Rebuilding the Great Nation of Bukalanga: The Twelve Tribes of Bukalanga Re-Discovered and Redefined

The Rev. G. H. Cullen Reed of the London Missionary Society station in Bulalima [Bulilima], in Matabeleland, who has labored for some years among the Makalanga of that district writes: In all descriptions of the Makalanga it must be carefully borne in mind that there is no tribe, existing as one, which bears this name, but the people to whom it is applied consist of many tribes having their own peculiar traditions and customs more or less allied, but with considerable differences most confusing to the enquirer - Richard Nicklin Hall and W. G. Neal 1904. The Ancient Ruins of Rhodesia: Monomotapae Imperium.

After almost two centuries of subjugation, suppression and distortion of our history, identity, languages and cultures, it is only right that we begin a book of this kind with a redefinition of who we are and what ethnolinguistic groups constitute the Nation that we call Bukalanga. It is no doubt one of the great tragedies of our time that for the 33 years of Zimbabwean history, anything to do with Bukalanga Peoples has been suppressed to the point that many people actually believe there is nothing to tell about these people.

In fact, Shona-centric writers tried by all means to advance the false idea that says Bukalanga Peoples are actually a hybrid of the Karanga and Ndebele who only came into existence in the 19th century. As a result, the tendency has been to think that Bakalanga, Banambya and Vhavenda are a people of so recent origin that there is no history of theirs to really talk of. I will show in this book that instead, Bukalanga is an old Nation with a history dating back many centuries, and contrary to the teachings of Zezuru writers, backed by their equally suppressive Ndebele and Tswana counterparts, Bukalanga is a large Nation with a long history Africa south of the Zambezi, a history longer than that of any other Bantu people group in the region.  

What Ethnolinguistic Groups Constitute Bukalanga - A Redefinition

By Bukalanga or the Kalanga Nation, this book goes beyond the definitions that we have in school textbooks today which claim that all who live in the so-called Matebeleland are AmaNdebele; and all who live in the Central District of Botswana are Ngwato-Tswana, and that all who live in the Maswingo and Midlands Provinces are Shona. The book goes beyond that and looks into the identity of the historic Nation of Bukalanga dating back almost 2000 years. The book seeks to totally redefine the Great Nation of Bukalanga and reclaim its identity and heritage and rescue it from the externally imposed Shona, Ndebele and Ngwato-Tswana identities. Where the identity of Bukalanga was totally redefined by sword in the 19th century as Ndebele and in the early 1980s as Shona, we shall in this 21st century redefine by the pen as Bakalanga, BaNambya and Vhavenda.[1]

It is my submission in this book that the Great Nation of Bukalanga is made up of Twelve Tribes, which tribes, identified by their origins, are as follows:

1. Bakalanga[2]	5. BaLozwi/BaLoyi	9. BaTwamambo
2. BaNambya	6. BaLemba	10. BaTembe
3. BaLobedu	7. Vhavenda	11. Babirwa
4. BaLembethu	8. BaTswapong	12. BaShangwe

We have the authority of a number of writers who lived among these people between the 15th and 19th centuries that indeed these groups are indeed of Bukalanga stock, and hence comprise the Great Nation of Bukalanga. Therefore, when I refer to Bukalanga in this or any other of my books, I am using the term as a collective name of all these Twelve Tribes. We now look at the Kalanga origins of the Twelve Tribes.

Let us start off with the Bukalanga-Venda-Lemba relationship. About this we have the testimony of Professor G. Fortune who stated:

The Venda had a special relationship with the endogamous caste of smiths and craftsmen called the Lemba who have Islamic [actually Judaic] traits in their culture. These people are also well known north of the Limpopo. In Vendaland this group still speaks a form of Kalanga and, in Rhodesia, the only specimen of Lemba that the writer has seen is certainly Kalanga (Fortune 1973, 3).

