Lecture 3

Early history of Southern Africa

The second migration (1000-1200AD)

The immigrants of the first migration were only distantly related to the negroid immigrants who arrived in southern Africa during the 11th and 12th centuries AD.

The new immigrants were divided into four major groups - Sotho, Nguni, Ba-Thonga and Ba-Venda.

There is an on-going debate about which group was the first to arrive.

Whatever the truth, these people occupied the territories they occupy today well before the arrival of European seamen in the early 17th. century.

The Sotho peoples were made up of :

1. Tswana - Botswana, Northern cape, North West.
2. Northern Sotho - Northern Province
3. Southern Sotho - Lesotho, Free State

The Nguni peoples were made up of:

1. Swazi - Swaziland and Northern Province
2. Zulu - KwaZulu Natal
3. Pondo - Eastern Cape
4. Thembu - Eastern Cape
5. Xhosa - Eastern Cape
6. Ndebele - Mpumalanga
7. Mfengu (Fingoes) - Eastern Cape

The Venda - Mpumalanga and Northern Province

The Lemba - Mpumalanga and Northern Province

This distribution of Black peoples still holds good for today.

(South African language group distribution - SAlang)

When Bartholomew Diaz, the Portuguese navigator, arrived at Mosselbai on the south coast in 1487, he met the Khoikhoi.

When Vasco da Gama arrived north of Cape town in 1497, he also met Khoikhoi people.

When Vasco da Gama continued around the coast and landed near Durban, he met black-skinned negroid people whom he found friendly and hospitable.

When the Dutch seaman, Jan van Riebeeck landed at the cape in 1652, he met people of various racial and ethnic groups, principally San and Khoikhoi, who were cohabiting and farming the land.

By this time - 1652, the Nguni peoples had migrated southwards to the Gamtoos River.