Mfecane - Lifaqane - Difaqane

19th Century Upheavals

Tragedy on a vast scale struck southern Africa in the early 1800's. The event was named the Mfecane "the crushing" by the Nguni and Difaqane "the scattering of tribes" by the Sotho-Tswana.

Europeans called the catastrophe the "Wars of Calamity". 

By 1825, two and half million starving, homeless people wandered

about southern Africa looking for respite.

 
The Mfecane "Difaqane" evidenced through tribal migration.

The causes of the Mfecane were many. Starting in 1800, a long drought made southern Africa inhospitable. People moved in search of food and fought for meagre supplies, producing the Difaqane. The entire Sotho-Tswana region had fallen into a state of anarchy. One clan conquered the other,

only to be defeated by another.

Ken Karner
Shaka Zulu (1787 – 1828)

The Mfecane gave rise to Shaka Zulu. In less than two decades, a powerful Zulu empire arose from a typical Bantu decentralized pastoral society. Shaka had created a highly centralized, well organized nation-state,

with a large and powerful standing army.

 Refugee groups escaping Chaka's anger, invaded the lands of present-day Botswana. Sobhuza of the Swazi moved his people north from the Pongola River to present-day Swaziland and conquered the peoples living there. The marauding Hlubi and Ngwane created chaos as they tramped westward. The Basotho were pushed into the mountains where they were harassed by cannibals. Setting towns on fire, the Ndebele swept ahead of the Zulu Impi to settle in present day Zimbabwe, where they absorbed others and became the Matabele. Along the way they encountered King Thulare's Pedi empire, which was destroyed. They attacked the Mokololo to the northwest, who were Sotho-Tswana 's speakers from the south pushing north. Forced off their lands, many Nguni and Tswana peoples collided with the Voortrekkers moving from the south. The Xhosa expanded into Khoi-khoi lands. Some Khoi-khoi retreated into the Kalahari Desert. Others were killed or enslaved by the Voortrekkers. The Tlokoa marched from Natal leaving a path of destruction all the way to Botswana. They attacked the Fokeng forcing them west. The Fokeng marched north to the Zambezi River and beyond, where they raided destitute refugees. Vagrants from various Nguni and Sotho groups formed a new tribe,the Mfengu, which means 'beggar' in iziXhosa.
 

By the time of Shaka's murder in 1828, no group of people were living on their original lands.  Cannibalism had been rife over the vast area.

Adding to this historic account, it should be remembered that this written history was recorded by Afrikaans and English speaking people, on or about their first contact with the inhabitants of the interior of South Africa. What they failed to consider or record when dating, defining and anointing "the" Mfecane - Lifaqane - Difaqane or Wars of Calamity, were that  droughts and tribal adventurism had been going from early times. The historic generalization of "the period", ignores any mention of Portuguese 16th century accounts of more or less the same shenanigans. No, we do not surmise that peace prevailed between the centuries it took the new arrivals to catch up with the earlier European adventures, nor do we have reason to believe tribal behaviour or natural weather patterns, were significantly different prior to the arrival of the Portuguese.