Fortune cites as his sources Professor G. P. Lestrade (The Copper Mines of Musina, pp. 6, 10; “Some notes on the ethnic history of the VhaVenda and their Rhodesian affinities”, in Contributions towards Venda History, Religion and Tribal Ritual, edited by N. J. van Warmelo); and N.J. van Warmelo (“Zur Sprache und Hernkuft der Lemba”, Hamburger Beit rage zur Afrika-kunde, 1966). Professor Lestrade and van Warmelo had at the time done what was perhaps the most extensive study of the peoples living on the banks of the Limpopo.

We also read the following concerning the Kalanga-Venda-Lemba relationship in a 1905 report titled Native Tribes of the Transvaal prepared for the General Staff of the War Office in London. The report was prepared by Major R. H. Massie, General Commanding-in-Chief, South Africa and a portion reads:

The BaVenda people, apart from the ruling families, are believed to have crossed to the south of the Limpopo about 1700 A.D, and to have originally come from the valley of the Congo. Before entering the Transvaal they probably made a long stay in Mashonaland, the country of the “Makalanga,” and while there, seem to have come in contact with people of Arab extraction or other Semitic stock, for many individuals of the tribe at the present day show a strain of Semitic blood in their features. The language of the BaVenda, which is called Sivenda, is not easily understood by other tribes, but appears to be a mixture of some form of Sesuto with Lukalanga, the speech of the Makalanga people. It is said that a tribe now living on the Congo speaks a very similar dialect. There are remnants of a tribe called BaLemba among the BaVenda. These people are chiefly found in the Shivhasa district; they have no chiefs of their own, but have distinct customs, which point to Semitic origin, e.g., they do not eat pork or the flesh of any animal killed by people of other tribes. They speak the Lukalanga language (Massie 1905, Online).[3]

Regarding that the Lemba are a people of Bukalanga stock is also attested to by the writers of the Electronic Bibliography for African Languages and Linguistics (EBALL). EBALL is a bibliographical database aiming to collect, as exhaustively as possible, references to works dealing with African languages and linguistics, with an intended coverage comprising any and all languages found on the African continent: Afro-asiatic, Khoesan, Niger-Congo and Nilo-Saharan. The 2010 version lists the Kalanga Group Languages as made up of the following languages: Lemba/Remba, Lembethu/Rembethu, Nyayi/Rozwi, Thwamamba/Xwamamba, Lilima/Humbe, Nambya/Nanzwa, Pfumbi, Peri, Talahundra, Romwe, and Jawunda (Maho 2010, Online).

A draft document of the Preliminary “Indigenous” Institutional Profile of the Limpopo River Basin also lists Kalanga as comprising various sub-dialects such as Lemba, Lozwi, and Nambya among others (Earle n.d., Online).

Concerning the Kalanga-Venda and Thwamamba/Twamambo relationship, we have the record of Professor David Beach, formerly Professor of History at the University of Zimbabwe. He wrote:

The Zoutparnsberg [Makhado] Mountains had long been inhabited by Venda groups known as Ngona and Mbedzi, while the Limpopo Valley and the courses of its tributaries such as the Shashe or the Mzingwane had been the equally long-occupied area of the … Kalanga. These Kalanga, or more accurately, southern Kalanga - had been cut off from the northern Kalanga of the Togwa and Tjangamire states by the immigration of the Sotho-speaking Birwa, such as Hwadalala. One of the groups of southern Kalanga south of the Limpopo was ‘Twamamba’, and whereas some in the Brak River-Saltpan area continued to speak Kalanga, those who lived in the Zoutpansberg range itself came to speak Venda (Beach 1994, 180).[4]

Let us now proceed to a consideration of other Bukalanga groups. That the BaTswapong are a Kalanga group was first revealed to me by my 70-year grandmother, Elizabeth MaDumani, who belongs to that tribe, when I asked her to recite for me their praise poetry (zwitetembelo). I would later find recorded evidence in the works of Professor Werbner who, in his contributing chapter to Meyer Fortes and Sheila Patterson’s Studies in African Anthropology, identified BaTswapong as a Kalanga people (Werbner, in Fortes and Patterson 1975). Lest it be surmised that Professor Werbner, being a Jew, cannot be an authority on who is Kalanga or not, we will do well to know that his research work among the Kalanga was assisted by leading and elderly Kalanga men and women such as Mbiganyi Tibone, Onalenna Selolwane, Sam Mpuchane, Gobe Matenge and Richard Mannathoko, all who are proud and self-identifying Kalanga.

