Smaller South Africa; no Great Trek

Spun off from another thread.

No Great Trek, no Voortrekkers. The Boers stay south of the Orange River.

OTL the land between the Orange and the Zambezi rivers -- the northern half of South Africa plus Rhodesia and a hunk of Mozambique -- had been almost emptied of humanity by the Mfecane ("the Crushing"), Shaka Zulu's ambitious campaign to rid the world of non-Zulus. It was basically a post-apocalyptic deathscape, an empty land inhabited largely by small, deeply paranoid bands of skulking refugees.

So when the Boers -- tired of whiny liberal pansy-ass British abolishing slavery and such cheerful local customs as whipping your servants to death for petty theft, lateness or a negative attitude -- when the Boers, I say, struck out in favor of freedom and individual rights, they were able to expand into a land that had been mostly emptied of humanity. Yes, there were some people still living there. And the legacy of the Mfecane had left them a little touchy of strangers (as some unlucky Boers soon discovered).

But across an immense, subcontinental area of a couple of million square km, there were no longer any large, organized tribes capable of offering sustained resistance. After a few sharp encounters, the Boers had it more or less all their own way. So most of the Boers poured out of Cape Colony and spread out over a Texas-sized area to the north and east, where they could stake out huge ranches, read their Bibles, raise immense families, and terrorize and enslave the natives in peace. There they would remain for 60 years or so, until the British, weary of these cruel and petty small states on their northern border, decided to bring the Boers the benefits of civilization by declaring war on them, herding them into concentration camps., and annexing their land to a new "Union of South Africa".

Okay. So [handwave] say this doesn't happen.

Why not? Well, the simplest is for there to not be a Mfecane. Say someone drops a rock on young Shaka Zulu's head and his happy dreams of conquest and bloodshed are tragically cut short. The Zulu remain a major regional military force, of course, but they don't turn into the African version of the Huns circa 430 AD. The region between the Orange and Zambezi rivers remains densely populated, inhabited by a mix of tribes who OTL fled north (Ndebele), south (Lesotho), or were simply wiped out of existence. And the first Boer scouts who poke their noses over the Orange? Their heads end up adorning a kraal somewhere.

Obviously this will have huge knock-on effects on African history. But let's focus on Cape Colony for the moment: in this TL, the Boers stay home.

Now what?



Doug M.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
What about Moshoshoe I kicks Shaka's ass earlier, maybe with Xhosa support (and support from some of the many generals of Shaka who revolted) and forms a stable Sotho empire over the region, thus meaning the Voortrekkers have a choice between sticking around (in a region where they're a plurality anyway and have the potential to be a majority if Xhosa is a Sotho vassal) or trying to take over a stable-ish african state?

Basically you need Lesotho to get its act together early enough to take advantage of a moment of weakness by the Zulu king. Or one of the many civil wars of the period to succeed in deposing Shaka.

That would lead to a Lesotho that covers Orange and potentially expands over large areas of Transvaal; if Xhosa is a vassal Ciskei doesn't become part of the cape province. If the african scramble happens as OTL anyway, Lesotho might become its own colony separate from South Africa or a protectorate. I would find the idea of an ethiopian solution entertaining though.
 

abc123

Banned
What about Moshoshoe I kicks Shaka's ass earlier, maybe with Xhosa support (and support from some of the many generals of Shaka who revolted) and forms a stable Sotho empire over the region, thus meaning the Voortrekkers have a choice between sticking around (in a region where they're a plurality anyway and have the potential to be a majority if Xhosa is a Sotho vassal) or trying to take over a stable-ish african state?

Basically you need Lesotho to get its act together early enough to take advantage of a moment of weakness by the Zulu king. Or one of the many civil wars of the period to succeed in deposing Shaka.

That would lead to a Lesotho that covers Orange and potentially expands over large areas of Transvaal; if Xhosa is a vassal Ciskei doesn't become part of the cape province. If the african scramble happens as OTL anyway, Lesotho might become its own colony separate from South Africa or a protectorate. I would find the idea of an ethiopian solution entertaining though.


Too many mines in Orange and Transvaal to that be possible.
;)
 
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