The Boskop Man is an anatomically modern human fossil of the Middle Stone Age ( Late Pleistocene ) discovered in 1913 in South Africa. The fossil was at first described as Homo capensis and considered a separate human species by Broom (1918), but by the 1970s this "Boskopoid" type was widely recognized as representative of the modern Khoisan populations.
124-441: Most theories regarding a "Boskopoid" type were based on the eponymous Boskop cranium, which was found in 1913 by two Afrikaner farmers. They offered it to Frederick William FitzSimons for examination and further research. Many similar skulls were subsequently discovered by paleontologists such as Robert Broom , William Pycraft and Raymond Dart . The original skull was incomplete consisting of frontal and parietal bones, with
248-667: A universal franchise in 1994. As a result of this election the National Party was ousted from power, and was eventually dissolved in 2005. The term "Afrikaner"currently denotes the politically, culturally, and socially dominant and majority group among white South Africans , or the Afrikaans -speaking population of Dutch origin. Their original progenitors, especially in paternal lines, also included smaller numbers of Flemish , French Huguenot , German , Danish , Norwegian , Swiss , and Swedish immigrants. Historically,
372-539: A PhD thesis by Lin-chin Tsai, current ethnic makeup of Taiwan is largely the result of Chinese settler colonialism beginning in the seventeenth century. Europeans explored and settled Australia, displacing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples . The Indigenous Australian population was estimated at 795,000 at the time of European settlement. The population declined steeply for 150 years following settlement from 1788, due to casualties from infectious disease ,
496-691: A census of his non-indigenous subjects. White vrijburgers - now outnumbered by slaves brought from West Africa , Mozambique , Madagascar and the Dutch East Indies - only totaled about 6,000. Following the defeat and collapse of the Dutch Republic during Joseph Souham 's Flanders Campaign , William V, Prince of Orange , escaped to the United Kingdom and appealed to the British to occupy his colonial possessions until he
620-553: A colonial state and writes that Jewish settlers could expel the British in 1948 only because they had their own colonial relationships inside and outside Israel's new borders. Veracini believes the possibility of an Israeli disengagement is always latent and this relationship could be severed, through an " accommodation of a Palestinian Israeli autonomy within the institutions of the Israeli state ". Other commentators, such as Daiva Stasiulis , Nira Yuval-Davis , and Joseph Massad in
744-539: A colonist identifying as an Afrikaner occurred in March 1707, during a disturbance in Stellenbosch . When the magistrate , Johannes Starrenburg, ordered an unruly crowd to desist, a young white man named Hendrik Biebouw retorted, " Ik wil niet loopen, ik ben een Afrikaander – al slaat de landdrost mij dood, of al zetten hij mij in de tronk, ik zal, nog wil niet zwijgen! " ("I will not leave, I am an African – even if
868-407: A form of environmental racism . Some scholars describe the process as inherently genocidal , considering settler colonialism to entail the elimination of existing peoples and cultures, and not only their displacement (see genocide , "the intentional destruction of a people in whole or in part"). However, the opposite argument has also been made by Lorenzo Veracini , who argues that all genocide
992-579: A major destination for French Huguenot refugees fleeing persecution at home. In April 1688, the VOC agreed to sponsor the resettlement of over 100 Huguenots at the Cape. Smaller numbers of Huguenots gradually arrived over the next decade, and by 1702 the community numbered close to 200. Between 1689 and 1707 they were augmented by additional numbers of Dutch settlers sponsored by the VOC with grants of land and free passage to Africa. Additionally, there were calls from
1116-493: A number of Boers took up arms against the British. British officials retaliated by hanging five Boers for insurrection. In 1828, the Cape governor declared that all native inhabitants but slaves were to have the rights of citizens, in respect of security and property ownership, on parity with whites. This had the effect of further alienating the Boers. Boer resentment of successive British administrators continued to grow throughout
1240-589: A partial occiput, one temporal and a fragment of mandible. Fossils of similar type are known from Tsitsikamma (1921), Matjes River (1934), Fish Hoek and Springbok Flats, Skhul , Qafzeh , Border Cave , Brno , Tuinplaas, and other locations. The Boskop Man fossils are notable for their unusually large cranial capacities , with reported cranial-capacity ranges between 1,700 and 2,000 cm. It has been concluded that whenever archaeologists uncovered Hottentot skulls that possessed an especially large cranial capacity, they likely labeled them as Boskopoid skulls and as such,
1364-411: A population of 2,558,956 white Afrikaans speakers. The census noted that Afrikaners represented the eighth largest ethnic group in the country, or 6.3% of the total population. Even after the end of apartheid, the ethnic group only fell by 25,000 people. The South African National Census of 2001 was the second census conducted in post- apartheid South Africa. It was calculated on October 9 and reported
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#17327901192181488-618: A population of 2,576,184 white Afrikaans speakers. The census noted that Afrikaners represented the eighth largest ethnic group in the country, or 5.7% of the total population. Afrikaners make up approximately 58% of South Africa's white population, based on language used in the home. English speakers account for closer to 37%. As in Canada or the United States , most modern European immigrants elect to learn English and are likelier to identify with those descended from British colonials of
1612-568: A returning ship. During this period they established friendly relations with the locals, who sold them sheep, cattle, and vegetables. Both men presented a report advocating the Table valley as a fort and garden for the VOC fleets. We say, therefore, that the Honourable Company, by the formation of a fort or redoubt, and also of a garden of such size as may be practicable or necessary at the above-mentioned Cabo de Boa Esperanza , upon
1736-448: A semi-nomadic lifestyle permanently and became known as trekboers . The Boers were deeply suspicious of the centralised government and increasing complexities of administration at the Cape; they constantly migrated further from the reaches of the colonial officialdom whenever it attempted to regulate their activities. By the mid-eighteenth century the Boers had penetrated almost a thousand kilometres into South Africa's interior beyond
