129-664: The Union Buildings ( Afrikaans : Uniegebou ) form the official seat of the South African Government and also house the offices of the President of South Africa . The imposing buildings are located in Pretoria , atop Meintjeskop at the northern end of Arcadia , close to historic Church Square . The large gardens of the Buildings are nestled between Government Avenue, Vermeulen Street East, Church Street,
258-526: A prison where people were isolated, banished, and exiled for nearly 400 years. It was also used as a leper colony, a post office, a grazing ground, a mental hospital, and an outpost. The Cape Peninsula is a rocky and mountainous peninsula that juts out into the Atlantic Ocean at the south-western extremity of the continent. At its tip is Cape Point and the Cape of Good Hope . The peninsula forms
387-521: A severe water shortage from 2015 to 2018. According to Oxfam , "in the face of an imminent water shortage, the city of Cape Town in South Africa successfully reduced its water use by more than half in three years, cutting it from 1.2bn litres per day in February 2015 to 516m litres per day in 2018." In 2021 Cape Town also experienced a violent turf war between rival taxi firms which led to
516-525: A basement and three floors above ground. The interiors were created in the Cape Dutch style with carved teak fanlights , heavy doors, dark ceiling beams contrasting with white plaster walls and heavy wood furniture. Baker used indigenous materials as far as possible. The granite was quarried on site while Buiskop sandstone was used for the courtyards. Stinkwood and Rhodesian teak were used for timber and wood panelling. The roof tiles and quarry tiles for
645-400: A decreasing number of first language Afrikaans speakers in South Africa from 13.5% in 2011 to 10.6% in 2022. The South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) projects that a growing majority of Afrikaans speakers will be Coloured . Afrikaans speakers experience higher employment rates than other South African language groups, though as of 2012 half a million were unemployed. Despite
774-623: A few other towns. Industry and commerce is largely in service of the area. After the Cape Peninsula, Helderberg is the next most mountainous part of Greater Cape Town, bordered to the north and east by the highest peaks in the region along the watershed of the Helderberg and Hottentots Holland Mountains, which are part of the Cape Fold Belt with Cape Supergroup strata on a basement of Tygerberg Formation rocks intruded by part of
903-699: A flood of immigration into South Africa. In 1895 the city's first public power station, the Graaff Electric Lighting Works , was opened. Conflicts between the Boer republics in the interior and the British colonial government resulted in the Second Boer War of 1899–1902. Britain's victory in this war led to the formation of a united South Africa. From 1891 to 1901, the city's population more than doubled from 67,000 to 171,000. As
1032-547: A glorious life for all. All this we owe both to ourselves and to the peoples of the world who are so well represented here today. ....... We understand it still that there is no easy road to freedom. We know it well that none of us acting alone can achieve success. We must therefore act together as a united people, for national reconciliation, for nation building, for the birth of a new world. Let there be justice for all. Let there be peace for all. Let there be work, bread, water and salt for all. Let each know that for each
1161-539: A major gap at the Fish Hoek–Noordhoek valley. In the south much of the area is a low sandstone plateau with sand dunes. Maximum altitude is 1113 m on Table Mountain. The Cape Flats (Afrikaans: Kaapse Vlakte) is a flat, low-lying, sandy area, area to the east the Cape Peninsula, and west of the Helderberg much of which was wetland and dunes within recent history. To the north are the Tygerberg Hills and
1290-575: A national, but not official, language. There is a much smaller number of Afrikaans speakers among Zimbabwe's white minority, as most have left the country since 1980. Afrikaans was also a medium of instruction for schools in Bophuthatswana , an Apartheid-era Bantustan . Eldoret in Kenya was founded by Afrikaners. There are also around 30.000 South-Africans in the Netherlands , of which
1419-448: A number of satellite towns, suburbs and rural areas such as Atlantis , Bellville , Blouberg , Brackenfell , Durbanville , Goodwood , Gordon's Bay , Hout Bay , Khayelitsha , Kraaifontein , Kuilsrivier , Macassar , Melkbosstrand , Milnerton , Muizenberg , Noordhoek , Parow , Philadelphia , Simon's Town , Somerset West , and Strand among others. The Cape Peninsula is 52 km (30 mi) long from Mouille Point in
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#17327832933141548-622: A second language. It is widely taught in South African schools, with about 10.3 million second-language students. Afrikaans is offered at many universities outside South Africa, including in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Poland, Russia and the United States. In Afrikaans grammar, there is no distinction between the infinitive and present forms of verbs, with the exception of the verbs 'to be' and 'to have'. In addition, verbs do not conjugate differently depending on
1677-527: A semi-circular shape, with the two wings at the sides, this serves to represent the union of a formerly divided people. The clock chimes are identical to those of Big Ben in London. The east and west wings, as well as the twin-domed towers, represent two languages, English and Afrikaans , and the inner court was designed and built to symbolise the Union of South Africa . These buildings are considered by many to be
1806-554: A single negation. Certain words in Afrikaans would be contracted. For example, moet nie , which literally means 'must not', usually becomes moenie ; although one does not have to write or say it like this, virtually all Afrikaans speakers will change the two words to moenie in the same way as do not is contracted to don't in English. Cape Town Cape Town is the legislative capital of South Africa . It
1935-515: Is "a pure and proper language" for religious purposes, especially among the deeply Calvinist Afrikaans religious community that previously had been sceptical of a Bible translation that varied from the Dutch version that they were used to. In 1983 a fresh translation marked the 50th anniversary of the 1933 version. The final editing of this edition was done by E. P. Groenewald, A. H. van Zyl, P. A. Verhoef, J. L. Helberg and W. Kempen. This translation
2064-553: Is a groundswell movement within Afrikaans to be inclusive, and to promote itself along with the indigenous official languages. In Namibia, the percentage of Afrikaans speakers declined from 11.4% (2001 Census) to 10.4% (2011 Census). The major concentrations are in Hardap (41.0%), ǁKaras (36.1%), Erongo (20.5%), Khomas (18.5%), Omaheke (10.0%), Otjozondjupa (9.4%), Kunene (4.2%), and Oshikoto (2.3%). Some native speakers of Bantu languages and English also speak Afrikaans as
