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Oral Evidence in a Pseudo-Ethnicity: The Fingo Debate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 May 2014

Timothy J. Stapleton
Timothy J. Stapleton*
Affiliation:
Rhodes University
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Extract

There is a disturbing trend emerging in South African history. Unquestioning acceptance of African oral tradition threatens to become a requirement of politically correct scholarship. The African voice knows all. Julian Cobbing has been sharply criticized for ignoring oral evidence in his revision of early nineteenth-century South African history. Cobbing claims that African migration and state formation in the 1820s was caused by the illegal activities of colonial slave raiders who covered up their operations by claiming that the Zulu kingdom under Shaka had laid waste to the interior of southern Africa. This cover story was incorporated into South African history as the mfecane (or crushing) and served to justify white supremacy by portraying blacks as inherently violent. Carolyn Hamilton attacks Cobbing for ignoring the African voice which allegedly supports the orthodox mfecane by placing Shaka at the center of events. In response, Cobbing claims that the largest record of Zulu oral evidence was distorted by James Stuart, the colonial official who collected it at the turn of the last century. Although Elizabeth Eldredge rejects the Zulucentric mfecane in favor of a broad compromise theory based on environmental and trade factors plus the activities of a few Griqua labor-raiders on the High veld, she accused Cobbing of developing a Eurocentric hypothesis which robs Africans of initiative within their own history. More critically, Jeffrey Peires, whose work on the Xhosa is deeply rooted in the conventional mfecane, describes Cobbing as “a reactionary wolf dressed up in the clothing of a progressive sheep” and implies that his ideas are nothing short of racist.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 22 , January 1995 , pp. 359 - 368
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1995

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References

Notes

1. Cobbing, Julian, “The Mfecane as Alibi: Thoughts on the Battles of Dithakong and Mbolompo,” JAH 29 (1988), 487–518CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem., “A Tainted Well: the Objectives, Historical Fantasies and Working Methods of James Stuart, with Counter-Argument,” Journal of Natal and Zulu History 11(1988), 31-74.; Eldredge, E.A., “Sources of Conflict in Southern Africa, 1800-1830: The ‘Mfecane’ Reconsidered,” JAH 33 (1992), 1–35.CrossRefGoogle ScholarHamilton, Carolyn, “The Character of Chaka: A Reconstruction of the Making of Shaka as Mfecane Motor,” JAH 33 (1992), 37–63CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Peires, J.B., “Paradigm Deleted: The Materialist Interpretation of the Mfecane,” Journal of Southern African Studies 19 (1993), 295–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2. Webster, Alan C., “Land Expropriation and Labour Extraction Under Cape Colonial Rule: The War of 1835 and the “Emancipation” of the Fingo” (M.A., Rhodes University, 1991)Google Scholar; Stapleton, Timothy J., “The Fingo Exodus of 1865: A Reappraisal,” Seminar Paper, Rhodes University, May 1994.Google Scholar idem., Maqoma: Xhosa Resistance to Colonial Advance (Johannesburg, 1994).

3. Switzer, Les, Power and Resistance in an African Society: The Ciskei Xhosa and the Making of South Africa (Madison, 1993), 60.Google ScholarPeires, , “Paradigm Deleted”, 295, 310Google Scholar; Switzer, Les, “Points to Keep in Mind in the Construction of South African History,” Seminar handout, Rhodes University, May 1994.Google Scholar

4. Interviews with Qedile Eric Boma, Joza Township, Grahamstown, 12 January 1994; Vuma Nkosinkulu, Fingo Village, Grahamstown, 6 June 1994; and B.B. Zondani, Grahamstown, 14 June 1994. Mr. Boma's father came from Peddie. Mr. Nkosinkulu's father was born in Fingo Village and his grandfather in Port Elizabeth.

5. Ayliff, and Whiteside, J., History of the Abambo: Generally Known as Fingoes (Butterworth, 1912).Google Scholar For a more recent work which agrees completely with Ayliff and Whiteside, see Milton, John, The Edges of War (Cape Town, 1984).Google Scholar

6. Makiwane, T.M., “The Myth of Fingo Slavery,” South African Outlook, 2 September 1935Google Scholar; and interviews with Horatius Makhosonke (Maholi) Stamper and Victorus Neliswa Stamper, Durban Village, Peddie, 22 June 1994; and Qedile Eric Boma. Ayliff, /Whiteside, , History, 18–19.Google ScholarPeires, Jeffrey, The House of Phalo: A History of the Xhosa in the Days of their Independence (Johannesburg, 1981), 88.Google Scholar