1860-459: A small inlet which he named Vleesch Bay ('Meat Bay'), after the cattle trade, and another Visch Bay ('Fish Bay') after the abundance of fish. Not long afterwards, Admiral Joris van Spilbergen reported catching penguins and sheep on Robben Island. In 1648, Dutch sailors Leendert Jansz and Nicholas Proot had been shipwrecked in Table Bay and marooned for five months until picked up by
1984-554: A small port colony (the future Durban) there but were unable to seize the whole area from the war-ready Zulus and only kept to the Port of Natal. The Boers found the land safe from the British and sent an unarmed Boer land treaty delegation under Piet Retief on February 6, 1838, to negotiate with the Zulu King. The negotiations went well, and a contract between Retief and Dingane was signed. However, Dingane's forces surprised and killed
2108-581: A source of labour due to the decimation of the already small Guanche population by a combination of war, disease, and brutal forced labour. Historian Mohamed Adhikari has labelled the conquest of the Canary Islands as the first overseas European settler colonial genocide. Since 1975, the Kingdom of Morocco has sponsored settlement schemes that have encouraged several thousand Moroccan citizens to settle Moroccan-occupied Western Sahara as part of
2232-546: A suitable spot in Table Valley, stationing there according to your pleasure sixty to seventy as well soldiers as sailors, and a few persons acquainted with gardening and horticulture, could raise, as well for the ships and people bound to India as for those returning thence, many kinds of fruit, as will hereafter be more particularly demonstrated. Under recommendation from Jan van Riebeeck , the Heeren XVII authorised
2356-571: A survey to determine the best pastureland for the grazing of cattle. By 15 May, they had nearly completed construction on the Castle of Good Hope , which was to be an easily defensible victualing station serving Dutch ships plying the Indian Ocean . Dutch sailors appreciated the mild climate at the Cape, which allowed them to recuperate from their protracted periods of service in the tropical humidity of Southeast Asia. VOC fleets bearing cargo from
2480-461: A theory has also been criticized from the standpoint of postcolonial theory . Antiracism has been criticized on the basis that it does not provide a special status for indigenous claims, and in response settler colonial theory has been criticized for potentially contributing to the marginalization of racialized immigrants. Political theorist Mahmoud Mamdani suggested that settlers could never succeed in their effort to become native, and therefore
2604-406: Is a logic and structure of displacement by settlers , using colonial rule , over an environment for replacing it and its indigenous peoples with settlements and the society of the settlers. Settler colonialism is a form of exogenous (of external origin, coming from the outside) domination typically organized or supported by an imperial authority , which maintains a connection or control to
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#17327901192182728-422: Is a logic and structure, and not a mere occurrence. Settler colonialism takes claim of environments for replacing existing conditions and members of that environment with those of the settlement and settlers. Intrinsically connected to this is the displacement or elimination of existing residents, particularly through destruction of their environment and society. As such, settler colonialism has been identified as
2852-908: Is a state established through settler colonialism, by and for settlers. The settler colonial paradigm has been applied to a wide variety of conflicts around the world, including New Caledonia , Western New Guinea , the Andaman Islands , Argentina , Australia , British Kenya , the Canary Islands , Fiji , French Algeria , Generalplan Ost , Hawaii , Hokkaido , Ireland , Israel/Palestine , Italian Libya and East Africa , Kashmir , Korea and Manchukuo , Latin America , Liberia , New Zealand , northern Afghanistan , North America , Posen and West Prussia and German South West Africa , Rhodesia , Sápmi , South Africa , South Vietnam , and Taiwan . During
2976-597: Is distinct from migration because immigrants aim to join an existing society, not replace it. Mahmood Mamdani writes, "Immigrants are unarmed; settlers come armed with both weapons and a nationalist agenda. Immigrants come in search of a homeland, not a state; for settlers, there can be no homeland without a state." Nevertheless, the difference is often elided by settlers who minimize the voluntariness of their departure, claiming that settlers are mere migrants, and some pro-indigenous positions which militantly simplify, claiming that all migrants are settlers. The settler state
3100-437: Is settler colonial in nature. Depending on the definition, it may be enacted by a variety of means, including mass killing of the previous inhabitants, removal of the previous inhabitants and/or cultural assimilation . Therefore, colonial settling has been called an invasion or occupation, emphazising the violent reality of colonization and its settling, instead of the more domestic meaning of settling. Settler colonialism
3224-509: Is the mother tongue of Afrikaners and most Cape Coloureds . According to the South African National Census of 2022 , 10.6% of South Africans claimed to speak Afrikaans as a first language at home, making it the third most widely spoken home language in the country. The arrival of Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama at Calicut , India, in 1498 opened a gateway of free access to Asia from Western Europe around
3348-475: The burgher senate. The new judiciary then established circuit courts, which brought colonial authority directly to the frontier. These circuit courts were permitted to try colonists for allegations of abuse of slaves or indentured servants. Most of those tried for these offences were frontier Boers; the charges were usually brought by British missionaries and the courts themselves staffed by unsympathetic and liberal Cape Dutch. The Boers, who perceived most of
3472-580: The vrijburger population became known as the Cape Dutch and remained concentrated in the southwestern Cape and especially the areas closer to Cape Town. They were likelier to be urban dwellers, more educated, and typically maintained greater cultural ties to the Netherlands than the Boers. The Cape Dutch formed the backbone of the colony's market economy and included the small entrepreneurial class. These colonists had vested economic interests in
3596-570: The Americo-Liberian elite such as the Grebo Revolt in 1909–1910 and Kru Revolt in 1915 were quelled with U.S. military support. In colonial America , European powers created economic dependency and imbalance of trade, incorporating Indigenous nations into spheres of influence and controlling them indirectly with the use of Christian missionaries and alcohol. With the emergence of an independent United States, desire for land and