2193-526: Is absent from the other West Germanic standard languages. For example: Both French and San origins have been suggested for double negation in Afrikaans. While double negation is still found in Low Franconian dialects in West Flanders and in some "isolated" villages in the centre of the Netherlands (such as Garderen ), it takes a different form, which is not found in Afrikaans. The following
2322-475: Is an example: Compare with Ek wil dit nie doen nie , which changes the meaning to 'I want not to do this'. Whereas Ek wil nie dit doen nie emphasizes a lack of desire to act, Ek wil dit nie doen nie emphasizes the act itself. The -ne was the Middle Dutch way to negate but it has been suggested that since -ne became highly non-voiced, nie or niet was needed to complement
2451-569: Is neither a creole nor a direct descendant of Dutch, but a fusion of two transmission pathways. Most of the first settlers whose descendants today are the Afrikaners were from the United Provinces (now Netherlands), with up to one-sixth of the community of French Huguenot origin, and a seventh from Germany. African and Asian workers, Cape Coloured children of European settlers and Khoikhoi women, and slaves contributed to
2580-537: Is seen as the dawn of a new era in Afrikaans cinema. Several short films have been created and more feature-length movies, such as Poena Is Koning and Bakgat (both in 2008) have been produced, besides the 2011 Afrikaans-language film Skoonheid , which was the first Afrikaans film to screen at the Cannes Film Festival . The film Platteland was also released in 2011. The Afrikaans film industry started gaining international recognition via
2709-666: Is the country's oldest city and the seat of the Parliament of South Africa . It is the country's second-largest city, after Johannesburg , and the largest in the Western Cape . The city is part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality . The city is known for its harbour , its natural setting in the Cape Floristic Region , and for landmarks such as Table Mountain and Cape Point . In 2014, Cape Town
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#17327832933142838-532: Is the valley of the Steenbras River, in which the Steenbras Dam was built as a water supply for Cape Town. The dam has been supplemented by several other dams around the western Cape, some of them considerably larger. This is almost entirely a conservation area, of high biodiversity. Bellville , Brackenfell , Durbanville , Kraaifontein , Goodwood and Parow are a few of the towns that make up
2967-405: The -ne . With time the -ne disappeared in most Dutch dialects. The double negative construction has been fully grammaticalised in standard Afrikaans and its proper use follows a set of fairly complex rules as the examples below show: A notable exception to this is the use of the negating grammar form that coincides with negating the English present participle . In this case there is only
3096-605: The Evangelie volgens Markus ( Gospel of Mark , lit. 'Gospel according to Mark'); however, this translation was never published. The manuscript is to be found in the South African National Library, Cape Town. The first official translation of the entire Bible into Afrikaans was in 1933 by J. D. du Toit , E. E. van Rooyen, J. D. Kestell, H. C. M. Fourie, and BB Keet . This monumental work established Afrikaans as 'n suiwer en ordentlike taal , that
3225-541: The Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 . The city became the capital of the newly formed Cape Colony , whose territory expanded very substantially through the 1800s, partially as a result of numerous wars with the amaXhosa on the colony's eastern frontier. In 1833 slavery was abolished in the colony freeing over 5500 slaves in the city, almost a third of the city's population at the time. The Convict Crisis of 1849, marked by substantial civil upheaval, bolstered
3354-696: The Arabic alphabet : see Arabic Afrikaans . Later, Afrikaans, now written with the Latin script , started to appear in newspapers and political and religious works in around 1850 (alongside the already established Dutch). In 1875 a group of Afrikaans-speakers from the Cape formed the Genootskap vir Regte Afrikaaners ('Society for Real Afrikaners'), and published a number of books in Afrikaans including grammars, dictionaries, religious materials and histories. Until
3483-714: The Battle of Salt River , the Portuguese admiral Francisco de Almeida and sixty-four of his men were killed and his party was defeated by the "Goringhaiqua" in Dutch approximate spelling) using cattle that were specially trained to respond to whistles and shouts. The Gorinaiqua were one of the Khoikhoi clans who inhabited the area. In the late 16th century French, Danish, Dutch and English, but mainly Portuguese, ships regularly continued to stop over in Table Bay en route to
3612-718: The Cape Supergroup , of which parts of the Graafwater and Peninsula Formations remain, were uplifted between 280 and 21S million years ago, and were largely eroded away during the Mesozoic. The region was geologically stable during the Tertiary, which has led to slow denudation of the durable sandstones. Erosion rate and drainage has been influenced by fault lines and fractures, leaving remnant steep-sided massifs like Table Mountain surrounded by flatter slopes of deposits of
3741-571: The Dutch vernacular of South Holland ( Hollandic dialect ) spoken by the predominantly Dutch settlers and enslaved population of the Dutch Cape Colony , where it gradually began to develop distinguishing characteristics in the 17th and 18th centuries. Although Afrikaans has adopted words from other languages, including German and the Khoisan languages , an estimated 90 to 95% of
3870-704: The Far East . Jan van Riebeeck 's arrival on 6 April 1652 established the VOC Cape Colony , the first permanent European settlement in South Africa. Cape Town outgrew its original purpose as the first European outpost at the Castle of Good Hope , becoming the economic and cultural hub of the Cape Colony . Until the Witwatersrand Gold Rush and the development of Johannesburg, Cape Town was
3999-602: The First World War as well as a plaque in memory of those that died during the Korean War . Afrikaans language Afrikaans ( / ˌ æ f r ɪ ˈ k ɑː n s / AF -rih- KAHNSS , / ˌ ɑː f -, - ˈ k ɑː n z / AHF -, - KAHNZ ) is a West Germanic language , spoken in South Africa , Namibia and (to a lesser extent) Botswana , Zambia and Zimbabwe . It evolved from
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4128-500: The Fort de Goede Hoop (later replaced by the Castle of Good Hope ). The settlement grew slowly during this period, as it was hard to find adequate labour. This labour shortage prompted the local authorities to import enslaved people from Indonesia and Madagascar . Many of these people are ancestors of modern-day Cape Coloured and Cape Malay communities. Under Van Riebeeck and his successors, as VOC commanders and later governors at
4257-590: The Northern Suburbs of Cape Town. In current popular culture these areas are often referred to as being beyond the " boerewors curtain," a play on the term " iron curtain ." UNESCO declared Robben Island in the Western Cape a World Heritage Site in 1999. Robben Island is located in Table Bay, some 6 km (3.7 mi) west of Bloubergstrand, a coastal suburb north of Cape Town, and stands some 30m above sea level. Robben Island has been used as
