • After the discovery of diamonds in the 1870s, Britain invested large amounts of money in mines and in sugarcane plantations.
  • Huge numbers of labourers were needed, but
  • the Africans did not want to be labourers as they were contented with their land and cattle.
  • To control the labour force, Britain defeated independent chiefdoms and made Protectorates of the Basotho, Swazi and Tswana states
  • = Basutoland, Swaziland and Bechuanaland.
  • The chiefs had to collect taxes for themselves and the Colony.
  • They had to keep the people obedient and loyal to Britain.
  • Britain kept the Protectorates poor so that the people were forced to become migrant workers.

Sugar plantations

  • In 1843 Britain had made Natal a colony and started large sugarcane plantations.
    • They required a huge amount of capital investment and many labourers –
    • but the Africans were not prepared to leave their homes.
  • In desperation, the British imported over 150 000 Indians, between 1860 and 1911, to work on the plantations.
    • They had a contract for five years –
    • after this they could work elsewhere or renew the contract.
    • After 10 years of work, they were given a free trip back to India.
    • Many chose to stay –
    • they brought their families to settle in Natal and
    • became involved in trading.

Mines and railways

  • Coal was discovered at Dundee in Natal.
  • Labour was badly needed on the diamond, gold and coal mines.
  • Railways were built from the ports to the mines –
    • more labour was needed.
  • Africans preferred to be tenant farmers and rent land from the whites.
  • As a result, capital investors encouraged the British government to subjugate the indigenous people of Natal.

The Anglo–Zulu wars

  • Britain needed to conquer the Zulu kingdom to get a controlled supply of labour.
  • Cetshwayo was king of the Zulu from 1872 to 1879.
  • When Britain brought large numbers of troops to the Zululand border, the king was worried.
  • He wrote to the missionaries and told them that he did not want war.
  • After a few border incidents, the British gave the Zulu king an ultimatum to disband his army or there would be war.
  • Cetshwayo attacked first and beat the British at Isandlwana in January 1879.
  • The war continued for 6 months until the British took the capital, Ulundi.
  • The king was captured and sent to Cape Town and then to London.
  • Britain divided the Zulu kingdom into 13 areas and appointed their own chiefs.

The Civil War

Cetshwayo came back in 1883. A Zulu civil war over leadership broke out.

  • The civil war lasted eight years and virtually destroyed the Zulu kingdom.
  • Thousands of Zulu homesteads were destroyed.
  • Because they had lost their land and their cattle, the men were forced to work on the mines and plantations in order to survive.
  • Zululand was divided between the Boers and the Natal settlers, leaving the Zulus on a fraction of their original land.

Other African kingdoms

  • Britain also invaded the Pedi under Sekhukuni and beat them.
  • By the 1880s, Britain had annexed all the land between the Cape Colony and Natal.


The Boer Republics and Moshoeshoe

As you already know, Britain recognised the independence of the two Boer Republics in the 1850s, but this was before the discovery of diamonds and gold.

  • Over the years, the Boers had many conflicts and alliances with the local chiefdoms.
    • Moshoeshoe, the chief of the Basotho, had merged displaced people from Shaka’s campaigns into his kingdom – these were Kora, San, Nguni and Griqua.
    • There were many raids and battles between the Boers and the Basotho, e.g. the Basotho beat the Boers at Viervoet.
    • Eventually Moshoeshoe asked the British for protection against the destructive Boer raids.
    • Britain annexed Basutoland as a Protectorate in 1868 and it only became independent again in 1966.
  • Many Basotho had to enter the labour markets as they had lost much of their agricultural and grazing lands.
  • Moshoeshoe, the founder of the Basotho nation, died in his mountain home in 1870.
    • He had been a skilful tactician, balancing military strategy with a policy of generosity in victory.
    • He had dealt diplomatically with African leaders, the Boer trekkers, the British colonisers and the missionaries.
    • He had kept his nation independent for 40 years.