3720-513: The Australian frontier wars and forced re-settlement and cultural disintegration. Settler colonialism exists in tension with indigenous studies . Some indigenous scholars believe that settler colonialism as a methodology can lead to overlooking indigenous responses to colonialism; however, other practitioners of indigenous studies believe that settler colonialism has important insights that are applicable to their work. Settler colonialism as
3844-738: The Cape of Good Hope . This access necessitated the founding and safeguarding of trade stations along the African and Asian coasts. The Portuguese landed in Mossel Bay in 1498, explored Table Bay two years later, and by 1510 had started raiding inland. Shortly afterwards, the Dutch Republic sent merchant vessels to India and, in 1602, founded the Dutch East India Company ( Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie ; VOC). As
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3968-516: The Edict of Fontainebleau . The terms under which the Huguenots agreed to immigrate were the same as those offered to other VOC subjects, including free passage and the requisite farm equipment on credit. Prior attempts at cultivating vineyards or exploiting olive groves for fruit had been unsuccessful, and it was hoped that Huguenot colonists accustomed to Mediterranean agriculture could succeed where
4092-558: The Israeli–Palestinian conflict since its inception within a settler colonial context. Writing in the 1990s, the Australian historian Patrick Wolfe is credited with originating the field. He theorized settler colonialism as a structure (rather than an event) premised on the elimination rather than exploitation of the native population, thus distinguishing it from classical colonialism. Wolfe argued that settler colonialism
4216-447: The Israeli–Palestinian conflict . This academic framework has also been embraced by leftist groups and individuals involved in anti-Israel activism and campus protests. However, this viewpoint faces substantial criticism from scholars and is largely rejected by many Jews due to its perceived denial of the historical Jewish connection to Palestine , among other reasons. Many of the founding fathers of Zionism themselves described
4340-645: The Jewish people , seeking to reestablish a Jewish political entity in their historical territory. Zionism, Lissak argues, was both a national movement and a settlement movement at the same time, so it was not, by definition, a colonial settlement movement. Some scholars describe Russia as a settler colonial state, particularly in its expansion into Siberia and the Russian Far East , during which it displaced and resettled Indigenous peoples, while practicing settler colonialism. The annexation of Siberia and
4464-516: The Orient anchored in the Cape for a month, usually from March or April, when they were resupplied with water and provisions prior to completing their return voyage to the Netherlands. In extent the new refreshment post was to be kept as confined as possible to reduce administrative expense. Residents would associate amiably with the natives for the sake of livestock trade, but otherwise keep to themselves and their task of becoming self-sufficient. As
4588-599: The Treaty of Saginaw which saw the loss of more than 4,000,000 acres of land. Frederick Jackson Turner, the father of the "frontier thesis" of American history, noted in 1901: "Our colonial system did not start with Spanish War; the U.S. had had a colonial history from the beginning...hidden under the phraseology of 'interstate migration' and territorial organization'". While the United States government and local state governments directly aided this dispossession through
4712-541: The Western Sahara conflict . On 6 November 1975, the Green March took place, during which about 350,000 Moroccan citizens crossed into Saguia al-Hamra in the former Spanish Sahara after having received a signal from King Hassan II. As of 2015, it is estimated that Moroccan settlers constitute two-thirds of the population of Western Sahara. Under international law, the transfer of Moroccan citizens into
4836-468: The siege of Detroit , both eventually lost, thereby paving the way for American control over the region. Settlement into conquered land was rapid. Following the 1795 Treaty of Greenville , American settlers poured into southern Ohio, such that by 1810 it had a population of 230,760. The defeat of the confederacies in the Great Lakes paved the way for large land loss in the region, via treaties such as
4960-496: The use of military forces , ultimately this came about through agitation by settler society in order to gain access to Indigenous land. Especially in the US South, such land acquisition built plantation society and expanded the practice of slavery. Settler colonialism participated in the formation of US cultures and lasted past the conquest, removal, or extermination of Indigenous people. In 1928, Adolf Hitler spoke admiringly of
5084-613: The "Post Colonial Colony: time, space and bodies in Palestine/Israel in the persistence of the Palestinian Question" have included Israel in their global analysis of settler societies. Ilan Pappé describes Zionism and Israel in similar terms. Scholar Amal Jamal, from Tel Aviv University , has stated, "Israel was created by a settler-colonial movement of Jewish immigrants". Damien Short has accused Israel of carrying out genocide against Palestinians during
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5208-465: The 1960s, settlement and colonization were perceived as separate phenomena from colonialism . Settlement endeavours were seen as taking place in empty areas, downplaying the Indigenous inhabitants. Later on in the 1970s and 1980s, settler colonialism was seen as bringing high living standards in contrast to the failed political systems associated with classical colonialism. Beginning in the mid-1990s,
5332-608: The Afrikaner "parent stock", as no significant effort was made to secure more colonist families after the dawn of the 18th century, and a majority of Afrikaners are descended from progenitors who arrived prior to 1700 in general and the late 1600s in particular. Although some two-thirds of this figure were Dutch-speaking Hollanders, there were at least 150 Huguenots and a nearly equal number of Low German speakers. Also represented in smaller numbers were Swedes , Danes , and Belgians . In 1754, Cape Governor Ryk Tulbagh conducted
5456-621: The Afrikaner community along social and geographical lines, driving a wedge between the Voortrekkers and those who remained in the Cape Colony. Only about a fifth of the colony's Dutch-speaking white population at the time participated in the Great Trek. The Dutch Reformed Church , to which most of the Boers belonged, condemned the migration. Despite their hostility towards the British, there were also Boers who chose to remain in
5580-542: The Boskopoid skull type was simply an artifact of their biases. For instance, when James Henderson Sutherland Gear identified skulls recovered from Tsitsikamma as Boskopoid, he simply compared them with the original Boskop Man skull without comparing them with any modern African skulls and as a result, failed to realize they were Hottentot skulls. In the book Big Brain: The Origins and Future of Human Intelligence (2008) by neurologists Gary Lynch and Richard Granger, it