4386-733: The Roman Catholic and Anglican Churches, were involved. Afrikaans descended from Dutch dialects in the 17th century. It belongs to a West Germanic sub-group, the Low Franconian languages . Other West Germanic languages related to Afrikaans are German, English, the Frisian languages , Yiddish , and the unstandardised language Low German . Afrikaans is also widely spoken in Namibia. Before independence, Afrikaans had equal status with German as an official language. Since independence in 1990, Afrikaans has had constitutional recognition as
4515-589: The Senate , in which the Afrikaans language was declared a variety of Dutch. The Constitution of 1961 reversed the position of Afrikaans and Dutch, so that English and Afrikaans were the official languages, and Afrikaans was deemed to include Dutch. The Constitution of 1983 removed any mention of Dutch altogether. The Afrikaans Language Monument is on a hill overlooking Paarl in the Western Cape Province . Officially opened on 10 October 1975, it
4644-612: The Southern Suburbs , close to the mountains, rainfall is significantly higher and averages closer to 1,000 mm (39.4 in). Summer, which lasts from December to March, is warm and dry with an average maximum of 26 °C (79 °F) and minimum of 16 °C (61 °F). The region can get uncomfortably hot when the Berg Wind , meaning "mountain wind", blows from the Karoo interior. Spring and summer generally feature
4773-538: The Synod of Dordrecht of 1618 and was thus in an archaic form of Dutch. This was hard for Dutch speakers to understand, and increasingly unintelligible for Afrikaans speakers. C. P. Hoogehout, Arnoldus Pannevis [ af ] , and Stephanus Jacobus du Toit were the first Afrikaans Bible translators. Important landmarks in the translation of the Scriptures were in 1878 with C. P. Hoogehout's translation of
4902-635: The Table Mountain group sandstones that were deposited on the eroded surface of the granite and Malmesbury series basement about 450 million years ago. The sand, silt and mud deposits were lithified by pressure and then folded during the Cape Orogeny to form the Cape Fold Belt , which extends in an arc along the western and southern coasts. The present landscape is due to prolonged erosion having carved out deep valleys, removing parts of
5031-617: The Transvaal Republic , was the original owner of the farm 'Elandsfontein' on which Meintjieskop stands. In 1856 Andries Francois du Toit (1813–1883), in exchange for a Basotho pony , acquired part of the farm, which he named ' Arcadia ' and on which the Union Buildings were later constructed. He was also Pretoria 's first magistrate and was responsible for the layout of the city. During this period he sold his land to Stephanus Jacobus Meintjies (1819–1887), after whom
5160-548: The Union of South Africa , it was then the largest building in the country and possibly the largest building work undertaken in the Southern Hemisphere at that time. Several other sites were considered, including Muckleneuk Ridge, on the opposite side of the city, and Pretorius Square, in the centre of Pretoria, where the City Hall now stands. However, Herbert Baker was strongly in favour of Meintjieskop , which
5289-446: The Union of South Africa . Pretoria then became the administrative capital of the whole of South Africa, with Cape Town the legislative capital. Between 1860 and 1994, the city was also the capital of the province of Transvaal , superseding Potchefstroom in that role. The new Union required a governmental building which could signify unity and host the new government. Marthinus Wessel Pretorius , later to become first president of
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5418-448: The constitution of the Western Cape , which went into effect in 1998, declares Afrikaans to be an official language of the province alongside English and Xhosa . The Afrikaans-language general-interest family magazine Huisgenoot has the largest readership of any magazine in the country. When the British design magazine Wallpaper described Afrikaans as "one of the world's ugliest languages" in its September 2005 article about
5547-526: The monument , South African billionaire Johann Rupert (chairman of the Richemont Group ), responded by withdrawing advertising for brands such as Cartier , Van Cleef & Arpels , Montblanc and Alfred Dunhill from the magazine. The author of the article, Bronwyn Davies, was an English -speaking South African. An estimated 90 to 95 percent of the Afrikaans lexicon is ultimately of Dutch origin, and there are few lexical differences between
5676-589: The neo-classic architecture of the Italian Renaissance , and also combined an idiom of the English Renaissance, as well as significant elements of Cape Dutch detail, such as in the carved main doorways and fanlights and in much of the wrought-iron brass work and balustrades of the smaller areas. On 9 August 1956, 20,000 women marched to the doors of the Union Buildings, chanting "Wathint' Abafazi, wathint' imbokodo!" which means "strike
5805-452: The "language of the white oppressor" by some, pressure has been increased to remove Afrikaans as a teaching language in South African universities, resulting in bloody student protests in 2015. Under South Africa's Constitution of 1996, Afrikaans remains an official language , and has equal status to English and nine other languages. The new policy means that the use of Afrikaans is now often reduced in favour of English, or to accommodate
5934-528: The 19th century came to an end, the economic and political dominance of Cape Town in the Southern Africa region during the 19th century started to give way to the dominance of Johannesburg and Pretoria in the 20th century. In 1910, Britain established the Union of South Africa , which unified the Cape Colony with the two defeated Boer Republics and the British colony of Natal . Cape Town became
6063-676: The Arabic script. In 1861, L.H. Meurant published his Zamenspraak tusschen Klaas Waarzegger en Jan Twyfelaar ( Conversation between Nicholas Truthsayer and John Doubter ), which is considered to be the first book published in Afrikaans. The first grammar book was published in 1876; a bilingual dictionary was later published in 1902. The main modern Afrikaans dictionary in use is the Verklarende Handwoordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal (HAT). A new authoritative dictionary, called Woordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal (WAT),
6192-498: The Atlantic Ocean with significant precipitation and strong north-westerly winds. Winter months in the city average a maximum of 18 °C (64 °F) and minimum of 8.5 °C (47 °F). Winters are snow and frost free, except on Table Mountain and on other mountain peaks, where light accumulation of snow and frost can sometimes occur. Total annual rainfall in the city averages 515 mm (20.3 in) although in
