# The Chronicle of South Africa: From the cradle of humankind and the early San, Khoekhoe and Bantu-speaking kingdoms, through Dutch and British colonisation, the trauma of apartheid, and the birth of a non-racial democracy in 1994. History of South Africa: From the cradle of humankind and the early San, Khoekhoe and Bantu-speaking kingdoms, through Dutch and British colonisation… Canonical: https://terralore.co/country/ZAF/chronicle Updated: 2026-06-13 Founding: Union of South Africa — 31 May 1910. The modern state took its first political shape on 31 May 1910, when the British colonies of the Cape, Natal, Transvaal and Orange River were joined into the self-governing Union of South Africa under the South Africa Act passed by the British Parliament in 1909. Yet this founding rests on a far deeper past: the Sterkfontein and Swartkrans caves of the Cradle of Humankind preserve hominin fossils millions of years old, and the San and Khoekhoe have lived in the region for tens of thousands of years. The 1910 Union, however, was built on the exclusion of the Black majority from political power, a foundation that hardened into apartheid after 1948. The true birth of the modern nation came on 27 April 1994, when South Africans of all races voted together for the first time in a fully democratic, non-racial election, bringing Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress to power and ending more than three centuries of white minority rule. South Africa holds one of the deepest human pasts on Earth: the limestone caves of the Cradle of Humankind near Johannesburg have yielded hominin fossils millions of years old, and the San and Khoekhoe peoples have inhabited the subcontinent for tens of thousands of years. From the early centuries of the Common Era, Bantu-speaking farmers and herders spread across the eastern half of the region, building societies that culminated in states such as Mapungubwe. In 1652 the Dutch East India Company planted a refreshment station at the Cape, beginning a long history of European settlement, dispossession, and slavery. Britain seized the Cape in the early nineteenth century; the Mfecane convulsed the interior as the Zulu kingdom rose under Shaka; Voortrekkers founded Boer republics; and the discovery of diamonds at Kimberley in 1867 and gold on the Witwatersrand in 1886 transformed the region, leading to the devastating South African War and, in 1910, the Union of South Africa. After 1948 the National Party built the brutal system of apartheid, met by a long liberation struggle marked by Sharpeville, Soweto, and the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela. That struggle culminated in the first democratic, non-racial election of April 1994, when Mandela became president of a free South Africa governed today under one of the world's most admired constitutions. This file carries the chronicle's sourced event record — every event with its year, summary and source keys (resolved under References below). The full reading narrative lives on the canonical page. ## Early peoples: San, Khoekhoe and the Bantu-speaking kingdoms — Deep prehistory – c. 1600 CE From hominin ancestors in the Cradle of Humankind to the hunter-gatherer San, the herding Khoekhoe, and the Bantu-speaking farmers who built states such as Mapungubwe, southern Africa nurtured human societies across an immense span of time. - Deep prehistory: **The Cradle of Humankind** — The Sterkfontein and Swartkrans caves preserve hominin fossils spanning millions of years, including Mrs Ples and Little Foot, marking southern Africa as a key site of human origins; the area was inscribed by UNESCO in 1999. [unesco-hominid, britannica-sahistory, sahistory-cradle] - c. 1st millennium BCE: **San and Khoekhoe of the subcontinent** — The San, hunter-gatherers present for tens of thousands of years, were joined around two thousand years ago by the herding Khoekhoe, together forming the long-established Khoisan societies of the region. [britannica-sahistory, sahistory-cradle] - early centuries CE: **Bantu-speaking farmers spread south** — Bantu-speaking communities bringing iron-working, cattle and cultivated crops settled the eastern half of southern Africa, ancestors of the region's Nguni, Sotho-Tswana, Venda and Tsonga peoples. [britannica-sahistory, sahistory-cradle] - c. 1220–1300: **The kingdom of Mapungubwe** — Near the Limpopo, Mapungubwe rose as southern Africa's first state-level society, trading gold and ivory to the Indian Ocean coast and producing famed gold artefacts before its decline around 1300. [unesco-mapungubwe, britannica-sahistory] Figures: - The San (Bushmen) (present for tens of thousands of years) — Hunter-gatherer peoples of southern Africa. Southern Africa's oldest enduring inhabitants, hunter-gatherers whose deep knowledge of the land and whose rock art across the subcontinent record one of humanity's longest continuous cultural traditions. ## The Dutch Cape Colony and the frontier — 1652 – 1806 In 1652 the Dutch East India Company founded a refreshment station at the Cape, beginning European settlement, the importation of enslaved people, the