On BaLobedu (also called Bakhalaka or Bakgalaka) who now inhabit the area around Polokwane in Limpopo Province, we have the evidence of Eileen Jensen Kridge, Professor Emeritus of Social Anthropology in the University of Natal. She and her husband, Dr J. D. Kridge, visited twenty-six tribes in the Northern Transvaal in 1937 to obtain information on the Lobedu and surrounding peoples and came up with the following information:

The genealogy of the Lobedu dynasty of Modjadji chiefs shows that their earliest chief, Dzugudini, flew southwards from Vokhalaka [or Bukalanga] c. 1600. She points out that “There can be no doubt that the underlying Lovhedu [Lobedu] divine kingship stems from Rhodesia.” She states that according to oral tradition the Lobedu once lived at a place called Maulwe which formed part of the Monomotapa kingdom ruled by a Mambo. The daughter of the Mambo, it is said, bore a child by her brother. Forced to flee before the wrath of her father, she left with her infant son and a following, taking with her the rain charms and ditugula (sacred amulets). They went south and after many vicissitudes, eventually arrived in the area they occupy today (Kridge, in Meyer and Patterson 1975).

We are told also by Robert F. Gray and P. H. Gulliver in their book, The Family in Eastern Africa: studies in the role of property in family structure and lineage continuity that:

The Lobedu are a South Bantu people characterized by the institution of ‘divine kingship.’ They live in a mountainous area of the north eastern Transvaal lowveld. Originally from Bokhalaga [Bukalanga] (S. Rhodesia), they migrated south when the empire of Monomotapa broke up and established themselves as rulers over the sparse Sotho population they found in occupation” (1964, np).

Now, it may perhaps be thought that most of the evidence presented above is the record of ignorant Europeans who did not know our relationships. But let us hear now the evidence of one of the most well known Lobedu and one of the most prominent leaders of South Africa, the ANC Chief Whip, Professor Mathole Motshekga, also founder of the Kara Heritage Institute. He declared before the Gauteng Legislature in September 2007 on Heritage Day that:

    

I am a Molozwi-Mokhalaka also known as Molobedu. The Balovedu (also known as BaLozwi) and Bavenda are an offshoot of BaLozwi … who founded the Maphungubwe and Great Zimbabwe Civilizations. The name BaLobedu means: the Recipients of Tributes while BaLozwi means: sacred scientists who can make rain and control the forces of nature. The BaLozwi … are an offshoot of the Makalaka/Bakhalaka people of Naphta (now Kordofan in the Sudan) …  the BaLozwi migrated to the Limpopo Valley where they established the Bokhalaka Empire with its Capital City of Maphungubwe which became both a spiritual and international trading centre of Central Africa (Mathole 2007, Online).

Since the beginning of my writings on Bukalanga, I have received several emails from across Southern Africa concurring with many of my findings with regards to the historic origins and Bukalanga connections of many of these tribes. For example, I received two of the following from the Limpopo Province in South Africa bearing testimony concerning the Lobedu. The first one, from Polokwane, reads:

Hi my chief. Here it goes. I am the fifth generation of Mabula Mabje who came down around Polokwane about 250 years ago. Our surname was Mabwe or Mabgwe, but is still meaning [but still means] stones even now. Mabje came along with others like Chief Mongatane and they occupied a [piece of] land and called it Kgopeng and was ruled over by Chief Mongatane [This is the origin of the Kalanga surname Khupe, apparently, as shall be seen later, a Sotho-ized version of the Kalanga word Kupa, that is, tick]. In Khopeng there is a village known as Batswapong which is about 50 years old now. We still call each other Bakgalaka (Sotho for Bakalanga). According Chief Mongatane, as he presented our history during the Khopeng land claim in [the] Pretoria High Court, which he attended several times, we are from Arabia and came through Egypt down to Kenya, etc., until the vast majority settled in what [became] Bokgalaka [Bukalanga] and we proceeded here [in Polokwane]. He [also] presented that [information] 7 years ago during my father’s gravestone unveiling [which] is even in video [was caught on video].