7. Interviews with Q.E. Boma and V. Nkosinkulu.

8. Interviews with Q.E. Boma, B.B. Zondani and V. Nkosinkulu.

9. Interview with Q.E. Boma. See also Spicer, M.W., “The War of Ngcayecibi (1877-78)” (MA., Rhodes University, 1978).Google Scholar

10. Interviews with Q.E. Boma, V. Nkosinkulu and B.B. Zondani; Baker, Lynne and Hunt, Keith, The 1820 Settlers (Cape Town, 1984)Google Scholar and Saunders, Chris, ed., Reader's Digest Illustrated History of South Africa: The Real Story (Cape Town, 1988)Google Scholar; Davenport, Rodney, South Africa: A Modern History (London, 1977).Google Scholar Sandy Rowoldt is the Cory Librarian at Rhodes University. Named after the well-known settler historian, George Cory, the Cory Library is a collection of books, periodicals, and archival documents relating to the history of southern Africa.

11. Interview with Maholi Stamper and Victorus Stamper. Stamper claims that as the early Afrikaner settlers could not pronounce the surname of his ancestors, Mqoqi, they renamed them Stamper, which means one who pounds maize. For an example of Xhosa informants see interview with Walter Mpisekhaya Gqirhana, Msobomvu Location, Alice District, 16 October 1991. For Ngqika resistance see Stapleton, Maqoma.

12. Kawa, Richard Tainton, Ibali LamaMfengu (Lovedale, 1935).Google Scholar (Cory Library) MS 16365, D.D.T. Jabavu to Rev. R.H.W. Shepherd of the Lovedale Press, 12 February 1937. For retribalization see Lacey, Marion, Working for Boroko: The Origins of a Coercive Labour System in South Africa (Johannesburg, 1981), 84–119.Google Scholar For the Fingo and retribalization see Crais, Clifton, “Representation and the Politics of Identity in South Africa: An Eastern Cape Example,” IJAHS 25 (1992), 99–122.Google Scholar The relationship between political/economic developments and the rise of Fingo identity throughout the late nineteenth and entire twentieth centuries requires further examination.

13. Interview with Victorus Stamper.

14. For distortion of Xhosa traditions see Stapleton, Timothy J., “The Memory of Maqoma: An Assessment of Jingqi Oral Traditions in Ciskei and Transkei,” HA 20 (1993), 321–35.Google Scholar For the intsomi see Zenani, Nongenile Masithathu, The World and the Word: Tales and Observations from the Xhosa Oral Tradition, collected and edited, with an introduction, commentaries, and annotations by Harold Scheub, (Madison, 1992), 11.Google Scholar

15. Interview with V. Nkosinkulu.

16. Manona, C.W., “Ethnic Relations in the Ciskei,” in Charton, Nancy, ed., Ciskei: Economics and Politics of Dependence in a South African Homeland (London, 1980), 103–04.Google Scholar (CL) MS 7720, Rev. J. Ross to mother, 1 May 1829.

17. The clan name issue was brought up during the “Mfecane” Aftermath Conference, University of the Witwatersrand, September 1991. Interview with Dr. Cecil Manona, Grahamstown, 23 June 1994. John Wright's work in Natal has not found evidence of a Fingo link. See Wright, John, “Political Mythology and the Making of Natal's Mfecane,” Canadian Journal of African Studies 23 (1989), 272–91.Google Scholar For a typical anthropological work of the 1950s see Hammond-Tooke, D.W., Tribes of the King William's Town District (Pretoria, 1958).Google Scholar For Ayliff see his History, 18.

18. For the conventional theory see Peires, , House of Phalo, 88.Google Scholar For the revision see Webster, , “Land Expropriation,” 133.Google Scholar See also Dohne, J.L., A Zulu/Caffer Dictionary (Cape Town, 1857)Google Scholar, and Simpson, D.P., Cassell's New Latin-English Dictionary (London, 1962).Google Scholar

19. Interview with V. Nkosinkulu; and Zenani, , The World and the Word, 11.Google Scholar

20. Interview with V. Nkosinkulu. Manona, , “Ethnic Relations,” 103.Google Scholar For the changing language see (CL) MS 16,365, Report for the Lovedale Press by D.D.T. Jabavu on Lincoln Mkentane, “Imigaqo Elula Yentetho YesiXhosa” (Simple Grammar for the Xhosa Language) 25 February 1948. Jabavu refers to new Xhosa terminology proposed by the Cape Educational Department in 1929 and the author. Kropf, Albert, Kafir-English Dictionary (Lovedale, 1915)Google Scholar and Doke, C.M. and Vilakazi, B.W., Zulu-English Dictionary (Johannesburg, 1948).Google Scholar