dispossession of the Khoekhoe, and the expansion of trekboers into a violent frontier. - 6 April 1652: **Van Riebeeck founds the Cape station** — Jan van Riebeeck landed at Table Bay and established a Dutch East India Company refreshment station, the beginning of permanent European settlement in South Africa. [britannica-vanriebeeck, sahistory-vanriebeeck, britannica-sahistory] - from 1658: **Slavery at the Cape** — The Company began importing enslaved people from Madagascar, East Africa, India and the Indonesian archipelago, founding a slave society whose labour underpinned the colony for nearly two centuries. [sahistory-slavery, britannica-sahistory] - 1713: **Smallpox devastates the Khoekhoe** — A smallpox epidemic introduced by passing ships killed great numbers of Khoekhoe, accelerating the loss of their land, herds and independence as the colony expanded. [britannica-sahistory, sahistory-slavery] - 1779: **First Cape Frontier War** — As trekboers reached the Great Fish River they clashed with the Xhosa, beginning a century-long series of frontier wars along the colony's eastern edge. [britannica-sahistory] Figures: - Jan van Riebeeck (1619–1677) — Founder and commander of the Cape station. Dutch East India Company official who established the refreshment station at the Cape in 1652, opening southern Africa to European settlement and laying the foundations of the Cape Colony. ## British rule, the Mfecane, the Zulu kingdom and the Boer republics — 1806 – 1867 Britain seized the Cape, slavery was abolished, the Zulu kingdom rose under Shaka amid the upheavals of the Mfecane, and Voortrekkers left the colony on the Great Trek to found independent Boer republics in the interior. - 1806: **Britain seizes the Cape** — British forces occupied the Cape Colony during the Napoleonic Wars, beginning lasting British rule confirmed by the Congress of Vienna in 1815. [britannica-sahistory, sahistory-slavery] - c. 1816–1828: **Rise of the Zulu kingdom and the Mfecane** — Shaka built the Zulu into a powerful centralised kingdom with a reorganised army; the wars and migrations of the Mfecane reshaped the political map of southern Africa. [britannica-mfecane, britannica-shaka, sahistory-revolution] - 1 December 1834: **Abolition of slavery at the Cape** — Slavery was abolished across the British Empire, freeing enslaved people at the Cape and deepening Boer discontent that helped spark the Great Trek. [sahistory-slavery, britannica-sahistory] - from 1836: **The Great Trek** — Thousands of Voortrekkers left the Cape Colony for the interior, seeking independence from British rule and founding new Boer communities on lands occupied by African peoples. [sahistory-bloodriver, britannica-sahistory] - 16 December 1838: **Battle of Blood River** — A Voortrekker commando under Andries Pretorius defeated a large Zulu army at the Ncome (Blood) River, a battle long mythologised in Afrikaner nationalism and preceding the rise of Boer republics. [sahistory-bloodriver, britannica-sahistory] Figures: - Shaka (c. 1787–1828) — King of the Zulu. Founder-king who transformed the Zulu into a dominant military kingdom in the 1810s and 1820s, his conquests central to the upheavals of the Mfecane; he was assassinated by his half-brothers in 1828. - Andries Pretorius (1798–1853) — Voortrekker leader. Boer commander who led the Voortrekkers to victory at Blood River in 1838 and helped establish the independent Boer republics; the city of Pretoria is named for his family. ## Diamonds, gold, the South African War and Union — 1867 – 1910 The discovery of diamonds at Kimberley and gold on the Witwatersrand turned southern Africa into a magnet for capital and labour, driving imperial ambition, the destructive South African War, and the creation of the Union of South Africa in 1910. - 1867: **Diamonds discovered at Kimberley** — The discovery of diamonds near the Vaal and Orange rivers triggered a rush to Kimberley, beginning the mineral revolution and drawing capital and migrant labour into the region. [britannica-minerals, sahistory-mineral-revolution] - 1886: **Gold found on the Witwatersrand** — The discovery of the world's largest goldfield on the Witwatersrand created Johannesburg, transformed the Transvaal's wealth, and entrenched a segregated migrant-labour system. [britannica-minerals, sahistory-mineral-revolution] - 1899–1902: **The South African War** — War between Britain and the Boer republics featured guerrilla campaigns and British concentration camps in which tens of thousands of Boer and Black civilians died. [sahistory-saw, britannica-saw, treaty-vereeniging-wiki] - 31 May 1902: **Treaty of Vereeniging** — The peace signed at Pretoria ended the South African War, bringing the Transvaal and Orange Free State under British sovereignty with promises of eventual self-government. [treaty-vereeniging-wiki, britannica-saw] - 31 May 1910: **Union of South Africa** — The four British colonies were united into the self-governing Union of South Africa under the South Africa Act, a white-controlled state that excluded the Black majority from political power. [sahistory-union, britannica-southafricaact, britannica-sahistory] Figures: - Cecil John Rhodes (1853–1902) — Mining magnate and Cape prime minister. British imperialist who built the De Beers diamond monopoly at Kimberley, became prime minister of the Cape Colony, and championed an expansionist vision whose schemes helped propel the region toward the South African War. - Louis Botha (1862–1919) — First Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa. Boer general in the South African War who became the first prime minister of the Union in 1910, pursuing reconciliation between British and Afrikaner whites within a state that excluded Black South Africans. ## Apartheid and the liberation struggle — 1948 – 1994 After 1948 the National Party built apartheid, a comprehensive legal system of racial domination. Decades of resistance — from the Defiance Campaign and the massacre at Sharpeville to the Soweto uprising and the long imprisonment of Nelson Mandela — finally forced the regime to negotiate its own end. - 1948: **National Party institutes apartheid** — The National Party won the 1948 election and began enacting apartheid, including the Population Registration Act and Group Areas Act of 1950, codifying racial classification, segregation and forced removals. [britannica-apartheid, sahistory-groupareas] - 21 March 1960: **Sharpeville massacre** — Police fired on a peaceful anti-pass-law protest at Sharpeville, killing at least 69 people and wounding scores more; the atrocity drew global condemnation and led to the banning of the ANC and PAC. [britannica-sharpeville, sahistory-sharpeville, csvr-trc] - 1964: **Rivonia Trial imprisons Mandela** — Nelson Mandela and fellow leaders of the ANC's armed wing were convicted of sabotage and sentenced to life imprisonment, beginning Mandela's 27 years behind bars. [sahistory-mandela, britannica-mandela] - 16 June 1976: **Soweto uprising** — Student protests against compulsory instruction in Afrikaans were met with police gunfire in Soweto, killing many, including children, and igniting nationwide resistance. [britannica-apartheid, sahistory-mineral-revolution, csvr-trc] - 11 February 1990: **Mandela freed and the ANC unbanned** — President F. W. de Klerk unbanned the ANC, PAC and other organisations and released Nelson Mandela from prison, opening the way to negotiations that would dismantle apartheid. [sahistory-mandela, britannica-mandela, britannica-apartheid] Figures: - Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) — Liberation leader and political prisoner. ANC leader imprisoned for 27 years for his role in the armed struggle, he became the embodiment of the fight against apartheid and, on his release in 1990, the chief negotiator of South Africa's transition to democracy. - Hendrik Verwoerd (1901–1966) — Architect of apartheid and Prime Minister. As minister of native affairs and then prime minister, he designed many of apartheid's foundational laws, including 'Bantu education' and the homelands system, before his assassination in 1966. ## Democratic South Africa since 1994 — 1994 – present On 27 April 1994 South Africans of every race voted together for the first time, electing Nelson Mandela president. A new constitution, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the ANC's long dominance defined a democracy still wrestling with inequality and the legacies of apartheid. - 26–29 April 1994: **First democratic election** — South Africans of all races voted together for the first time; the ANC won about 62.65 percent of the vote on an 86.9 percent turnout, ending apartheid rule. The main polling day, 27 April, is marked as Freedom Day. [sahistory-1994, apartheidmuseum-1994, britannica-sahistory] - 10 May 1994: **Mandela inaugurated as president** — Nelson Mandela was sworn in as the first president of a democratic South Africa, leading a Government of National Unity and symbolising reconciliation across the country's racial divide. [sahistory-mandela, britannica-mandela] - 1996: **Truth and Reconciliation Commission** — Chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the TRC began public hearings into apartheid-era human rights abuses, offering conditional amnesty in exchange for full disclosure as a model of transitional justice. [trc-wiki, csvr-trc] - signed 10 December 1996: **A new Constitution** — South Africa's final Constitution, with its justiciable Bill of Rights, was signed into law in 1996 and took effect in February 1997, widely regarded as among the most progressive in the world. [sahistory-constitution, britannica-sahistory] - 2024: **ANC loses its majority** — In the 2024 general election the ANC lost the outright parliamentary majority it had held since 1994, leading to a multiparty government of national unity and a new phase of coalition politics. [britannica-sahistory] Figures: - Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) — First President of democratic South Africa. Inaugurated in 1994 after 27 years' imprisonment, he led South Africa's peaceful transition, championed reconciliation, and stepped down after a single term, becoming a global symbol of freedom and forgiveness. - Desmond Tutu (1931–2021) — Archbishop and chair of the TRC. Anglican archbishop and Nobel Peace laureate who gave moral voice to the anti-apartheid cause and chaired the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, coining the vision of South Africa as a 'rainbow nation'. Machine-readable claims — every event above as an addressable claim ID (TL:ZAF:event::) with its sources and a ready citation string: https://terralore.co/country/ZAF/chronicle.claims.json ## References - [britannica-sahistory] South Africa (country, history and government) — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/place/South-Africa - [unesco-hominid] Fossil Hominid Sites of South Africa — UNESCO World Heritage Centre · https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/915/ - [unesco-mapungubwe] Mapungubwe Cultural Landscape — UNESCO World Heritage Centre · https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1099/ - [sahistory-cradle] Cradle of Humankind — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/cradle-humankind - [britannica-vanriebeeck] Jan van Riebeeck — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jan-van-Riebeeck - [sahistory-vanriebeeck] Jan van Riebeeck — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/jan-van-riebeeck - [sahistory-slavery] History of slavery and early colonisation in South Africa — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/history-slavery-and-early-colonisation-south-africa - [britannica-mfecane] Mfecane — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/event/Mfecane - [britannica-shaka] Shaka, Zulu chief — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/biography/Shaka-Zulu-chief - [sahistory-revolution] Political revolution between 1820 and 1835 — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/political-revolution-between-1820-and-1835 - [sahistory-bloodriver] Origins of the Battle of Blood River 1838 — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/origins-battle-blood-river-1838 - [britannica-minerals] South Africa: Diamonds, gold and imperialist intervention (1870–1902) — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/place/South-Africa/Diamonds-gold-and-imperialist-intervention-1870-1902 - [sahistory-mineral-revolution] Grade 8 – Topic 2 – The Mineral Revolution in South Africa — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/grade-8-topic-2-mineral-revolution-south-africa - [sahistory-saw] The South African War 1899–1902 — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/south-african-war-1899-1902 - [britannica-saw] South African War — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/event/South-African-War - [treaty-vereeniging-wiki] Treaty of Vereeniging — Wikipedia · https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Vereeniging - [sahistory-union] The Union of South Africa 1910 — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/union-south-africa-1910 - [britannica-southafricaact] South Africa Act — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/event/South-Africa-Act - [britannica-apartheid] Apartheid — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/topic/apartheid - [sahistory-groupareas] The Group Areas Act of 1950 — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/group-areas-act-1950 - [britannica-sharpeville] Sharpeville massacre — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/event/Sharpeville-massacre - [sahistory-sharpeville] Sharpeville Massacre, 21 March 1960 — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/sharpeville-massacre-21-march-1960 - [sahistory-mandela] Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/nelson-rolihlahla-mandela - [britannica-mandela] Nelson Mandela — Encyclopaedia Britannica · https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nelson-Mandela - [sahistory-1994] The South African general elections: 1994 — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/south-african-general-elections-1994 - [apartheidmuseum-1994] 1994 Election — Apartheid Museum · https://www.apartheidmuseum.org/exhibitions/1994-election - [trc-wiki] Truth and Reconciliation Commission (South Africa) — Wikipedia · https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_and_Reconciliation_Commission_(South_Africa) - [csvr-trc] South Africa Truth and Reconciliation Commission (1996–2002) — African Transitional Justice Hub (CSVR) · https://atjhub.csvr.org.za/south-africa-truth-and-reconciliation-commission-1996-2002/ - [sahistory-constitution] Mandela signs SA Constitution into law — South African History Online · https://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/mandela-signs-sa-constitution-law - [statedept-southafrica] A Guide to the United States' History of Recognition: South Africa — U.S. Department of State, Office of the Historian · https://history.state.gov/countries/south-africa Citation template: Terralore, "The Chronicle of South Africa: From the cradle of humankind and the early San, Khoekhoe and Bantu-speaking kingdoms, through Dutch and British colonisation, the trauma of apartheid, and the birth of a non-racial democracy in 1994.", terralore.co/country/ZAF/chronicle, retrieved .