5704-545: The British annexed the Cape Colony, there were already large Dutch-speaking European settlements in the Cape Peninsula and beyond; by the time British rule became permanent in 1806, these had a population of over 26,000. There were, however, two distinct subgroups in the vrijburger population settled under the VOC. The first were itinerant farmers who began to progressively settle further and further inland, seeking better pastures for their livestock and freedom from
5828-469: The Cape after local officials noted that the cost of maintaining gardens to provision passing ships could be eliminated by outsourcing to a greater number of vrijburgers . Furthermore, the size of the Cape garrison could be reduced if there were many colonists capable of being called up for militia service as needed. Following the passage of the Edict of Fontainebleau , the Netherlands served as
5952-568: The Cape of Good Hope, at which point they encountered the Xhosa people , who were migrating southwards from the opposite direction. Competition between the two communities over resources on the frontier sparked the Xhosa Wars . Harsh Boer attitudes towards black Africans were permanently shaped by their contact with the Xhosa, which bred insecurity and fear on the frontier. The second subgroup of
6076-464: The Cape of Good Hope. They had to be married Dutch citizens who were regarded as being "of good character" by the VOC and committed to at least twenty years' residence in South Africa. Reflecting the multi-national nature of the workforce of the early modern trading companies, some foreigners, particularly Germans, were open to consideration as well. If their application for vrijburger status
6200-591: The Cape of their own accord. For its part, the distinct Cape Dutch community remained loyal to the British Crown and focused its efforts on building political organisations seeking representative government; its lobbying efforts were partly responsible for the establishment of the Cape Qualified Franchise in 1853. As important as the Trek was to the formation of Boer ethnic identity, so were
6324-517: The Cape peninsula and were not inclined to venture inland because of the great difficulties in maintaining contact with a viable market. This was in sharp contrast with the Boers on the frontier, who lived on the margins of the market economy. For this reason the Cape Dutch could not easily participate in migrations to escape the colonial system, and the Boer strategy of social and economic withdrawal
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#17327901192186448-536: The Cape were overtaken by turmoil in the Netherlands, which was occupied by Napoleon during the Flanders Campaign . This opened the Cape to French naval fleets. To protect her own prosperous maritime shipping routes, Great Britain occupied the fledgling colony by force until 1803. From 1806 to 1814 the Cape was again governed as a British military dependency, whose sole importance to the Royal Navy
6572-464: The Castle of Good Hope with new ones of stone. In 1672, there were 300 VOC officials, employees, soldiers and sailors at the Cape, compared to only about 64 vrijburgers , 39 of whom were married, with 65 children. By 1687, the number had increased to about 254 vrijburgers , of whom 77 were married, with 231 children. Simon van der Stel , who was appointed governor of the Cape in 1679, reversed
6696-483: The Dutch had failed. They were augmented by VOC soldiers returning from Asia, predominantly Germans channeled into Amsterdam by the company's extensive recruitment network and thence overseas. Despite their diverse nationalities, the colonists used a common language and adopted similar attitudes towards politics. The attributes they shared served as a basis for the evolution of Afrikaner identity and consciousness. In
6820-409: The Dutch language. The use of other European languages was discouraged by a VOC edict declaring that Dutch should be the exclusive language of administrative record and education. In 1752, French astronomer Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille visited the Cape and observed that nearly all the third-generation descendants of the original Huguenot and German settlers spoke Dutch as a first language. Long before
6944-772: The Far East to Russia was resisted by the Indigenous peoples , while the Cossacks often committed atrocities against them. During the Cold War, new forms of Indigenous repression were practiced. This colonization continued even during the Soviet Union in the 20th century. The Soviet policy also sometimes included the deportation of the native population, as in the case of the Crimean Tatars . According to
7068-556: The Khoikhoi, who were known to the Dutch as Hottentots . There was also an unskilled labour shortage, which the VOC later resolved by bringing slaves from Angola, Madagascar, and the East Indies. In 1662, van Riebeeck was succeeded by Zacharias Wagenaer as governor of the Cape. Wagenaer was somewhat aloof towards the vrijburgers , whom he dismissed as "sodden, lazy, clumsy louts...since they do not pay proper attention to
7192-533: The Qing tried to colonize Xinjiang , Tibet , and other parts of the imperial frontier. To accomplish this goal they began a policy of settler colonialism by which Han Chinese were resettled on the frontier. This policy was renewed by the People's Republic of China, led by Chinese Communist Party . Zionism has been characterized by some scholars as a form of settler colonialism concerning region of Palestine and
7316-507: The Slachter's Nek Rebellion had demonstrated the futility of an armed uprising against the new order the British had entrenched at the Cape; one result was that the Boers who might have otherwise been inclined to take up arms began preparing for a mass emigration from the colony instead. Between 1834 and 1840 about 15 000 Afrikaners left the Cape Colony permanently. They called themselves 'emigrants' and their mass-trek an 'emigration', but in
7440-585: The South African government has re-opened the period for land claims under the Restitution of Land Rights Amendment Act. Liberia is often regarded by scholars as a unique example of settler colonialism and the only known instance of Black settler colonialism. It is frequently described as an African American settler colony tasked with establishing a Western form of governance in Africa. Liberia
7564-454: The VOC administration to sponsor the immigration of more German settlers to the Cape, as long as they were Protestant. VOC pamphlets began circulating in German cities exhorting the urban poor to seek their fortune in southern Africa. Despite the increasing diversity of the colonial population, there was a degree of cultural assimilation due to intermarriage, and the almost universal adoption of