The next one, also from Polokwane, is from a friend by the name Makono Mmakola Ke Tlhantlhagane. It also explains the confusion that exists between the Bakone and AmaNguni. It reads:

Bokgalaka is our origin and we are proud about that. From where I come from the Nguni’s are not part of Bakgalaka or Bokgalaka Empire. There is a difference between Bakoni and BaNguni. [We] Bakoni trace our migration directly from Bogkalaka but with the Nguni’s such [an origin] does not exist amongst them. Bakoni dominate the present Capricon District and part of Sekhukhune District [Limpopo Province]. We believe people confuse Koni and Nguni, these are not the same, the Koni are Matlala people from ga Matlala thaba in Polokwane [we may remember one of the most highly profile Koni in South Africa, Thabo Mbeki’s presidential spokesperson, Mukoni Ratshitanga].

A Facebook search will show that there are many “groups” of people who call themselves Bakgalaka or Bakhalaka (also BaLemba), the majority of them based in the Limpopo Province. Most of them now speak KiLobedu, a heavy accent Sotho dialect with Kalanga-Venda influences.[5]

 

Such are the historic relationships between Bakalanga, BaLobedu, BaLemba, BaTswapong, and Vhavenda. We now go on to Babirwa, a Sotho-speaking group of Kalanga origin closely related to the Lobedu and now found in the southern part of Gwanda District and Central District of Botswana. On them we have the record of Bulawayo historian, Pathisa Nyathi, himself a member of that community. Writing with a focus on one of the Birwa groups he stated:

The group in question is descended from one Tshamuyalila, said to be the son of Malahwana/Marahwana the son of Mafutana. It should be clear that Mafutana is probably Makhurane, a name that was later Ndebelised in line with the incorporated status of this group of Nyathis. This particular group of the Nyathis does remember that they are Mbikhwa, Mbikhwa waMakhura, Nareng, Mageza ngochago, amanzi alezibhidi (they bath with milk, because water is polluted) Banongula nonkaka [they that bath with milk] is a common family praise among the BaKalanga. The words have merely been translated into SiNdebele. (Interview with Goodboy Nguye Nyathi, Inyathi Mission 11 April 2009). It is interesting too to observe that Tshamuyalila sounds more Kalanga than Sotho. This should not come as a surprise given that the Babirwa are part of the generic BaKalanga. It could also be an indicator that the Babirwa had retained their erstwhile Kalanga identity by moving north. By so doing they were moving into an area where TjiKalanga was still spoken (Nyathi 2012, Online).

Explaining how the Birwa came to speak a dialect of Sotho, namely Sepedi, Nyathi wrote:

The move to the south by the Babirwa must have brought them into contact with the ethnic Sotho. The Babirwa must have adopted both the language and the cultural practices of the Sotho. The one cultural practice they adopted was the preferred first cousin marriages. The language too changed but there were elements of the Kalanga/Venda that were characteristic of Northern Sotho. The Sebirwa has a heavy accent, for example, in comparison with Setswana” (ibid).

In searching through the internet for more information on Babirwa, I found the following Wikipedia entry on Bobirwa (that is, land of Babirwa region) apparently created by Babirwa in Botswana  (although unfortunately it does not cite the sources used):

The Bobirwa Sub District in Botswana is an area populated by the Babirwa (Ba-Birwa) people who originate from the Kalanga and the Nyai (Ba-Nyai). The Babirwa as a people are found in Bobirwa in Botswana, in the Bochum District of the Limpopo Province of South Africa and Southern Matebeleland of Zimbabwe around the City of Kwanda (Gwanda). From the above it is clear that the Babirwa people originate from the confluence of the Limpopo River and the Shashe River, the area that today includes the Mapungubjwe [Maphungubgwe] Ruins. The Babirwa in South Africa reside in areas north of Stryberg Mountains south of Polokwane. This area is popularly known as Bokgalaka (Bo-Kalanga), meaning where Ba-Kalanga people reside.  

