Kaffir Wars

Kaffir Wars

 

the name given in bourgeois literature to the wars between the Xhosa (Kaffirs), a South African people, and the Anglo-Boer conquerors in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The armed resistance of the Xhosa to the colonizers lasted from the late 1770’s to the early 1880’s. The largest military clashes took place in the years 1779–81, 1789–93, 1799–1803, 1811–12, 1818–19, 1834–35, 1846–47, 1850–53, 1858, and 1877–79. As a result of these wars, the borders of Cape Colony were constantly moved to the east. By the early 1880’s all the territory inhabited by the Xhosa had been seized by the colonizers. During the Kaffir Wars the colonizers took advantage of the lack of unity among the Xhosa and instigated conflicts among the tribes.

REFERENCES

Potekhin, I. I. Formirovanie natsional’noi obshchnosti iuzhno-afrikan-skikh bantu. Moscow, 1955.
Walker, E. A. A History of Southern Africa, 3rd ed. London, 1959.