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#17327901192187688-479: The VOC underwent a period of commercial decline beginning in the late eighteenth century which ultimately resulted in its bankruptcy. The company had suffered immense losses to its trade profits as a result of the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War and was heavily in debt with European creditors. In 1794, the Dutch government intervened and assumed formal administration of the Cape Colony. However, events at
7812-485: The VOC's earlier policy of keeping the colony limited to the confines of the Cape peninsula itself and encouraged Dutch settlement further abroad, resulting in the founding of Stellenbosch . Van der Stel persuaded 30 vrijburgers to settle in Stellenbosch and a few years afterwards the town received its own municipal administration and school. The VOC was persuaded to seek more prospective European immigrants for
7936-508: The VOC's primary goal was merchant enterprise, particularly its shipping network traversing the Atlantic and Indian Oceans between the Netherlands and various ports in Asia, most of its territories consisted of coastal forts, factories, and isolated trading posts dependent entirely on indigenous host states. The exercise of Dutch sovereignty, as well the large scale settlement of Dutch colonists,
8060-560: The VOC's registration and identification system were denoted either as employees or vrijburgers . The legal classifications imposed upon every individual in the Company possessions determined their position in society and conferred restraints upon their actions. VOC ordinances made a clear distinction between the "bonded" period of service, and the period of "freedom" that began once an employment contract ended. In order to ensure former employees could be distinguished from workers still in
8184-419: The VOC's regulations. This community of settlers collectively identified themselves as Boers to describe their agricultural way of life. Their farms were enormous by European standards, as the land was free and relatively underpopulated; they merely had to register them with the VOC, a process that was little more than a formality and became more irrelevant the further the Boers moved inland. A few Boers adopted
8308-404: The [slaves] lent to them, or to their work in the fields, nor to their animals, for that reason seem wedded to the low level and cannot rid themselves of their debts". When Wagenaer arrived, he observed that many of the unmarried vrijburgers were beginning to cohabit with their slaves, with the result that 75% of children born to Cape slaves at the time had a Dutch father. Wagenaer's response
8432-589: The administration, able to participate in urban affairs, and did so regularly. Boers often refer to settled ethnic European farmers or nomadic cattleherders. During the Batavian Republic of 1795–1806, burgher ('citizen') was popularised among Dutch communities both at home and abroad as a popular revolutionary form of address. In South Africa, it remained in use as late as the Second Boer War of 1899–1902. The first recorded instance of
8556-446: The charges levelled against them to be flimsy or exaggerated, often refused to answer their court summons. In 1815, a Cape police unit was dispatched to arrest a Boer for failure to appear in court on charges of cruelty towards indentured Khoisan servants; the colonist fired on the troopers when they entered his property and was killed. The controversy which surrounded the incident led to the abortive Slachter's Nek Rebellion , in which
8680-480: The colonial government. Around March 1657, Rijcklof van Goens , a senior VOC officer appointed as commissioner to the fledgling Dutch Cape Colony , ordered Jan van Riebeeck to help more employees succeed as vrijburgers so the company could save on their wages. Although an overwhelming majority of the vrijburgers were farmers, some also stated their intention to seek employment as farm managers, fishermen, wagon-makers, tailors, or hunters. A ship's carpenter
8804-404: The colonists. Furthermore, they insisted that the Cape Colony finance its own affairs by taxes levied on the white population, an unpopular measure which bred resentment. By 1812, new attorneys-general and judges had been imported from England and many of the preexisting VOC-era institutions abolished, namely the Dutch magistrate system and the only vestige of representative government at the Cape,
8928-657: The colony's founding and its first five years of existence, however, expressed interest in applying for grants of land with the objective of retiring at the Cape as farmers. In time, they came to form a class of former VOC employees, vrijlieden , also known as vrijburgers (free citizens, who stayed in Dutch territories overseas after serving their contracts. The vrijburgers were to be of Dutch birth (although exceptions were made for some Germans), married, "of good character", and had to undertake to spend at least twenty years in Southern Africa. In March 1657, when
9052-509: The colony's population. The South African census of 1936 gave the following breakdown of language speakers of European origin. The South African census of 1960 was the final census undertaken in the Union of South Africa . The ethno-linguistic status of some 15,994,181 South African citizens was projected by various sources through sampling language, religion, and race. At least 1.6 million South Africans were white Afrikaans speakers, or 10% of
9176-514: The company's expatriate officialdom—did not find widespread expression until the late eighteenth century. It is to the ambitions of Prince Henry the Navigator that historians attribute the discovery of the Cape as a settling ground for Europeans. In 1424, Henry and Fernando de Castro besieged the Canary Islands , under the impression that they might be of use to further Portuguese expeditions around Africa's coast. Although this attempt
9300-509: The development or administration of the Dutch Cape Colony . From the VOC's perspective, there was little financial incentive to regard the region as anything more than the site of a strategic manufacturing centre. Furthermore, the Cape was unpopular among VOC employees, who regarded it as a barren and insignificant outpost with little opportunity for advancement. A small number of longtime VOC employees who had been instrumental in
9424-445: The establishment of a fort at the Cape, and this the more hurriedly to preempt any further imperial maneuvers by Britain, France or Portugal. Van Riebeeck, his family and seventy to eighty VOC personnel arrived there on 6 April 1652 after a journey of three and a half months. Their immediate task was the establishment of some gardens, "taking for this purpose all the best and richest ground"; following this they were instructed to conduct
9548-419: The exigencies of supplying local garrisons and passing fleets compelled the administration to confer free status on employees and oblige them to become independent farmers. Encouraged by the success of this experiment, the company extended free passage from 1685 to 1707 for Dutch families wishing to settle at the Cape. In 1688, it sponsored the settlement of 200 French Huguenot refugees forced into exile by