Whilst some readers will naturally dismiss a Wikipedia entry as unreliable, it may be helpful to know that the factual information contained in the entry is actually correct. A visit to Bochum in Limpopo Province will actually establish that the people there call themselves Bakgalaka and their area Bokgalaka. That the entry is backed by evidence not only from Botswana but Zimbabwe and South Africa surely makes it reliable, and we can safely conclude that Babirwa are actually a people of Bukalanga stock. This shall be made even more evident when we deal with the issue of identifying Bukalanga peoples through their surnames. We proceed to other groups.

On the Nambya we have the record of the explorer James Chapman who came upon them and Bakalanga on the Zambezi in 1863. Of these groups he wrote:

All the tribes here are descendants of the Banyai, a nation further to the east. The Makalakas were a distinct and independent people beyond the memory of man … The great-grandfather of the present Wankie, also called Whange, fled from his father Gole, chief of the Banyai, and set up for himself … The Banabea [BaNambya] claim descent from a great Banyai chief called Mambo, one of whose titles was Dalamo [of course the BaNyayi are the same people as the Kalanga as we shall see in a later chapter] (Tabler 1968, 73, 146).

Such is how the Twelve Tribes of Bukalanga are related, and for this reason I submit that they comprise the historic Great Nation of Bukalanga. We shall come to the Tembe and BaLoyi or BaLozwi in the next topic when we shall look at how the existence of Bukalanga groups all the way down to KwaZulu-Natal and up north as far as Tanzania is explained. 

Identifying Bukalanga Peoples by their Surnames

Now that we know the various tribes of Bukalanga, let us look at another important way of identifying people of Bukalanga stock - their surnames - the most notable feature being that the surnames are animal and body parts names^[6]. Due to the convulsions of the last 170 years, it will be noticed that many of the Kalanga surnames have since been translated into several of the languages that they now speak. It is also important to note that this is not a new phenomenon. Bukalanga peoples have always used this system of surnames, and a look at their oldest oral traditions shows that the surnames did not originate with the coming of the Ndebele in the 19th century as is commonly portrayed in the education system of Zimbabwe.

The list of Kalanga surnames, which is in all likelihood not exhaustive, is as follows (I shall in the near future, God willing, research and publish a piece of work focused on surnames):

Moyo	Sibanda	Dumani
Bhebhe	Nyoni	Nkomo
Dube	Nungu	Mpala
Ncube	Mvundla	Nyoni
Hungwe	Mpofu	Malaba
Ndebele	Nkala	Mloyi
Nkiwane	Nleya	Tjuma
Ndlovu	Khupe	Zhowu
Shoko	Shumba	Gumbo
Maphosa	Mthunzi	Baloyi
Mudau	Tau	Sibata
Ndou	Tlou	Mukoni
Nyathi	Mlalazi	Ngwenya[7]

Most of these Kalanga surnames given above are available in their various translated forms. For example, the surnames are rendered as follows in many cases: Mthembu and Tembo for Dube; Mdlovu, Tlou and Ndou for Ndlovu or Zhowu; Mncube, Msimang, Nsimango and Phiri,[8] for Ncube/Shoko; Mthunzi, Nhliziyo and Nkiwane for Moyo; and Mokoena for Ngwenya (please see below particularly for this surname). A look at these surnames reveals that millions of people who have them today are not generally identified as Kalanga, which is a result of the 200 year dispersion of the Great Nation of Bukalanga. Many are now identified as AmaZulu, AmaNdebele, BaTswana, Shona, Lozi, Sotho, etc. Explaining how our surnames got to be translated into these various languages. Bulawayo historian Pathisa Nyathi explains:

In dealing with … Kalanga people, we need to look at the situation before the arrival of the Ndebele. The Kalanga had surnames that they were using whose language the Ndebele did not understand. It became necessary for the Kalanga to give equivalents for their surnames. For example the Hhowu or Zhowu became Ndlovu, Whungwe became Nyoni. Long after colonialism there was a time when many Kalanga people sought to change their surnames into Ndebele. This was their way of fighting inferiority complex [imposed by the Ndebele] (Nyathi 2010, Online).[9]

But, if the Surnames listed above are of Bukalanga Origin, how then do we Explain Similar Surnames in South Africa, Especially in KwaZulu-Natal? 

Before going to press this particular chapter of the book was ‘leaked’ through my personal blog at http://www.ndzimuunami.blogspot.com and through the online news site, Bulawayo24. A lot of disputations came my way to the effect that it cannot be true that all people who use animal and body parts names for their surnames have their origins in Bukalanga. The biggest charge was that if this be the case, how then is the existence of these surnames all the way from Mpumalanga to KwaZulu-Natal explained. Some participants in Facebook groups that I am involved with charge that since there are people with the surnames Ncube, Mncube, Ndlovu, Mdlovu, Mthembu, etc., stretching all the way from Matebeleland Mpumalanga to KwaZulu-Natal, these people cannot be of Bukalanga stock.[10] A response article was written on Bulawayo24.com by one Mloyiswayizizwe Sokhela disputing my assertions especially that the Kalanga identity stretches into South Africa (and indeed all Southern Africa). Excerpts from the article went thus:

I read with great fascination Ndzimu-unami Moyo’s rendition of Kalanga history in his Chapter 1 installation in a Bulawayo24News edition. His consultation of sources was quite extensive (albeit not interpretively accurate) while his narration and arguments are fairly informative and intellectually provocative. Let me start by affirming his right to a cultural identity and express my solidarity with his desire to fight for the recognition, promotion and preservation of the Kalanga identity for it is the responsibility of every generation to ensure that it does not become the terminal point for the posterity of its species. The Kalanga have undoubtedly a rich heritage and legacy in Southern Africa as evidenced by the various ‘luswingo’ sites scattered throughout the region. In South Africa, although associated with the Venda (a point which Moyo clarifies), the  Mapungubwe ‘luswingo’ is so highly esteemed that in terms of the country’s national merit criteria, “The Order of Mapungubwe” is the utmost national honour that the country can ever bestow on an individual. I look forward to his further installations.

… Moyo also generously distributes Kalanga identity to everybody:  a section of Zulu people in South Africa are Kalanga and they are identifiable by their animal totems! A section of Tswana people including the aristocratic Ngwato clan as well as the Tswapong and Tauwana are Kalanga!  A section of the Tsonga people (baka BaLoyi) are Kalanga, a section of Sothos (Pedis) including the aristocratic Bakwenas are Kalanga and some sections of Venda people are Kalanga including the Lemba and Lobedu clans. While I fully sympathise with Moyo for his nostalgia (for indeed the Kalanga have a legendary foot print in the sub-region) I find his claims quite ridiculous in their attempt to construct a ubiquitous image of Kalanga identity which is being injected into the veins of every Southern African Bantu!

… Turning to the allegation of some Zulus in South Africa being Kalanga on the basis of their animal totems, I think Moyo committed a serious act of amateurish propaganda. His speculation that the Kalangas who left the ‘Mapungubwe city-state’ migrated to Natal is a desperate attempt to ‘deploy’ Kalanga ethnicity to other people without concrete historical facts. This is not only preposterous but also embarassing (Sokhela, Reconstruction of the Kalanga history welcome but beware of distortions! Bulawayo24News, 9 May 2012).

The Bukalanga origins of and relationships with the Nambya, Lemba, Lobedu, Tswapong, and Venda have already been dealt with above; we need not go back to that. What I want to concentrate on below is the issue of Kalanga surnames that Sokhela calls Zulu. He is right that some of the people bearing these surnames are now identified as Zulu and Ndebele, something which we have already explained above, but he ignores the Kalanga origins of these people, or simply would not bring himself to accept the evidence.

