The history of South Africa is viewed differently by various scholars and by its various population groups because South Africa is a multicultural country. The researchers' views heavily influence their perception of South African history.(See the demographics of South Africa and culture of South Africa.)

The Khoisan peoples are the aboriginal people of the region who have lived there for millennia. Black African South Africans, trace their origins to the Great Lakes region of Africa. Whites in South Africa, descendants of later European migrations, regard themselves as products of South Africa no less than their fellow citizens, as do South Africa's Coloureds, Indians, Asians and Jews.

Definitions: History and anthropology

There are two divergent ways in which information about the past can be conveyed: The definition of "history" means the study of the past based almost exclusively on written records because it is "usually distinguished from prehistory by the widespread adoption of writing in the area under study" (see History article.) Prehistory, as studied in anthropology, "is concerned with all institutions of all societies, but in practice anthropologists have tended to concentrate on the seemingly more "traditional" institutions, usages, and customs of non-Western, often tribal, societies".

Modern history of South Africa

European explorers "discovered" South Africa as a direct result of European countries' rivalry with each other for dominance and the subsequent need for wealth which lead to the efforts to "discover" (by exploration) sea routes to trade with Asia and the Far East during the Age of Discovery. Far-off places, whether they became colonies or not, were regarded as sources for raw materials to be processed or enjoyed by Europeans.

Over time, for example, be it jewels, spices and textiles from India, foods and silver from the Americas; wool from Australia; fruits, gold, diamonds, coal, uranium, or iron from South Africa; wood and minerals from Africa - obtained as the result of voyages of discovery, these resources were located and shipped in huge quantities to Europe over the centuries, generating immense wealth in helping countries to move to become even more sophisticated as they developed into newly industrialized countries like Great Britain, Germany and France. In the 1800s South Africa would become the world's leading producer of gold and diamonds as well as many other resources, which made it the envy and the play-thing of stronger imperial powers to the North.

Once the route around the Cape of Good Hope, located at the southern-most tip of Africa in South Africa, had been discovered by a series of "discoverers" it has remained of key importance to global trade that is dependent on the free passage of ships around the world. This is related to another principle, that wealthy nations are usually great maritime naval powers, and the use of navies is tied in with protecting those great nations' trade and their military strength both of which result in geostrategic dominance. Essentially, the power that has the mightiest navy and prevails on the high seas becomes the world's greatest power which is something nations have known for a long time, hence their commercial and naval rivalry on the high seas.

It is in this context that the position of the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa, and Southern Africa should be appreciated because in the Southern Hemisphere, only South Africa, the southern end of South America, and Australia have this key strategic position. In addition, from Europe - and also from the east coasts of the United States and South America (Brazil, Argentina), the route around South Africa's Cape is the shortest to Asia.

All the modern natives have sought to ensure that they either control these three southern "gateways" or that they remain open at all times to the free flow of shipping and it is why South Africa's strategic position is important in a geopolitical sense. It is the reason that the British knocked out the Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, and French navies and influence not just in Southern Africa, but all over the world, and asserted their will and continued this policy against Germany, Italy, Japan and Russia. Since World War II it has been the United States Navy that has assumed the role of the world's most dominant fleet protecting America' trade and the free flow of goods in the global economy and South Africa's place in this scheme of things is no less significant than it was in the times of the Dutch who established South Africa's early economy and the British who developed it into a more sophisticated modern one.

It should be noted that the Suez Canal did not exist for most of history. It was only completed in 1869, so that all shipping back and forth from Europe to Asia, Arabia, and to most of Africa had and has to be done by the long routes across the seas around South Africa's Cape. In addition, even after the Suez Canal's completion and modernization, it cannot accommodate larger vessels including many warships, tankers, and cargo vessels. Thus the Cape of Good Hope route remains one of the most important and highly desirable routes for free shipping when some of the world's other global choke points are closed off or in a state of turmoil such as war.

Portugal's Bartolomeu Dias' voyage (1487-88)

The Portuguese, the first Europeans to reach and land in South Africa, chose not to colonise the areas of present-day South Africa, instead they colonized Portuguese Guinea (present-day Guinea-Bissau) starting in 1446, Angola starting in 1483, Mozambique starting in 1498, and other colonies in the world.

It had been Portugal in the Age of Discovery that sent Bartolomeu Dias sailing southwards in the Atlantic Ocean (in those days sailing ship tried to stay close to the coast of Western Africa as they did so) looking for a route to India. Dias sailed around the Cape of Good Hope, the southern tip of Africa into the Southern Indian Ocean, in 1488, the first European known to do so since ancient times.

It should be noted that this is four years before another explorer by the name of Christopher Columbus set sail from rival Spain in order to find an even shorter route to India, but instead as he kept on sailing due West across the Northern Atlantic Ocean, he "discovered" America in 1492 -- and hence the Native Americans were called by the name of "Indians" mistaking them for the people of India. Dias did not settle in South Africa but took back a report that the Cape could be rounded. It was Vasco da Gama who was the first person to sail directly from Europe to India during 1497-1499.

Portugal's Vasco da Gama's first voyage (1497 - 1499)

Southern Africa was viewed as too dangerous and inhospitable for European sailors, let alone settlers. The Cape was known as "The Cape of Storms" because it was so dangerous for sailing ships, and it was only by 1652 that the Dutch finally saw fit to set up a permanent station at the Cape of Good Hope (it was not even a colony, just a station to supply passing ships with fresh water and vegetables.) This "supply depot" that was set up by the DutchCape Colony over the next two hundred years. developed into the

The British had long known about the importance of the Cape as a route to and from the East and had their eyes on it from the time that one of their own explorers, Sir Francis Drake rounded the Cape of Good Hope, in 1580 in his ship the Golden Hind. Drake was so enchanted by Table Mountain in the bay of what is today Cape Town, that he is reputed to have declared, that "No longer shall this be called the Cape of Storms, for it is the fairest Cape of them all."