9672-433: The farmers and the restrictions imposed upon them by British colonial authorities. Land prices had also increased considerably during the 1820s and 1830s, which meant that the younger generation could not afford their own pieces of land, a problem that would only grow. Another reason was concerns about labour loss and financial retribution with the passing of Ordinance 50 in 1828, which outlawed slavery. The Great Trek split
9796-586: The field of settler colonial studies was established distinct but connected to Indigenous studies . Although often credited with originating the field, Australian historian Patrick Wolfe stated that "I didn't invent Settler Colonial Studies. Natives have been experts in the field for centuries." Additionally, Wolfe's work was preceded by others that have been influential in the field, such as Fayez Sayegh 's Zionist Colonialism in Palestine and Settler Capitalism by Donald Denoon . Settler colonialism
9920-573: The fifteenth century, the Kingdom of Castile sponsored expeditions by conquistadors to subjugate under Castilian rule the Macaronesian archipelago of the Canary Islands, located off the coast of Morocco and inhabited by the Indigenous Guanche people. Beginning with the start of the conquest of the island of Lanzarote on 1 May 1402 and ending with the surrender of the last Guanche resistance on Tenerife on 29 September 1496 to
10044-618: The first vrijburgers started receiving their farms, the white population of the Cape was only about 134. Although the soil and climate in Cape Town were suitable for farming, willing immigrants remained in short supply, including a number of orphans, refugees, and foreigners. From 1688 onward, the Cape attracted some French Huguenots , most of them refugees from the protracted conflict between Protestants and Catholics in France. South Africa's white population in 1691 has been described as
10168-609: The holiday was officially recognised and named the Day of the Covenant, changed to Day of the Vow in 1980 (Mackenzie 1999:69) and, after the abolition of apartheid, to Day of Reconciliation in 1994. The Boers saw their victory at the Battle of Blood River as evidence that they had found divine favour for their exodus from British rule. Settler colonialism Settler colonialism
10292-508: The impact of white settler colonialism on the Natives, stating the US had "gunned down the millions of Redskins to a few hundred thousand, and now keep the modest remnant under observation in a cage". The practice of writing the Indigenous out of history perpetrated a forgetting of the full dimensions and significance of colonialism at both the national and local levels. Near the end of their rule
10416-628: The late 1820s and early 1830s, especially with the official imposition of the English language. This replaced Dutch with English as the language used in the Cape's judicial system, putting the Boers at a disadvantage, as most spoke little or no English at all. Bridling at what they considered an unwarranted intrusion into their way of life, some in the Boer community began to consider selling their farms and venturing deep into South Africa's unmapped interior to preempt further disputes and live completely independent from British rule. From their perspective,
10540-475: The late 19th century this mass-movement became known as the Great Trek and the emigrants Voortrekkers . The Voortrekkers departed the colony in a series of parties, taking with them all their livestock and portable property, as well as slaves, and their dependents. They had the skills to maintain their own wagons and firearms, but remained dependent on equally mobile traders for vital commodities such as gunpowder and sugar. Nevertheless, one of their goals
10664-462: The magistrate were to beat me to death or put me in jail, I shall not be, nor will I stay, silent!"). Biebouw was flogged for his insolence and later banished to Batavia (present-day Jakarta, Indonesia). The word Afrikaner is thought to have first been used to classify Cape Coloureds , or other groups of mixed-race ancestry. Biebouw had numerous "half-caste" (mixed race) siblings and may have identified with Coloureds socially. The growing use of
10788-548: The members of the delegation; a large-scale massacre of the Boers followed: see Weenen massacre . Zulu izibutho ('regiments') attacked Boer encampments in the Drakensberg foothills at what was later called Blaauwkrans and Weenen , killing women and children along with men. (By contrast, in earlier conflicts the trekkers had experienced along the eastern Cape frontier, the Xhosa had refrained from harming women and children.) A commando of 470 men arrived to help
10912-428: The mid-seventeenth century. The Dutch East India Company established a refreshment station for ships sailing between Europe and the east. The initial plan by Dutch East India Company officer Jan van Riebeeck was to maintain a small community around the new fort, but the community continued to spread and settle further than originally planned. There was a historic struggle to achieve the intended British sovereignty that
11036-487: The nineteenth century. Aside from coastal pockets in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal they remain heavily outnumbered by those of Afrikaans origin. The South African National Census of 2011 counted 2,710,461 white South Africans who speak Afrikaans as a first language, or approximately 5.23% of the total South African population. The census also showed an increase of 5.21% in Afrikaner population compared to
11160-595: The notion, especially following a skirmish with the Khoikhoi in 1497, when one of his admirals was wounded. After the British East India Company was founded in 1599, London merchants began to take advantage of the route to India by the Cape. James Lancaster , who had visited Robben Island some years earlier, anchored in Table Bay in 1601. By 1614, the British had planted a penal colony on
11284-668: The now-unified Spanish crown , the archipelago was subject to a settler colonial process involving systematic enslavement, mass murder, and deportation of the Guanches, who were replaced with Spanish settlers, in a process foreshadowing the Iberian colonisation of the Americas that followed shortly thereafter. Also like in the Americas, Spanish colonialists in the Canaries quickly turned to the importation of slaves from mainland Africa as
11408-621: The occupied territory constitutes a direct violation of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention (cf. Turkish settlers in Northern Cyprus and Israeli settlers in the Palestinian territories ). In 1652, the arrival of Europeans sparked the beginning of settler colonialism in South Africa. The Dutch East India Company was set up at the Cape, and imported large numbers of slaves from Africa and Asia during
