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Article2016 in Review
In 2016 South Africa History Online celebrates 15 years of being a public open source heritage site. What a journey it has been. At the end of the first week…
ArticleNelson Mandela Timeline 1970-1979
1970 16 February, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and 21 others, who were detained under the Suppression of Communism Act, in May 1969, are acquitted. Three are…
ArticlePassive Resistance in South Africa
The passive resistance movement in South Africa is seen as, largely, led by M K Gandhi and the Indian Congresses campaigns. However, this form of passive…
ArticleGrade 4 - Term 4: Communication through time
Communication through time, topic focuses on how communication has changed over time and how many forms of communication have stayed the same. We first learn…
Report of the Coolie Commission of 1872
On 13 February 1871, the Red Riding Hood sailed from Durban with the first group of repatriated ex-indentured workers for India, arriving in Madras on 10 April…
Grade 4 Term 2 Timeline: Mahatma Gandhi
1869 Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi is born in Porbandar, Gujarat, India 1883 Gandhi marries KasturbaiMakhanji in an arranged child marriage 1888 …
ArticleForced Removals in South Africa
Forced removals refer to the moving of people from their homes against their will. This may not always involve physical threat or force, but sometimes coercion…
ArticleOliver Tambo Speeches 1971-1979
1971 Statement by OR Tambo to the People of South Africa on the 10th Anniversary of Umkhonto we Sizwe. 16 December 1971 1972 "Speech by Oliver…
ArticleColonial history of Bloemfontein
The area between the Orange and Vaal rivers, originally known as Transoranje, with its abundance of permanent water sources, was the hunting grounds of the San…
ArticleWages Commission
Soon after the 1971 garment workers’ strike at Currie’s Fountain, three students from the Durban campus of the University of Natal –David Hemson, Halton…
Iron Age Kingdoms of Southern Africa
Our ancestors survived by hunting wild animals and gathering berries and roots. The women usually gathered food while the men hunted. Source: museums.ncl.ac.uk…
ArticleThe ‘four nation’ thesis
The concepts of a nation state and a plural society are often seen to be at odds with one another. Jon Soske states, in his essay ‘The Impossible Concept:…
ArticleColonial History of Port Elizabeth
Colonial settlement Land wars The 'Frontier Wars' in the Eastern Cape Europeans who came to stay in South Africa first settled in and around Cape Town. As…
ArticleFatima Meer Timeline 1928-2010
1928 Fatima Meer was born in Durban, daughter of Moosa and Amina Meer. 1940s Established literacy classes for adults in her father's garage She spent…
Article1970’s: Poetry Timeline
1971 Closure of The Classic, by Nat Nakasa, editor. Publication of ‘Sounds of a Cowhide Drum’, Oswald Mtshali’s first book of poetry, by Renoster Books,…
ArticleWestern Cape Civic Association (WCCA)
Civic organisation also experienced problems in organising across the racial divide. Initially the emerging civic organisation in African township and coloured…
ArticleHighlights for 2013
South African History Online believes that history is made every day and to that effect we have compiled what we feel are the key historical events of 2013. We…
June 17
The second day... was marked by uncontrollable fury and burning hostility...Police also assumed another attitude. They shot at random, and at anyone who would…
Prehistory of the Nelspruit area
Prehistory of the Nelspruit area Prehistory of Southern Africa Lying just below the escarpment, Nelspruit is the capital of a region with important…
ArticleThe Roots of Segregation: 1860-1910
By the 1860s, subjugation of African people in the immediate vicinity of the Cape had been achieved. Other than a small, enfranchised minority who owned land,…
ArticleChanges in modern forms of communication
The Postal system The act of sending letters from one person to another developed soon after the invention of writing, however, the creation of a formal…
ArticlePretoria: The Founding of the City
Pretoria’s founder – a man by the name of Marthinus Wessels Pretorius - arrived in Pretoria in 1848 [i]. At the time of his arrival, King Mzilikazi and the…
ArticleDr Alfred Bitini Xuma Timeline 1893-1998
1893 Alfred Bitini Xuma is born, the seventh child born of Abraham and Elizabeth Xuma, an aristocratic Xhosa family living in Manzana Village in the Engcobo…
ArticleTimeline — Land Dispossession and Restitution in South Africa - 1995-2013
After the advent of democratic rule in 1994, the newly elected ANC led government was faced with the task of dealing with a legacy of centuries of land…
ArticleSouth African Police Services (SAPS)
The South African Police Service (SAPS) that we are familiar with today has its origin after the Second Anglo-Boer War in 1902. Prior to the war each colony or…
ArticleHistory Grade 11 - Topic 4 Contextual Overview
Figure 1.1. With his call to put “America First”, Donald Trump is the latest recruit to a dangerous nationalism. Flagrantly authoritarian figures like Donald…
Durban an Overview
In 1824 Nathaniel Isaacs obtained from Shaka, King of the amaZulu, a grant of land in the area immediately surrounding the bay of Durban. Initially settlement…
CAPS Grade 5: Intermediate Phase History - Term 2
GRADE 5: INTERMEDIATE PHASE HISTORY - TERM 2 Topic: The first farmers in southern Africa Suggested…
ArticleLives of Courage
The writing of the history of the Liberation Struggle only began in earnest after 1994 with the establishment of the new democratic government and the opening…
The Cape Northern Frontier
The San © www.safrica.info In the late 17th and early 18th century the Dutch at the Cape Colony only had contact with the Khoikhoi and San peoples. The Dutch…