Summary of Topic

  • With Britain taking over the Cape from the Dutch, southern Africa was drawn into the world economy.
  • Many groups living in the Cape at this time were unhappy with British rule, which led to a series of migrations into the interior of southern Africa.
  • These migrations inevitably resulted in conflict as the migrating parties (e.g. the Boers) came into contact with the indigenous people.
  • The British, realising the economic importance of South Africa (e.g. the discovery of diamonds and later gold) also began to lay claim to the interior of South Africa, as well as Natal.
  • Together, the Boers’ migration and British economic ambitions, led to a series of wars (e.g. the Frontier Wars and the Anglo-Zulu wars) that led to the eventual colonisation of the whole of South Africa.
  • However, before this colonisation of South Africa, there was co-operation and conflict on the Highveld between the fragile Boer Republics (e.g. the South African Republic that the Boers established in 1852) and the Highveld chiefdoms, in particular with Moshoeshoe.

How did the period of the South African War impose the social, economic and political patterns of South Africa in the 20th century?

The tension between the British in South Africa and the Boers built up over many years. It was made worse by the discovery of diamonds and gold and resulted in a bloody war. The foundations for apartheid were laid with the pass laws, the migrant labour system and job reservation. A society of classes developed and an economic system of racial capitalism started. The Union of 1910 left the black people out of the government. The Natives Land Act of 1913 led to forced removals which deprived the blacks of their land.

Impact of mining development on the Witwatersrand

  • In 1867 diamonds were discovered at Kimberley.
  • The Cape and Natal were British colonies.
  • The South African Republic (ZAR) and the Orange Free State (OFS) were independent Boer Republics.
    • They were surrounded by independent chiefdoms.
  • After a long dispute among many claimants, Britain gave the diamond fields to the Griquas.
  • In 1877 Britian annexed Griqualand West – in which Kimberley was located – and it became part of the Cape Colony.
    • The Griquas were given some compensation.
    • At that stage they had no idea how valuable the ‘little stones’ would become in the future.
  • Hundreds of fortune hunters came from all over the world.
    • The mineral revolution had started.
    • South Africa began to change from an agricultural society to an industrialised, capitalist society.
  • It became difficult for miners to dig their claims to the required depth to unearth diamonds.
  • A new approach was needed to mine on a large scale.
  • A lot of capital was needed to buy big machinery.
    • Cecil John Rhodes, J.B. Robinson and Barney Barnato bought up the individual claims and formed a company called De Beers.
    • They developed a system to organise the mining efficiently.
    • Blacks had to have passes to work on the mines.
    • This was the start of racial discrimination – later it was called apartheid.
    • Capitalism became entrenched in South Africa – rich bosses exploited workers by paying them low wages.
    • Compounds were built where the black mineworkers lived in overcrowded, terrible conditions.
  • But many blacks did not want to work on the mines for low wages.
  • They still had their land to graze their cattle.
  • There was a new market for their farming produce.
  • Some blacks were involved in ox-wagon transport or in building the new town of Kimberley.

Britain annexes the ZAR and defeats some African kingdoms

Britain’s imperialism was motivated by a desire to continue being the most powerful empire in the world.

  • To do this they needed: WEALTH
  • To mine the wealth they needed: LABOUR
  • To control the labour they needed to: SUBDUE CHIEFDOMS
    • In 1878 Britain crushed an uprising of the Thlaping.
    • In 1879 the Zulu kingdom came under British control after a bloody war.
    • In 1881 the ZAR reacted to the British trying to take over the Republic and defeated them at Majuba. This was the First Boer War of Independence.
    • During 1884–5, Britain proclaimed Protectorates over Swaziland and Basutoland to prevent them from falling into Boer hands and to safeguard the timber, grain and labour for the mines.

All the above events had a huge impact on gold mining in the ZAR and the gradual breakdown of blacks as independent farmers on their own lands.

Influx of capital and development of mining companies, the stock exchange and technologies

In 1886 gold was discovered on the Witwatersrand in a 60 km gold-bearing reef south of Pretoria, the capital of the ZAR.