6321-702: The Boers and their servants." In 1925 Afrikaans was recognised by the South African government as a distinct language, rather than simply a vernacular of Dutch. On 8 May 1925, that is 23 years after the Second Boer War ended, the Official Languages of the Union Act, 1925 was passed—mostly due to the efforts of the Afrikaans-language movement —at a joint sitting of the House of Assembly and
6450-522: The Cape was considered a " Coloured labour preference area", to the exclusion of " Bantus ", i.e. Black Africans. The implementation of this policy was widely opposed by trade unions, civil society and opposition parties. It is notable that this policy was not advocated for by any Coloured political group, and its implementation was a unilateral decision by the apartheid government. During the student-led Soweto Uprising of June 1976, school students from Langa , Gugulethu and Nyanga in Cape Town reacted to
6579-408: The Cape, a wide range of agricultural plants were introduced to the Cape. Some of these, including grapes, cereals, ground nuts, potatoes, apples and citrus, had a large and lasting influence on the societies and economies of the region. With the Dutch Republic being transformed into Revolutionary France 's vassal Batavian Republic , Great Britain moved to take control of Dutch colonies, including
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#17327832933146708-399: The Dutch Cape Colony between 1652 and 1672 had a Dutch father. Sarah Grey Thomason and Terrence Kaufman argue that Afrikaans' development as a separate language was "heavily conditioned by nonwhites who learned Dutch imperfectly as a second language." Beginning in about 1815, Afrikaans started to replace Malay as the language of instruction in Muslim schools in South Africa, written with
6837-407: The Indies. They traded tobacco, copper, and iron with the Khoikhoi clans of the region in exchange for fresh meat and other essential travelling provisions. In 1652, Jan van Riebeeck and other employees of the United East India Company ( Dutch : Verenigde Oost-indische Compagnie , VOC) were sent to the Cape Colony to establish a way-station for ships travelling to the Dutch East Indies , and
6966-407: The R104 and Blackwood Street. Fairview Avenue is a closed road through which only officials can enter the Union Buildings. Though not in the centre of Pretoria, the Union Buildings occupy the highest point of Pretoria, and constitute a South African national heritage site . The Buildings are one of the centres of political life in South Africa; "The Buildings" and "Arcadia" have become metonyms for
7095-453: The South African flagship Millennium celebration was held here. In attendance was the then deputy president Jacob Zuma , and other ministers. On 10 December 2013, the Union Buildings Amphitheatre was renamed the Nelson Mandela Amphitheatre. On 16 December 2013, a 9-metre high bronze statue of Mandela was unveiled at the Union Buildings. The building is surrounded by beautifully terraced gardens of indigenous plants. Various monuments adorn
7224-425: The South African government. It has become an iconic landmark of Pretoria and South Africa in general, and is one of the most popular tourist attractions in the city and an emblem of democracy. The Buildings are the location of presidential inaugurations. These buildings, built from light sandstone , were designed by the architect Sir Herbert Baker in the English monumental style and are 285 m long. They have
7353-410: The South African national flag is flown on the left-hand side if the president is in office. The Buildings are divided into three sections; the left offices, amphitheatre, and right offices. All are 95 metres in length. Each offices block contains three inner courtyards providing light and air to the offices. Each block has a basement and three floors above ground. The central curved building behind
7482-419: The Stellenbosch district. The Helderberg area of Greater Cape Town, previously known as the "Hottentots-Holland" area, is mostly residential, but also a wine-producing area east of the Cape Flats, west of the Hottentots Holland mountain range and south of the Helderberg mountain, from which it gets its current name. The Helderberg consists of the previous municipalities of Somerset West, Strand, Gordons Bay and
7611-407: The Stellenbosch granite pluton. The region includes the entire catchment of the Lourens and Sir Lowry's rivers, separated by the Schapenberg hill, and a small part of the catchment of the Eerste River to the west. The Helderberg is ecologically highly diverse, rivaling the Cape Peninsula, and has its own endemic ecoregions and several conservation areas. To the east of the Hottentots Holland mountains
7740-479: The Union Buildings was undertaken by Johan de Ridder and T.W. Baker as the appointed architects. On 10 May 1994, the inauguration of Nelson Mandela , South Africa's first democratically elected president after the end of Apartheid , and his vice-presidents, heralded the beginning of a new era in South Africa's history. Part of Nelson Mandela's inaugural address: "Today, all of us do, by our presence here, and by our celebrations in other parts of our country and
7869-402: The Western Cape province. The official boundaries of the city proper extend between the City Bowl and the Atlantic Seaboard to the east and the Southern Suburbs to the south. The City of Cape Town , the metropolitan municipality that takes its name from the city covers the Greater Cape Town metropolitan area , known as the Cape Metropole, extending beyond the city proper itself to include
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#17327832933147998-408: The architect's greatest achievement and a South African architectural masterpiece . The Nelson Mandela statue in Sandton City's Nelson Mandela Square was commissioned originally to stand on the spot where Nelson Mandela gave his inaugural address. The building was sited on a disused quarry, which now makes up the amphitheatre . The matching statues on top of the domed towers are Atlas, holding up
8127-408: The area, arrived in 1488 and named it "Cape of Storms" ( Cabo das Tormentas ). It was later renamed by John II of Portugal as " Cape of Good Hope " ( Cabo da Boa Esperança ) because of the great optimism engendered by the opening of a sea route to the Indian subcontinent and East Indies . In 1497, Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama recorded a sighting of the Cape of Good Hope. In 1510, at
8256-481: The balcony of Cape Town City Hall , hours after being released on 11 February 1990. His speech heralded the beginning of a new era for the country. The first democratic election , was held four years later, on 27 April 1994. Nobel Square in the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront features statues of South Africa's four Nobel Peace Prize winners: Albert Luthuli , Desmond Tutu , F. W. de Klerk and Nelson Mandela . Cape Town has undergone significant changes in
8385-424: The best governed province and city in the country. Of South Africa's 257 municipalities, only 38 received a clean financial audit in 2022 from the Auditor-General . Of those, 21 were in the Western Cape. The city's economy has diversified, with growth in sectors such as finance, real estate, and tourism. The establishment of the City Centre Improvement District (CCID) has been particularly successful in revitalizing
