Episode 53 – The surge in centralized chiefdoms circa 1800 and the development of an African military system

This episode we return to the eastern coastal region of what would become Zululand – but first we’ll cover the trekboers quick getaway in the Zuurveld.
It’s crazy town time at Ngqika’s Great Place after Ndlambe his uncle makes off westwards and the Khoe in the area decide it’s time to fight the trekboers once more.
By the end of 1800 Coenraad de Buys had convinced all trekboers and the missionary Van Der Kemp it was time to leave the amaXhosa king’s /Great Place before he killed them all.
Ngqika’s vascillations between were unnerving and so when de Buys suggested they all leave through a cunning plan he had devised, Van Der Kemp was ready to go. The reason is not too difficult to fathom. In more than a year of prothelitising, Van der Kemp had managed a scant conversion of five Khoekhoe women and their children.
Not one amaXhosa had converted to Christianity, furthermore, van Der Kemp had been forbidden to preach to the amaXhosa. And the Boers living in the Great Place were also no help – in fact while his back was turned some were helping themselves to his property and were caught doing this.
However, it’s time to leave our intrepid missionary and to head back north eastwards, to what would become known as Zululand.
Up to 1800 the situation on the coastal section and the plateau had been radically transformed and this transformation would accelerate over the coming years. There were three overlapping phases of change taking place starting from the last quarter of the 18th Century and running through until after 1870 with the British Zulu wars dominating events in the latter period.