  • The majority of the thousands of fortune seekers that came from Kimberley and from all over the world were British, and were known as uitlanders.
  • After a short time there was no room for the independent miners, as the mining had to go down very deep, which needed a lot of money.
    • The money came from the rich mining capitalists, who came from Kimberley. Rhodes, Robinson, Barnato and Alfred Beit – known as the Randlords – founded the Chamber of Mines.
    • The Randlords needed lots of capital for machinery and modern technology.
    • The money was raised by selling shares on the London Stock Exchange and the new Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
    • Profits, called dividends, were later to be divided amongst the shareholders.

Gold mining resulted in economic development: railways, roads, enlarged harbours, secondary industries, commercial farming, houses, offices, shops, banks, post offices.

Britain as the world’s international financier

In the late 19th century, Britain’s economic power had been challenged by the growing industrialisation of countries such as Germany and the USA.

  • To keep its dominance Britain needed to replenish its decreasing supply of gold.
    • Gold was so important at that time because the international monetary system was being changed to a gold standard. This meant that paper money was being printed, but it had to be backed by gold in the Reserve Bank.
    • Gold was also a very important means of exchange, so it could be used to pay for trade and to purchase guns.
    • Therefore, the British were so desperate to get control of the gold mines in the ZAR.

The emergence of social classes: the rise of capitalism

  • Mining resulted in the following classes being formed:
    • Randlords – multi-millionaires; owners of companies; the bosses
    • Middle-class entrepreneurs – people who made their own living by being builders, craftsmen, lawyers, doctors, shopkeepers
    • White mineworkers, mainly British – uitlanders
    • White ex-tenant Dutch farmers – poor; unskilled; unemployed because the black workers got all the low-wage, unskilled jobs; living in slums
    • Black unskilled workers – living in unhygienic, overcrowded compounds.
    • Capitalism is the system in which anyone can make as much money as they like.
    • However, the rich often exploit the poor for their own profits.
    • Often the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
    • Racial capitalism emerged when laws were made to prevent black people from even trying to become educated or skilled.
    • This kept them on the level of servants and in poverty.

The migrant labour system

  • A Hut Tax was introduced to force black subsistence farmers to work on the mines as they needed money to pay the tax.
    • Mineworkers had a 6- to 12-month contract.
    • They would stay in mine hostels or compounds. These were overcrowded, unhygienic and strictly disciplined, and the food was poor.
    • Their families stayed behind in the rural areas and had to cope by themselves.
  • The ‘tout system’ was a system whereby mine owners paid people – and sometimes chiefs – to recruit workers, from as far as Tanzania.
    • When recruiting them, these people would often lie to the workers about getting high wages.
  • The mining revolution led to a whole way of life being destroyed.
    • Families broke up, detribalisation happened, traditional culture was lost, children grew up without a father’s discipline.
    • Men were treated like ‘boys’ on the mines and this led to a feeling of inferiority and lack of self-worth.

A racially divided industrial labour force

Racism developed because of the early culture of the Boers.

  • They were a deeply religious people who followed the Bible closely.
  • They interpreted one verse to mean that black people will always be servants: ‘hewers of wood and drawers of water’.
  • The white miners became very insecure when the blacks got all the low-wage, unskilled jobs.
  • Job reservation was introduced and later the Colour Bar Act would only allow whites to become skilled.
  • Laws promoted racial discrimination and forcibly kept the blacks out of the better jobs, keeping them in poverty.

After 1994, the Dutch Reformed Church admitted that this belief was racist and completely wrong. But this could never compensate for the years and years of horrific, humiliating racial suffering endured by millions of blacks.

Response of African societies to demand for labour

  • After the destruction of independent chiefdoms, black resistance along traditional lines ended.
  • By the late 1890s, the mines were still short of labour. But the black tenant farmers and sharecroppers had a comfortable life compared to the life on the mines. Those farmers far from towns managed to avoid the tax collectors.
  • Some preferred to do other jobs, building or domestic work. For example, the amawasha were 600 blacks who did washing for the whites in Johannesburg.

Britain’s increasing interest in South Africa with the discovery of minerals

We have already discussed why Britain was desperate to get control of the mines.

  • Britain also feared that other countries, especially Kruger’s friend, Germany, would beat them to it. (Kruger was president of the ZAR.)
  • Mine owners wanted to modernise the industry.
    • They were keen to create a Union of South Africa.
    • This would give them control of all the land and the workforce under the chiefs and on white farms.