8514-424: The body, the mind and the soul have been freed to fulfill themselves. Never, never and never again shall it be that this beautiful land will again experience the oppression of one by another and suffer the indignity of being the skunk of the world. Let freedom reign. The sun shall never set on so glorious a human achievement! Let us as a Rainbow nation keep this in focus and move forward!" On 31 December 1999
8643-414: The building ranges from the lower levels' Edwardian style to the top levels' Cape Dutch design with shutters on the windows. The windows from bottom to top are elongated and become shorter towards the top floor. This is to give the illusion of height. The Union Buildings are the site of presidential inaugurations. The official offices of the president are on the left-hand side of the Union Buildings, and
8772-424: The buildings as well as the 9,000 seat Nelson Mandela amphitheatre . Within the grounds are various monuments, statues and memorials. Starting at the bottom of the gardens, a large statue of General Louis Botha (first prime minister of the Union of South Africa ) on horseback dominates the lawn. About halfway up the terraces, the Delville Wood War Memorial is a tribute to South African troops who died during
8901-401: The challenges of demotion and emigration that it faces in South Africa, the Afrikaans vernacular remains competitive, being popular in DSTV pay channels and several internet sites, while generating high newspaper and music CD sales. A resurgence in Afrikaans popular music since the late 1990s has invigorated the language, especially among a younger generation of South Africans. A recent trend is
9030-413: The city center, bringing businesses and people back into the area. This initiative has transformed public spaces such as Greenmarket Square , Company's Garden , and St George's Mall, attracting both locals and tourists. In 2014, Cape Town was named World Design Capital of the Year. Cape Town was voted the best tourist destination in Africa at the 2023 World Travel Awards in Dubai and continues to be
9159-509: The city centre. The legacy of Apartheid means Cape Town remains one of the most racially segregated cities in South Africa. Many Black South Africans continue to live in informal settlements with limited access to basic services such as healthcare, education, and sanitation. The unemployment rate remains high at 23% (though nearly 10 points lower than the nationwide average), particularly among historically disadvantaged groups, and economic opportunities are unevenly distributed. Cape Town faced
9288-644: The colonial possessions of the VOC. Britain captured Cape Town in 1795 , but it was returned to the Dutch by treaty in 1803. British forces occupied the Cape again in 1806 following the Battle of Blaauwberg when the Batavian Republic allied with Britain's rival, France, during the Napoleonic Wars . Following the conclusion of the war Cape Town was permanently ceded to the United Kingdom in
9417-618: The colonnade houses the committee rooms, a library and conference rooms while the basement contains the kitchen, dining rooms and lounges. The interior is treated in the Cape Dutch style: carved teak fanlights, heavy doors, dark ceiling beams contrasting with white plaster walls and heavy wood furniture. The Boer Republics of the ZAR and the Orange Free State were united with the Cape Colony and Natal Colony in 1910 to become
9546-815: The course of the 18th century. As early as the mid-18th century and as recently as the mid-20th century, Afrikaans was known in standard Dutch as a 'kitchen language' (Dutch: kombuistaal ), lacking the prestige accorded, for example, even by the educational system in Africa, to languages spoken outside Africa. Other early epithets setting apart Kaaps Hollands (' Cape Dutch ', i.e. Afrikaans) as putatively beneath official Dutch standards included geradbraakt , gebroken and onbeschaafd Hollands ('mutilated, broken, or uncivilised Dutch'), as well as verkeerd Nederlands ('incorrect Dutch'). Historical linguist Hans den Besten theorises that modern Standard Afrikaans derives from two sources: So Afrikaans, in his view,
9675-414: The deaths of 83 people. Since the 2010s, Cape Town and the wider Western Cape province have seen the rise of a small secessionist movement . Support for parties "which have formally adopted Cape independence" was around 5% in the 2021 municipal elections . Cape Town is located at latitude 33.55° S (approximately the same as Sydney and Buenos Aires and equivalent to Casablanca and Los Angeles in
9804-512: The development of Afrikaans. The slave population was made up of people from East Africa, West Africa, Mughal India , Madagascar , and the Dutch East Indies (modern Indonesia). A number were also indigenous Khoisan people, who were valued as interpreters, domestic servants, and labourers. Many free and enslaved women married or cohabited with the male Dutch settlers. M. F. Valkhoff argued that 75% of children born to female slaves in
9933-409: The early 20th century Afrikaans was considered a Dutch dialect , alongside Standard Dutch , which it eventually replaced as an official language. Before the Boer wars , "and indeed for some time afterwards, Afrikaans was regarded as inappropriate for educated discourse. Rather, Afrikaans was described derogatorily as 'a kitchen language' or 'a bastard jargon', suitable for communication mainly between
10062-624: The earth and fire. There are two sets of stairs leading to the memorial. On each step, raised in bronze letters are the words from 'The Demand of the Women of South Africa for the Withdrawal of Passes for Women and Repeal of the Pass Laws.' On approaching the imbokodo, visitors trigger infrared beams, which activates history's "whispered voices", echoed in all 11 official languages, the rally cry, repeated softly. In 1986, significant restoration of
10191-406: The east and joins the peninsula to the mainland. The Cape Town region is characterised by an extensive coastline, rugged mountain ranges, coastal plains and inland valleys. The extent of Cape Town has varied considerably over time. It originated as a small settlement at the foot of Table Mountain and has grown beyond its city limits as a metropolitan area to encompass the entire Cape Peninsula to
10320-607: The entire bottom of False Bay exposed. During this period an extensive system of dunes was formed on the sandy floor of False Bay. At this time the drainage outlets lay between Rocky Bank Cape Point to the west, and between Rocky Bank and Hangklip Ridge to the east, with the watershed roughly along the line of the contact zone east of Seal Island and Whittle Rock. Cape Town has a warm summer Mediterranean climate ( Köppen : Csb ), with mild, moderately wet winters and dry, warm summers. Winter, which lasts from June to September, may see large cold fronts entering for limited periods from
