By Steven Kotze

Among the many diverse cultural groups found in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa, the Bhaca people are endowed with one of the most remarkable legends of their origin. It is a story that is not very well known beyond the boundaries of their relatively small territory in the valleys surrounding the village of Mount Frere.

     In these wonderful, secret places, often only known to those fortunate to be born there, and out of sight among the folds of the Mzimkhulu, Mzimvubu and Kinira rivers, there is a great deal of our past which is magical. The Bhaca people live in these hidden, enchanted places in scattered homesteads where they still tend their cattle and crops.

     They themselves are largely responsible for their understated presence in the cultural landscape of South Africa, because concealing themselves is something for which the Bhaca are well known. It is an attribute they trace back to their most famous chief and founder, a man called Madzikane kaKalimetshe, and his celebrated encounter with the army of King Shaka in 1826. The name amaBhaca actually means “the hidden ones” in the Zulu language, and was bestowed on them in a fit of grudging pique by warriors of the Zulu king, whom they once outwitted in spectacular fashion.

     During the period of social upheaval that gave rise to the Zulu kingdom 200 years ago, many African communities were faced with simple, stark choices. The majority of amaKhosi (chiefs) who resisted the armed might of Shaka kaSenzangakhona and his impi were defeated in battle and gave up their lives. Those who submitted willingly also surrendered their autonomy, and were relegated to largely subservient positions within the new Zulu kingdom even though they retained a degree of authority within their own communities.

      In a desperate attempt to maintain their independence, a small number of leaders made an equally painful decision. Leaving their ancestral homes north of the Thukela River in what eventually became the heartland of Shaka’s kingdom, they led their people to different areas beyond the frontiers of the new empire. Some of these communities settled far to the south of Zululand in the fertile valleys beyond the Mzimkhulu and Mzimvubu rivers.

     The Zulu kings regarded the Mzimkhulu River, in particular, as the boundary of the civilised world. People living beyond it were derogatively called amaXamu or “those without law”, and the territory south of the Mzimkhulu was known in Zulu as emaXameni – “place of the lawless”.  This wild frontier region, an ungoverned hinterland, was where many refugees of the cataclysmic wars surrounding the creation of the Zulu kingdom hoped to find some peace.

     More than 200 years ago, the amaWushe and amaZelemu, ancestors of the Bhaca, were precisely such refugees fleeing the wrath of Shaka. During the terrible conflict that brought the Zulu kingdom into existence, they fled before the violence and tried to find new places to live in peace. Crossing the Mzimkhulu River into the lawless frontier districts, they hoped to find some security, but it was not to be. Towards the end of King Shaka’s reign, he sent the warriors of his army to seize the chief of those fugitive folk, the soon to be illustrious Madzikane kaKalimetshe, and to drive his people back to Zululand. Those who resisted were to be killed.

     In the winter of 1826, Madzikane thus received the terrifying news that an impi of Zulu warriors were on the way to capture him. As the amaWushe and amaZelemu were no match for Shaka’s men, Madzikane knew this meant almost certain death. However, Chief Madzikane was a cunning man, and he came up with an incredible strategy to defeat the Zulu army. …….

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