Political and economic struggle for control of the goldfields

The tensions

Joseph Chamberlain, a true imperialist, was the British Secretary of State for the Colonies.

  • He chose another imperialist, Lord Milner to be Governor of the Cape.
  • Rhodes was Prime Minister of the Cape.
    • He had conquered a large territory across the Limpopo River, which was called Rhodesia. Today it is Zimbabwe.
    • Rhodes owned the newspapers The Johannesburg Star and the Cape Times.
    • These newspapers stirred up British opinion in favour of a war with the ZAR.
  • The religious, conservative Afrikaners (= Boers) were resentful of the uitlanders who were a threat to their quiet, traditional way of life.
  • President Kruger built his own railway line to Delagoa Bay, so that he would not have to rely on the British railway lines from the Cape and Natal.

The grievances of the uitlanders

The uitlanders were frustrated with the backward policies of Kruger and his government, called the Volksraad, which they said was corrupt and inefficient.

  • They wanted to create a society to meet the requirements of a capitalist economy, e.g. good infrastructure for transport, water and sewerage.
  • They resented the Boers having the monopoly of the supply of dynamite and other mining essentials.
  • They hated having to pay heavy taxes while having no say in the government.
  • They could only vote after living in the Republic for 14 years.

The Jameson Raid, 1895–6

The grievances of the uitlanders gave Rhodes the opportunity to plan to take over the ZAR.

He planned to get the uitlanders to call on Britain for help against the terrible treatment from the ZAR.

  • His friend Dr Jameson was sent to Pitsani on the Bechuanaland border with 800 mounted police from Rhodesia.
  • The uitlanders, even though they had been smuggling in guns for some time, decided not to revolt.
  • Rhodes therefore told Jameson not to invade.
  • One version is that some telegraph lines had been cut and Jameson did not get the message.
  • Another version is that Jameson saw this invasion as an opportunity for fame and so ignored the orders from Rhodes.
  • Kruger’s commando was easily able to capture the invaders.
  • The invaders were punished in various ways.
  • This was a triumph for the ZAR.
  • Rhodes was so humiliated that he resigned as Prime Minister of the Cape.
  • Britain’s fears of a Boer-German alliance increased when the German Kaiser sent Kruger a congratulatory telegram.
  • Tensions further increased when the ZAR bought large quantities of modern weapons from Germany.

War breaks out

  • Milner sent a telegram to Chamberlain saying that Britain needed to intervene because the British subjects were being treated like ‘helots’, meaning slaves.
  • To prevent a war, President Steyn of the OFS organised a conference between Milner and Kruger in Bloemfontein.
    • Milner demanded that the uitlanders get the vote after five years of residence in the ZAR.
    • Kruger tried to compromise and said they could vote after seven years.
    • Milner refused this offer.
    • Kruger said: ‘You just want my country.’
  • In September 1899, British reinforcements sailed to South Africa and British troops were sent to the ZAR border.
  • Kruger sent an ultimatum to Milner demanding that the troops be removed.
    • Nothing happened and so war was declared between the two Boer republics and Britain.

The two phases of the war

The first phase: October 1899 – September 1900

  • The Boers invaded Natal and the Cape.
    • They besieged the towns of Mafeking, Kimberley and Ladysmith. This meant that the Boers surrounded the town, hoping that the British residents would eventually surrender because they were starving.
    • The British had a ‘Black Week’ during which the ‘Pride of the British Empire’ was beaten by the Boers at Magersfontein, Stormberg and Colenso. Nearly 3 000 men were killed or wounded and many field-guns were lost.
  • In February 1900 reinforcements arrived under Lord Roberts.
    • A counter-offensive relieved the besieged towns.
    • Roberts beat the Boers and took the towns of Bloemfontein in February, Johannesburg in May, and Pretoria in June.
    • In September 1900 the ZAR was annexed by the British Empire.
    • Kruger went to Switzerland. Some sources say he went to get help; others say he went into exile.
    • Roberts left for Britain and left Lord Kitchener in charge to carry out the peace arrangements.