10449-563: The eroded material overlaying the older rocks, There are two internationally notable landmarks, Table Mountain and Cape Point , at opposite ends of the Peninsula Mountain Chain, with the Cape Flats and False Bay to the east and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. The landscape is dominated by sandstone plateaux and ridges, which generally drop steeply at their margins to the surrounding debris slopes, interrupted by
10578-494: The expansive lawns, including the Delville Wood War Memorial and a statue of the country's first Prime Minister , General The Rt Hon. Louis Botha . The lawn in front of the Union Buildings are often the location for public gatherings, whether they be protest or celebration, such as the presidential inauguration. Notable are the terraced gardens , planted exclusively with indigenous plants, surrounding
10707-520: The floors were made in Vereeniging . The cornerstone was laid in November 1910, shortly after the Union of South Africa – for which the buildings are named – was formed. Taking 1,265 workers over three years to build, the structure was completed in 1913 at a total cost of £1,310,640 for the building and £350,000 for the site. Designed by Sir Herbert Baker in 1908, building began in 1909 and
10836-473: The government for Afrikaans, in terms of education, social events, media (TV and radio), and general status throughout the country, given that it now shares its place as official language with ten other languages. Nevertheless, Afrikaans remains more prevalent in the media – radio, newspapers and television – than any of the other official languages, except English. More than 300 book titles in Afrikaans are published annually. South African census figures suggest
10965-657: The hill is named. In 1909 Herbert Baker was commissioned to design the Government Building of the Union of South Africa (which was formed on 31 May 1910) in Pretoria. Pretoria was to become the administrative centre for the new government. In November 1910 the cornerstone of the Union Building was laid. Lord Selborne and Henry Charles Hull , a member of the first Union Cabinet, chose Meintjieskop as
11094-406: The increased availability of pre-school educational CDs and DVDs. Such media also prove popular with the extensive Afrikaans-speaking emigrant communities who seek to retain language proficiency in a household context. Afrikaans-language cinema showed signs of new vigour in the early 21st century. The 2007 film Ouma se slim kind , the first full-length Afrikaans movie since Paljas in 1998,
11223-544: The language distance for Anglophones once remarked that the differences between (Standard) Dutch and Afrikaans are comparable to those between the Received Pronunciation and Southern American English . Afrikaans is an official language of the Republic of South Africa and a recognised national language of the Republic of Namibia. Post-apartheid South Africa has seen a loss of preferential treatment by
11352-581: The language of instruction for half the subjects taught in non-White schools (with English continuing for the other half). Although English is the mother tongue of only 8.2% of the population, it is the language most widely understood, and the second language of a majority of South Africans. Afrikaans is more widely spoken than English in the Northern and Western Cape provinces, several hundred kilometres from Soweto. The Black community's opposition to Afrikaans and preference for continuing English instruction
11481-617: The largest city in southern Africa. The metropolitan area has a long coastline on the Atlantic Ocean , which includes False Bay, and extends to the Hottentots Holland mountains to the east. The Table Mountain National Park is within the city boundaries and there are several other nature reserves and marine-protected areas within, and adjacent to, the city, protecting the diverse terrestrial and marine natural environment. The earliest known remnants of human occupation in
11610-574: The legislative capital of the Union, and later of the Republic of South Africa . By the time of the 1936 census , Johannesburg had overtaken Cape Town as the largest city in the country. In 1945 the expansion of the Cape Town foreshore was completed adding an additional 194 ha (480 acres) to the City Bowl area to the city centre. Prior to the mid-twentieth century, Cape Town was one of
11739-513: The likes of big Afrikaans Hollywood film stars, like Charlize Theron ( Monster ) and Sharlto Copley ( District 9 ) promoting their mother tongue. SABC 3 announced early in 2009 that it would increase Afrikaans programming due to the "growing Afrikaans-language market and [their] need for working capital as Afrikaans advertising is the only advertising that sells in the current South African television market". In April 2009, SABC3 started screening several Afrikaans-language programmes. There
11868-541: The majority are of Afrikaans-speaking Afrikaner and Coloured South-African descent. A much smaller and unknown number of speakers also reside in the Dutch Caribbean . Contrary to popular belief, the majority of Afrikaans speakers today are not Afrikaners or Boers , but Coloureds . In 1976, secondary-school pupils in Soweto began a rebellion in response to the government's decision that Afrikaans be used as
11997-410: The most important government building of the new state was unthinkable to those who commissioned it, as a result, the terraces and retaining walls in the grounds are built predominantly of mountain stone quarried on site, the foundation of the building is of granite, while freestone was used for the exterior walls, the amphitheatre and major courtyards. For the overall design of the building, Baker chose
12126-475: The most important tourist destination in the country. Cape Town has been named the best travel city in the world every year since 2013 in the Telegraph Travel Awards. The legacy of apartheid's spatial planning is still evident, with significant disparities between affluent areas and impoverished townships . 60% of the city's population live in townships and informal settlements far from
12255-822: The most racially integrated cities in South Africa. In the 1948 national elections , the National Party won on a platform of apartheid (racial segregation) under the slogan of " swart gevaar " (Afrikaans for "black danger"). This led to the erosion and eventual abolition of the Cape's multiracial franchise . In 1950, the apartheid government first introduced the Group Areas Act , which classified and segregated urban areas according to race. Formerly multi-racial suburbs of Cape Town were either purged of residents deemed unlawful by apartheid legislation, or demolished. The most infamous example of this in Cape Town
12384-493: The mountain. To the immediate south of the city, the Cape Peninsula is a scenic mountainous spine jutting 40 km (25 mi) southward into the Atlantic Ocean and terminating at Cape Point . There are over 70 peaks above 300 m (980 ft) within Cape Town's official metropolitan limits . Many of the city's suburbs lie on the large plain called the Cape Flats , which extends over 50 km (30 mi) to