11532-483: The only way to end settler colonialism was to erase the political significance of the settler–native dichotomy. According to Chickasaw scholar Jodi Byrd, in contrast to settler, the term arrivant refers to enslaved Africans transported against their will, and to refugees forced into the Americas due to the effects of imperialism. In his book Empire of the People: Settler Colonialism and
11656-692: The perceived threat of permanent Indigenous political and spatial structures led to violent relocation of many Indigenous tribes to the American West, in what is known as the Trail of Tears . In response to American encroachment on native land in the Great Lakes region, the Pan-Indian confederacies of the Northwest Confederacy and Tecumseh's Confederacy emerged. Despite initial victories in both cases, such as St. Clair's defeat or
11780-500: The previous, 2001 census. The earliest Afrikaner communities in South Africa were formed at the Cape of Good Hope, mainly through the introduction of Dutch colonists, French Huguenot refugees, and erstwhile servants of the VOC. During the early colonial period, Afrikaners were generally known as "Christians", "colonists", "emigrants", or ingezeetenen ("inhabitants"). Their concept of being rooted in Africa—;as opposed to
11904-642: The project as colonization, such as Vladimir Jabotinsky , who said "Zionism is a colonization adventure." Founder of the World Zionist Organization , Theodor Herzl , described the Zionist project as "something colonial" in a letter to Cecil Rhodes in 1902. In 1967, the French historian Maxime Rodinson wrote an article later translated and published in English as Israel: A Colonial Settler-State? Lorenzo Veracini describes Israel as
12028-409: The project. Between 1822 and the early 20th century, around 15,000 African Americans colonized Liberia on lands acquired from the region's indigenous African population. The African American elite monopolized the government and established minority rule over the locals. As they possessed Western culture , they felt superior to the natives, whom they dominated and oppressed. Indigenous revolts against
12152-527: The running conflicts with various indigenous groups along the way. One conflict central to the construction of Boer identity occurred with the Zulu in the area of present-day KwaZulu-Natal . The Boers who entered Natal discovered that the land they wanted came under the authority of the Zulu King Dingane kaSenzangakhona , who ruled that part of what subsequently became KwaZulu-Natal. The British had
12276-512: The service of the company, it was decided to provide them a "letter of freedom", a licence known as a vrijbrief . European employees were repatriated to the Netherlands upon the termination of their contract, unless they successfully applied for a vrijbrief , in which they were charged a small fee and registered as a vrijburger in a VOC record known collectively as the vrijboeken ('free(dom) books'). Fairly strict conditions were levied on those who aspired to become vrijburgers at
12400-509: The settler population or through reforms to colonial structures, settler-indigenous compacts and reconciliation processes. Settler colonial studies has often focused on former British colonies in North America , Australia and New Zealand , which are close to the complete, prototypical form of settler colonialism. However, settler colonialism is not restricted to any specific culture and has been practised by non-Europeans. During
12524-636: The settlers. On 16 December 1838, the Voortrekkers under the command of Andries Pretorius confronted about 10,000 Zulus at the prepared positions. The Boers had three injuries without any fatalities. Due to the blood of 3,000 slain Zulus that stained the Ncome River , the conflict afterwards became known as the Battle of Blood River . In present-day South Africa, 16 December remains a celebrated public holiday, initially called "Dingane's Day". After 1952,
12648-593: The site, and in 1621 two Englishmen claimed Table Bay on behalf of King James I , but this action was not ratified. They eventually settled on Saint Helena as an alternative port of refuge. Due to the value of the spice trade between Europe and their outposts in the East Indies , Dutch ships began to call sporadically at the Cape in search of provisions after 1598. In 1601, a Captain Paul van Corniden came ashore at St. Sebastion's Bay near Overberg . He discovered
12772-434: The skull of a hydrocephalus patient. Afrikaner Afrikaners ( Afrikaans: [afriˈkɑːnərs] ) are a Southern African ethnic group descended from predominantly Dutch settlers first arriving at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652 . Until 1994, they dominated South Africa 's politics as well as the country's commercial agricultural sector. Afrikaans , a language primarily descended from Dutch ,
12896-650: The term appeared to express the rise of a new identity for white South Africans, suggesting for the first time a group identification with the Cape Colony rather than with an ancestral homeland in Europe. Afrikaner culture and people are also commonly referred to as the Afrikaans or Afrikaans people . VOC initially had no intention of establishing a permanent European settlement at the Cape of Good Hope ; until 1657, it devoted as little attention as possible to
13020-461: The terms " burgher " and " Boer " have both been used to describe white Afrikaans-speakers as a group; neither is particularly objectionable, but "Afrikaner" has been considered a more appropriate term. By the late nineteenth century, the term was in common usage in both the Boer republics and the Cape Colony . At one time, burghers denoted Cape Dutch : those settlers who were influential in
13144-400: The territory through the settler's colonialism. Settler colonialism contrasts with exploitation colonialism , where the imperial power conquers territory to exploit the natural resources and gain a source of cheap or free labor . As settler colonialism entails the creation of a new society on the conquered territory, it lasts indefinitely unless decolonisation occurs through departure of
13268-422: The total population. They also constituted 9.3% of the population in neighbouring South West Africa . According to the 1985 South African census, there were 2,581,080 white Afrikaans speakers then residing in the country, or about 9.4% of the total population. The South African National Census of 1996 was the first census conducted in post- apartheid South Africa. It was calculated on Census Day and reported
13392-430: The traditional framework of colonialism. S. Ilan Troen views Zionism as the return of an indigenous population to its historic homeland, distinct from imperial expansion. Most Jews oppose the paradigm, saying it denies their historical connection to the land and aspirations for self-determination . Moses Lissak asserted that the settler-colonial thesis denies the idea that Zionism is the modern national movement of