The second phase: guerrilla warfare

The Boer generals Botha, Steyn, De la Rey, De Wet and Cronje, wanted to fight ‘tot die bitter einde’ – to the bitter end. They had a strong nationalistic spirit.

  • They formed themselves into commandos and raided the British with hit-and-run tactics, doing much damage.
  • For two years, fewer than 60 000 Boers fought a guerrilla war against 200 000 British soldiers.

The scorched earth policy

The Boer commandos survived by staying on farms where they were supplied with fresh horses and food.

  • Lord Kitchener gave the order to burn all the farmhouses, their contents, the crops and the animals, and to put Boer women and children as well as their black farm workers into concentration camps. He hoped that the Boers would then surrender.
  • More than 30 000 farmhouses were systematically burned down, using this strategy (called the scorched earth policy) in order to defeat the Boers.

British concentration camps

  • 116 000 Boer women and children were herded off to 40 camps around the country, where about 26 000 died.
  • 115 000 blacks went to 66 camps, where over 14 000 died.
  • Conditions at the camps were shocking:
    • tents on bare land (extremely hot in summer and freezing in winter)
    • overcrowded
    • unhygienic
    • a lack of food, medicines, clean water, beds and blankets.
    • Pneumonia, measles, enteric fever, dysentery and malaria caused most of the deaths.
  • The British actions in this war were to result in a passionate Afrikaner nationalism that would make them protect their own people at all costs.
  • The bitterness that resulted against the British was passed on from generation to generation.
    • This bitterness helped to swing the referendum vote in 1960 that saw South Africa become a republic, free from British rule, in May 1961.

The role of women and blacks in the war

  • Emily Hobhouse was a wealthy British lady who came to South Africa during the War.
    • She was horrified at the conditions in the concentration camps.
    • She became very unpopular with the British government as she campaigned and raised funds for better rations, sanitation and facilities in the camps.
    • Because of her tireless effort, the death rate in the camps did come down.
    • Today she is remembered as a heroine and is honoured by being buried at the Women’s Monument in Bloemfontein.
  • Nurses from all over the world came to South Africa to help nurse both sides.
    • Lady Sarah Wilson was the first woman to be appointed as a war correspondent.
  • About 100 000 blacks thought that if they joined the British.
    • They would get the vote when the British won.
    • They were very useful to the British (The blacks that worked for the Boers did the same jobs):
    • they knew the territory well
    • they acted as spies and messengers
    • they performed jobs such as cooking, looking after animals and doing other camp chores.
    • Mahatma Gandhi organised 1 000 Indian stretcher-bearers for the British.

The end of the war: peace negotiations

The Boers eventually surrendered because their commandos were worn down and their losses were enormous.

  • The Peace Treaty of Vereeniging was signed on 31 May 1902 and a negotiated settlement took place.
    • The Boers were promised self-government in the future
    • but the blacks had no political rights.
    • The Dutch language was protected
    • but the Boers had to become British subjects under the Union Jack flag and the monarch.
    • The two Boer Republics became British colonies.
    • Boer prisoners who had been sent to St Helena, Bermuda and Sri Lanka would be brought back and given back their guns.
    • The British said that they would try to help the Boers rebuild their houses and re-establish their farms.