12513-399: The news of the protests against Bantu Education by organising gatherings and marches of their own. A number of school buildings were burnt down and the protest action was met with forceful resistance from the police. Cape Town has been home to many leaders of the anti-apartheid movement . In Table Bay , 10 km (6 mi) from the city is Robben Island . This penitentiary island was
12642-432: The north to Cape Point in the south, with an area of about 470 km (180 sq mi), and it displays more topographical variety than other similar sized areas in southern Africa, and consequently spectacular scenery. There are diverse low-nutrient soils, large rocky outcrops, scree slopes, a mainly rocky coastline with embayed beaches, and considerable local variation in climatic conditions. The sedimentary rocks of
12771-503: The northern hemisphere) and longitude 18.25° E. Table Mountain , with its near vertical cliffs and flat-topped summit over 1,000 m (3,300 ft) high, and with Devil's Peak and Lion's Head on either side, together form a dramatic mountainous backdrop enclosing the central area of Cape Town, the so-called City Bowl . A thin strip of cloud, known colloquially as the "tablecloth" ("Karos" in Afrikaans ), sometimes forms on top of
12900-513: The once continuous Table Mountain Group sandstone cover from over the Cape Flats and False Bay, and leaving high residual mountain ridges. At times the sea covered the Cape Flats and Noordhoek valley and the Cape Peninsula was then a group of islands. During glacial periods the sea level dropped to expose the bottom of False Bay to weathering and erosion, with the last major regression leaving
13029-529: The other official languages. In 1996, for example, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reduced the amount of television airtime in Afrikaans, while South African Airways dropped its Afrikaans name Suid-Afrikaanse Lugdiens from its livery . Similarly, South Africa's diplomatic missions overseas now display the name of the country only in English and their host country's language, and not in Afrikaans. Meanwhile,
13158-410: The other way round. Mutual intelligibility thus tends to be asymmetrical, as it is easier for Dutch speakers to understand Afrikaans than for Afrikaans speakers to understand Dutch. In general, mutual intelligibility between Dutch and Afrikaans is far better than between Dutch and Frisian or between Danish and Swedish . The South African poet writer Breyten Breytenbach , attempting to visualise
13287-411: The past tense is also often replaced with the perfect.) When telling a longer story, Afrikaans speakers usually avoid the perfect and simply use the present tense, or historical present tense instead (as is possible, but less common, in English as well). A particular feature of Afrikaans is its use of the double negative ; it is classified in Afrikaans as ontkennende vorm and is something that
13416-472: The push for self-governance in the Cape. With expansion came calls for greater independence from the UK, with the Cape attaining its own parliament (1854) and a locally accountable Prime Minister (1872). Suffrage was established according to the non-racial Cape Qualified Franchise . During the 1850s and 1860s, additional plant species were introduced from Australia by the British authorities. Notably rooikrans
13545-536: The region were found at Peers Cave in Fish Hoek and have been dated to between 15,000 and 12,000 years old. Various Khoikhoi groups notably the Gorinaiqua lived on these lands for thousands of years. Khoikhoi communities were some of the wealthiest groups in Africa and their lands and cattles would go on to build colonial Cape Town and the rest of South Africa. Bartolomeu Dias . Dias, the first European to reach
13674-418: The site for Baker's design. The site was that of a disused quarry and the existing excavations were used to create the amphitheatre, which was set about with ornamental pools, fountains, sculptures, balustrades, and trees. The design consisted of two identical wings, joined by a semi-circular colonnade forming the backdrop of the amphitheatre. The colonnade was terminated on either side by a tower. Each wing had
13803-479: The site of a maximum security prison where many famous apartheird-era political prisoners served long prison sentences. Famous prisoners include activist, lawyer and future president Nelson Mandela who served 18 of his 27 years of imprisonment on the island, as well as two other future presidents, Kgalema Motlanthe and Jacob Zuma . In one of the most famous moments marking the end of apartheid, Nelson Mandela made his first public speech since his imprisonment, from
13932-504: The site. Baker envisaged identical wings of rectangular office blocks, each representing one of the two official languages. They were to be linked by a semicircular wing, and the space in-between the two wings was levelled to bring form an amphitheatre as in the Greek fashion for gatherings of national and ceremonial importance. Baker wanted the buildings to be built of imported granite, but any idea of using anything but South African stone for
14061-574: The south, the Cape Flats , the Helderberg basin and part of the Steenbras catchment area to the east, and the Tygerberg hills, Blouberg and other areas to the north. Robben Island in Table Bay is also part of Cape Town. It is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and False Bay to the south. To the north and east, the extent is demarcated by boundaries of neighbouring municipalities within
14190-442: The subject. For example, Only a handful of Afrikaans verbs have a preterite , namely the auxiliary wees ('to be'), the modal verbs , and the verb dink ('to think'). The preterite of mag ('may') is rare in contemporary Afrikaans. All other verbs use the perfect tense, het + past participle (ge-), for the past. Therefore, there is no distinction in Afrikaans between I drank and I have drunk . (In colloquial German,
14319-404: The then powers that be, who were at the time, preoccupied with the ideal of establishing a new and united nation. The British high commissioner at the time, Lord Selborne , remarked; People will come from all over the world to wonder at the beauty of the site and to admire the forethought and courage of the men who selected it. The design of the buildings was largely determined by the nature of
14448-537: The two languages. Afrikaans has a considerably more regular morphology, grammar, and spelling. There is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between the two languages, particularly in written form. Afrikaans acquired some lexical and syntactical borrowings from other languages such as Malay , Khoisan languages , Portuguese, and Bantu languages , and Afrikaans has also been significantly influenced by South African English . Dutch speakers are confronted with fewer non-cognates when listening to Afrikaans than
14577-430: The vocabulary of Afrikaans is of Dutch origin. Differences between Afrikaans and Dutch often lie in the more analytic morphology and grammar of Afrikaans, and different spellings. There is a large degree of mutual intelligibility between the two languages, especially in written form . The name of the language comes directly from the Dutch word Afrikaansch (now spelled Afrikaans ) meaning 'African'. It