Britain's Sir Francis Drake rounded the Cape in 1580

The British seized the Cape Colony from the Dutch at the end of the 18th century because they feared French fleets would take control following Napoleon's victories over much of mainland Europe. The United Kingdom invaded and occupied the Cape Colony in 1795 ("The First Occupation") but relinquished control of the territory in 1803. However, British forces returned on January 19, 1806 and occupied the Cape once again ("The Second Occupation"). The territory was ceded to the UK in the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 and was henceforth administered as the Cape Colony. It remained a British colony until incorporated into the independent Union of South Africa in 1910, now known as the Republic of South Africa.

The ever-expanding number of European settlers led to conflicts with the natives over the rights to land and farming, which caused numerous fatalities on both sides. Hostilities also emerged between the Dutch and the British, and many Dutch people packed up their ox-wagons and trekked into the central Highveld in order to establish their own self-governing colonies.

The Dutch (by then known as Boers) and the British went to war twice in the Anglo-Boer Wars in the late 1800s, which ended in the defeat of the Boers and of their independent republics.

Dutch Jan van Riebeeck, first Dutch East India Company commander of Cape Colony 1652-1662.

The Cape Colony, Natal and the two Boer republics united in 1910 as the Union of South Africa. The Boer republics did not grant Black people suffrage, and the rights of Black, Coloured, and Asian people continued to erode in the Union.

The National Party came to power (1948), on a platform of racial discrimination which became known as apartheid. As a rising tide of national liberationThird World receiving support, arms, and training from the newly dominant Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China, South Africa's Blacks demanded freedom and political rights that white South Africa had not granted them. Instead, the Afrikaner-dominated government answered with increased Apartheid policies which then became deeply entrenched in South African society, despite continued resistance. grew in the

When Commonwealth nations began to threaten South Africa with economic and political sanctions, white South Africa headed by Prime Minister HF Verwoerd decided to leave the commonwealth, and chose to become a republic in 1961, with its own State President CR Swart. This was the first time that there was a South African president in sixty years, since the days of the old Transvaal South African Republic when President Paul Kruger was exiled by the British in 1900.

The African National Congress offered the most active black-run opposition to apartheid, and after two decades of racial oppression and increasing economic pressures, the government of F.W. de Klerk dismantled the apartheid system in 1992. The first fully-inclusive election, in which blacks from the entire South Africa could vote, took place in 1994, electing Nelson Mandela as President. South Africa now sees itself as a multiracial democracy.

Pre-historic anthropology of South Africa

Ape-like hominids who migrated to South Africa around 3 million years ago became the first human-like inhabitants of the area now known as South Africa. Representatives of homo erectus gradually replaced them around a million years ago when they also spread across Africa and into Europe and Asia. Homo erectus gave way to homo sapiens around 100,000 years ago. The first homo sapiens formed the Bushman culture of skilled hunter-gatherers.

South Africa prior to the emergence of modern humans (Homo sapiens) remains shrouded in mystery. A major archaeological find in 1998 at SterkfonteinJohannesburg revealed that hominids roamed across the Highveld at least three million years ago. About a million years ago, Homo erectus had emerged and ranged well beyond Africa, leaving traces in Europe and in Asia. Somewhere around 100,000 years ago, modern man replaced the hominids. Although archaeologists continue to debate the details, fossils found near the mouth of the Klasies River in Eastern Cape Province indicate that Homo sapiens may have lived in South Africa as early as 90,000 years ago. near

The Bushmen probably became the first modern people to migrate to the southern tip of the African continent. Skilled hunter-gatherers and nomads, the Bushmen had great respect for the land, and their lifestyle had low environmental impact, allowing them to sustain their way of life for years without leaving much archaeological evidence. Other than a series of striking rock paintings, the Bushmen left few traces of their early culture. Attempts to analyse the existing samples by radiocarbon dating indicate that the Bushmen lived in the area of modern-day South Africa at least as early as 25,000 years ago, and possibly as early as 40,000 years ago. Small numbers of Bushmen still live in South Africa today, making their culture one of the oldest continuously existing in the world, along with that of the Indigenous Australians.

Ancient history

Around 2,500 years ago Bantu peoples migrated into Southern Africa from the Niger River Delta. The Bushmen and the Bantu lived mostly peacefully together, although since neither had any method of writing, researchers know little of this period outside of archaeological artifacts.

Beginning around 2,500 years ago, some Bushman groups acquired livestock from further north. Gradually, hunting and gathering gave way to herding as the dominant economic activity as the Bushmen tended to small herds of cattle and oxen. The arrival of livestock introduced concepts of personal wealthproperty-ownership into Bushman society. Community structures solidified and expanded, and chieftaincies developed. and

The pastoralist Bushmen, known as Khoikhoi ("men of men"), began to move further south, reaching as far as the cape now known as the Cape of Good Hope. Along the way they intermarried with the hunter-gatherer Bushmen, whom they referred to as San, to the point where drawing a clear line between the two groups became impossible (prompting the use of the term Khoisan). Over time the Khoikhoi established themselves along the coast, while small groups of Bushmen continued to inhabit the interior.