13516-735: The twentieth century, Afrikaner nationalism took the form of political parties and closed societies, such as the Broederbond . In 1914, the National Party was founded to promote Afrikaner interests. It gained power by winning South Africa's 1948 general elections . The party was noted for implementing a harsh policy of racial segregation ( apartheid ) and declaring South Africa a republic in 1961. Following decades of domestic unrest and international sanctions that resulted in bilateral and multi-party negotiations to end apartheid , South Africa held its first multiracial elections under
13640-448: The volume of traffic rounding the Cape increased, the VOC recognised its natural harbour as an ideal watering point for the long voyage around Africa to East Asia and established a victualling station there in 1652. VOC officials did not favour the permanent settlement of Europeans in their trading empire, although during the 140 years of Dutch rule many VOC servants retired or were discharged and remained as private citizens. Furthermore,
13764-643: Was achieved in other parts of the Commonwealth . State sovereignty belonged to the Union of South Africa (1910–1961), followed by the Republic of South Africa (1961–1994) and finally the modern day Republic of South Africa (1994–present day). In 1948, the policy of Apartheid was introduced South Africa in order to segregate the races and ensure the domination of the Afrikaner minority over non-whites, politically, socially and economically. As of 2014,
13888-418: Was centered on the control of land, that it continued after the closing of the frontier, and that continued to exist today, classifying Israel as a modern form of settler colonialism . His approach was defining for the field, but has been challenged by other scholars on the basis that many situations involve a combination of elimination and exploitation. Critics of the paradigm argue that Zionism does not fit
14012-570: Was claimed the large brain size in Boskop individuals might be indicative of particularly high general intelligence . Anthropologist John Hawks harshly criticized the depiction of the Boskop fossils in the book and in the book's review article in Discover magazine. An image has circulated across the Internet which is purported to be of a Boskopoid skull. However, this image in actuality depicts
14136-687: Was founded as the private colony of Liberia in 1822 by the American Colonization Society , a White American -run organization, to relocate free African Americans to Africa, as part of the Back-to-Africa movement . This settlement scheme stemmed from fears that free African Americans would assist slaves in escaping, as well as the widespread belief among White Americans that African Americans were inherently inferior and should thus be relocated. U.S. presidents Thomas Jefferson and James Madison publicly endorsed and funded
14260-450: Was granted a tract of forest, from which he was permitted to sell timber, and one miller from Holland opened his own water-operated corn mill, the first of its kind in Southern Africa. The colony initially did not do well, and many of the discouraged vrijburgers returned to VOC service or sought passage back to the Netherlands to pursue other opportunities. Vegetable gardens were frequently destroyed by storms, and cattle lost in raids by
14384-403: Was its strategic relation to Indian maritime traffic. The British formally assumed permanent administrative control around 1815, as a result of the Treaty of Paris . Relations between some of the colonists and the new British administration quickly soured. The British brought more liberal attitudes towards slavery and treatment of the indigenous peoples to the Cape, which were utterly alien to
14508-545: Was not viable for them. Their response to grievances with the Cape government was to demand political reform and greater representation, a practice that became commonplace under Dutch and subsequently British rule. In 1779, for example, hundreds of Cape burghers smuggled a petition to Amsterdam demanding an end to VOC corruption and contradictory laws. Unlike the Boers, the contact most Cape Dutch had with black Africans were predominantly peaceful, and their racial attitudes were more paternal than outright hostile. Meanwhile,
14632-472: Was restored. Holland's administration was never effectively reestablished; upon a new outbreak of hostilities with France, expeditionary forces led by Sir David Baird, 1st Baronet , finally permanently imposed British rule when they defeated Cape governor Jan Willem Janssens in 1806. At the onset of Cape Town 's annexation to the British Empire , the original Afrikaners numbered 26,720 – or 36% of
14756-448: Was successful, the Company granted them plots of farmland of thirteen and a half morgen (equal to 2,000 to 10,100 square metres or 1 ⁄ 2 to 2 + 1 ⁄ 2 acres), which were tax exempt for twelve years. They were also loaned tools and seeds. The extent of their farming activities, however, remained heavily regulated: for example, the vrijburgers were ordered to focus on the cultivation of grain. Each year their harvest
14880-409: Was therefore extremely limited at these sites. During the VOC's history only two primary exceptions to the rule emerged: the Dutch East Indies and the Cape of Good Hope, through the formation of the vrijburgers . The VOC operated under a strict corporate hierarchy which allowed it to formally assign classifications to those whom it determined fell within its legal purview. Most Europeans within
15004-522: Was to be sold exclusively to the VOC at fixed prices. They were forbidden from growing tobacco, producing vegetables for any purpose other than personal consumption, or purchasing cattle from the native Khoikhoi at rates which differed from those set by the VOC. With time, these restrictions and other attempts by the VOC to control the settlers resulted in successive generations of vrijburgers and their descendants becoming increasingly localised in their loyalties and national identity, and hostile towards
15128-487: Was to sever their ties with the Cape's commercial network by gaining access to foreign traders and ports in east Africa, well beyond the British sphere of influence. The various motives for the Great Trek are laid out in the Voortrekker leader, Piet Retief's 1837 manifesto. On the one hand, there was an ongoing conflict between the Boers and the Xhosa inhabitants on the frontier, as well as growing resentment between
15252-474: Was to sponsor the immigration of Dutch women to the colony as potential wives for the settlers. Upon the outbreak of the Second Anglo-Dutch War , Wagenaer was perturbed by the British capture of New Amsterdam and attacks on other Dutch outposts in the Americas and on the west African coast. He increased the Cape garrison by about 300 troops and replaced the original earthen fortifications of
15376-542: Was unsuccessful, Portugal's continued interest in the continent made possible the later voyages of Bartholomew Dias in 1487 and Vasco da Gama ten years later. Dias made known to the world a "Cape of Storms", rechristened "Good Hope" by John II . As it was desirable to take formal possession of this territory, the Portuguese erected a stone cross in Algoa Bay . Gama and his successors, however, did not take kindly to
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