14706-539: The west side of False Bay and the Cape Flats. On the east side are the Helderberg and Hottentots Holland mountains. The three main rock formations are the late- Precambrian Malmebury group (sedimentary and metamorphic rock), the Cape Granite suit, comprising the huge Peninsula, Kuilsrivier-Helderberg, and Stellenbosch batholiths, that were intruded into the Malmesbury Group about 630 million years ago, and
14835-521: The women, strike the rock", to protest against the pass laws of 1950. This historical event is commemorated by the public holiday National Women's Day . Wilma Cruise and Marcus Holmes were approached to design a memorial to commemorate the Women's March . They made use of the "imbokodo". The imbokodo is a grinding stone used by the women to grind maize. Cruise and Holmes, rested the imbokodo, representing nurture and sustenance, on bronze plates, representing
14964-423: The world, confer glory and hope to newborn liberty. Out of the experience of an extraordinary human disaster that lasted too long, must be born a society of which all humanity will be proud. Our daily deeds as ordinary South Africans must produce an actual South African reality that will reinforce humanity's belief in justice, strengthen its confidence in the nobility of the human soul and sustain all our hopes for
15093-538: The world, sculpted by Abraham Broadbent. The statue on the domed rostrum in the amphitheatre between the wings is Mercury , a mythic Roman messenger and a god of trade, sculpted by George Ness. The closest suburb to the Union Buildings is Arcadia , which means "Playground of Gods". Pretoria has the second largest number of embassies in the world, after Washington, D.C., most of which are located in or near Arcadia. The design of each level differs, and therefore each stone had to be individually cut. The Architectural styles of
15222-479: The years since Apartheid. Cape Town has experienced economic growth and development in the post-apartheid era. The city has become a major economic hub in South Africa, attracting international investment and tourism. The Democratic Alliance (DA), a liberal political party which came to power in Cape Town in 2006, has been credited with improving bureaucratic efficiency, public safety and fostering economic development. Opinion polls show that South Africans see it as
15351-402: Was completed in 1913. It took approximately 1,265 artisans, workmen and labourers almost three years to construct, using 14 million bricks for the interior office walls, 5,000,000 cubic feet (140,000 m) of freestone, 74,000 cubic yards (57,000 m) of concrete, 40 000 bags of cement and 20,000 cubic feet (570 m) of granite. Originally built to house the entire Public Service for
15480-589: Was erected on the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Society of Real Afrikaners , and the 50th anniversary of Afrikaans being declared an official language of South Africa in distinction to Dutch. The earliest Afrikaans texts were some doggerel verse from 1795 and a dialogue transcribed by a Dutch traveller in 1825. Afrikaans used the Latin alphabet around this time, although the Cape Muslim community used
15609-464: Was influenced by Eugene Nida 's theory of dynamic equivalence which focused on finding the nearest equivalent in the receptor language to the idea that the Greek, Hebrew or Aramaic wanted to convey. A new translation, Die Bybel: 'n Direkte Vertaling was released in November 2020. It is the first truly ecumenical translation of the Bible in Afrikaans as translators from various churches, including
15738-622: Was introduced to stabilise the sand of the Cape Flats to allow for a road connecting the peninsula with the rest of the African continent and eucalyptus was used to drain marshes. In 1859 the first railway line was built by the Cape Government Railways and a system of railways rapidly expanded in the 1870s. The discovery of diamonds in Griqualand West in 1867, and the Witwatersrand Gold Rush in 1886, prompted
15867-582: Was named the best place in the world to visit by The New York Times , and was similarly ranked number one by The Daily Telegraph in both 2016 and 2023. Located on the shore of Table Bay , the City Bowl area of Cape Town is the oldest urban area in the Western Cape , with a significant cultural heritage. It was founded by the Dutch East India Company (VOC) as a supply station for Dutch ships sailing to East Africa , India , and
15996-399: Was previously referred to as 'Cape Dutch' ( Kaap-Hollands or Kaap-Nederlands ), a term also used to refer to the early Cape settlers collectively, or the derogatory 'kitchen Dutch' ( kombuistaal ) from its use by slaves of colonial settlers "in the kitchen". The Afrikaans language arose in the Dutch Cape Colony , through a gradual divergence from European Dutch dialects , during
16125-490: Was the suburb of District Six . After it was declared a whites-only area in 1965, all housing there was demolished and over 60,000 residents were forcibly removed. Many of these residents were relocated to the Cape Flats . The earliest of the Cape Flats forced removals saw the expulsion of Black South Africans to the Langa , Cape Town's first and oldest township, in line with the 1923 Native Urban Areas Act . Under apartheid,
16254-679: Was the translation of the whole Bible into Afrikaans. While significant advances had been made in the textual criticism of the Bible, especially the Greek New Testament , the 1933 translation followed the Textus Receptus and was closely akin to the Statenbijbel . Before this, most Cape Dutch-Afrikaans speakers had to rely on the Dutch Statenbijbel . This Statenvertaling had its origins with
16383-549: Was under development As of 2018. The official orthography of Afrikaans is the Afrikaanse Woordelys en Spelreëls , compiled by Die Taalkommissie . The Afrikaners primarily were Protestants, of the Dutch Reformed Church of the 17th century. Their religious practices were later influenced in South Africa by British ministries during the 1800s. A landmark in the development of the language
16512-622: Was underlined when the government rescinded the policy one month after the uprising: 96% of Black schools chose English (over Afrikaans or native languages) as the language of instruction. Afrikaans-medium schools were also accused of using language policy to deter Black African parents. Some of these parents, in part supported by provincial departments of education, initiated litigation which enabled enrolment with English as language of instruction. By 2006 there were 300 single-medium Afrikaans schools, compared to 2,500 in 1994, after most converted to dual-medium education. Due to Afrikaans being viewed as
16641-460: Was within 1.6 kikometres of the centre of Pretoria and reminded him strongly of some of the acropolises of Greece and Asia Minor, where he had studied Mediterranean architecture. The concept of an acropolis and a building that agreed with renowned British Architect Sir Christopher Wren 's theory that a public building should be a national ornament which establishes a nation, draws people and commerce and makes people love their country easily persuaded
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