  • After the war, the Boers were devastated from the loss of thousands of lives and thousands of farms.
  • £19 million was set aside to help the Boers modernise their farms.
  • The blacks were very disillusioned as many had supported Britain in the war but nothing was done for them afterwards to get the vote.
  • The economy was shattered as the mines had closed during the war.
  • Milner wanted to create a British majority in the country.
  • He organised for 1 200 British families to come and settle in South Africa.
  • He tried to make everything English to ‘denationalise’ the Boers by ignoring their culture.
  • But this produced the opposite effect – they became more nationalistic and resented this ‘Milnerism’.
  • In 1902 there were only 45 000 black mineworkers. During 1904–5, thousands of Chinese were shipped in to get the mines going again.
  • In 1906 the Liberals in Britain won the election. They believed that the Boers had been victims of an unjust war. By 1908 the Afrikaners were again in power in the Transvaal (= the former ZAR), OFS and in the Cape.
  • In 1906 Chief Bambatha led a rebellion against the government’s taxes. This raised fears amongst the whites about their ability to control the Zulu without the cooperation of the British.
  • A draft constitution for a Union was drawn up.
  • The only blacks who would have voting rights in the Union would be black voters in the Cape who qualified.
  • In 1909, one of the ‘elite’ African leaders, John Jabavu, organised an open letter to 1 000 British politicians, protesting against the fact that blacks in Transvaal, the OFS and in Natal had no political rights.
  • An eight-man delegation then went to London in 1909, but the British government said that they could not interfere with the laws of the selfgoverning dominion.
  • After much negotiation, the English and Afrikaners agreed to compromise on certain issues. For example:
  • the black vote in the Cape would be entrenched into the constitution – it could only be changed by a vote of two-thirds majority in government
  • there would be three capitals
  • the seats for parliament in the rural areas would require fewer voters than the town seats – this meant that the Afrikaner farmers could get an equal number of seats as the English urban voters.
  • On 31 May 1910, the Union of South Africa was proclaimed with General Botha as Prime Minister.
  • Four colonies were united under one flag, but the country was not united.

The economic and social impact

Before 1913, thousands of African families had made their own living by subsistence farming, tenant farming or sharecropping. But this whole way of life was destroyed by one law.

  • The aim of the Natives Land Act originated with British imperialism –
    • a desire for more land and power, wanting minerals (especially gold) and
    • therefore needing cheap labour to make a profit.
  • Africans did not want to work on the mines because they had a better life farming. Therefore, the obvious solution was to take the Africans off the land.
    • The law forced Africans into reserves, which meant 80% of the population had 8%, and later 13% of the land.
    • They were evicted, uprooted and dispossessed of their ancestral lands.
    • They lost their homes, schools and churches without compensation.
    • Their means of self-employment and their independence were taken away from them.
    • The reserves were too crowded to farm – the men were forced to go to the towns and mines to find work, resulting in the migratory system.
  • The social impact of the Land Act was that the foundations of apartheid were laid, as the Africans’ traditional way of life was destroyed.
  • The economic impact was that Africans helped the mines to become profitable and the economy to grow, but it was at their expense.

Sol Plaatje

In 1912 Sol Plaatje became the first general secretary of the African National Congress (ANC).

  • He was an intellectual author who spoke eight languages, edited three newspapers and wrote several books.
  • In 1913 he rode around the reserves on a bicycle to see the early effects of the Land Act.
  • He was shocked and horrified at the misery that he saw, and wrote about this in his book called Native Life in South Africa.
  • In 1914 Plaatje was part of an unsuccessful delegation to Britain to appeal against the Land Act.
  • He returned in 1917 and headed another unsuccessful delegation to Britain in 1919, which also went to Canada and the USA.
  • Britain said that they could not interfere in the internal affairs of a self-governing dominion.

The foundations of the apartheid pattern

You have seen the beginning of a pattern that was to get worse and worse, especially after 1948, until it ended in 1994.

  • The pass laws and the contracts on the mines got stricter.
  • The Colour Bar Act and job reservation laws kept the black South Africans in a subservient position of being unskilled –
    • resulted in poverty.
  • The Land Act took away the chance of Africans to earn their own living.
  • Inhumane, discriminatory, racist laws resulted in a deep-seated bitterness against the white oppressors, which went from generation to generation.

Summary of Topic

In this topic we set out to answer the question “How did the period of the South African War impose the social, economic and political patterns of South Africa in the 20th century?” To be able to answer this question we looked at:

  • political and economic conditions in South Africa from 1870 onwards
  • the discovery of diamonds
  • the formation of the rich monopolies owned by a few individuals
  • the discovery of gold and its consequences.

[Bod]The goldfields were situated in the ZAR. Britain wanted control and ownership of this source of riches to enhance itself and to prevent other powers from gaining control. The influx of foreign uitlanders led the Afrikaners to fear for their culture and way of life and so war became inevitable.

The mines demanded huge numbers of unskilled labourers, and these were gained through various measures, such as:

  • the defeat of the African kingdoms
  • the introduction of laws which made it impossible for blacks to lead independent lives.


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