Could it be true that mine is mere “speculation that the Kalangas who left the ‘Mapungubwe city-state’ migrated to Natal [and that it] is a desperate attempt to ‘deploy’ Kalanga ethnicity to other people without concrete historical facts”? Well, let us see if we can have some concrete historical facts below. To do so we will look at a few sources that point to Kalanga migrations into and settlements in Natal, starting with Mr. J.T. Bent who in 1892 recorded that there was a major Kalanga migration down into Natal in the 1720s which was forced by the migrations of the Nguni tribes. He wrote in The Ruined Cities of Mashonaland that:

Several tribes of Makalanga came into Natal in 1720, forced down by the powerful Zulu hordes, with traditions of once having formed part of a powerful tribe further north. Three centuries and a half ago, when the Portuguese first visited the country, they were then all-powerful in this country, and were ruled over by a chief with the dynastic name of Monomotapa…” (Bent 1892, 32-33).

Secondly we have the record of the missionary Alfred T. Bryant who wrote in his work, Synopsis of Zulu Grammar and a Concise History of the Zulu People from the Most Ancient Times, in 1905, that indeed, there are people of Bukalanga stock and ancestry in Natal, the AmaLala. Of them he wrote:

The aboriginal inhabitants of Natal were not, unless remotely, of the same stock as the Zulus. They were AmaLala - another people with another speech. Their so-called tekeza language was, previous to the time of Shaka, considerably different to that of the trans-Tukelian clans and was almost unintelligible to them; and it was only after the over-running of Natal and the universal leading into captivity of its peoples by the conquering Zulu host, that the ancient tekeza speech died out and all the youth of the land grew up knowing and speaking nothing but the language of their conquerors … There are … many words in use in Natal which are absolutely unknown in Zululand, some perhaps remnants of the original Lala speech - an incident we should most certainly expect - while others are probably importations from neighbouring tribes (Bryant 1905, Online).

Conjecturing that the AmaLala were originally a people of Kalanga stock and that they lost that identity as a result of the 19th century Shakan invasions, Bryant further wrote:

It has been stated by Bent - but with what authority we do not know - that certain wandering Kalanga peoples came down into Natal about this time, or as he says, in the year 1720. Now, in Natal at the present day we find no knowledge whatever of any such immigration. But we do find that territory occupied by numerous clans whose origin and speech seems to have been altogether different from that of the Zulu clans now north of the Tukela. These are the Lala people who, we have said, were, immediately prior to their entering Natal, in residence, or at least a part of them, in present-day Zululand, while others perhaps were more inland in territory adjoining Swaziland. At any rate, they were the sole occupants of Natal at the time of Shaka’s invasion at the beginning of last century, and were commonly known to the Zulus under the general name of AmaLala - a name whose meaning often puzzled us, until we were given by old Lala the picturesque explanation that it was a term, unknown to themselves, but, contemptuously applied to them by Shaka’s people, who used to say, ngoba belala benomunwe egolo.[11]

Somehow or other, perhaps owing  to their forefathers having been all but exterminated by the Zulu conqueror Shaka, these clans, even though still abundantly in evidence in Natal (notwithstanding that they have now entirely lost their original language), no longer possess any tradition of their origin or their history prior to the time of the Shakan invasion. What we do know is that they were a people famous to the Zulu tribes as working in iron, and that their speech, unlike the softer Zulu, belonged to that harsh tekeza variety of the Bantu, common to the Swazi and some other peoples further north. But the Kalanga too were, and still are, celebrated precisely in the same manner as great iron-workers, and, moreover, many of the clans in the region of Mashonaland seem to us to speak a language which, along with that of the Lalas and Swazis, appears to have the tekeza characteristics. May, then, the Kalanga heard of by Bent (probably from some Suto or middle African source) as having emigrated into Natal, have been really these same amaLala tribes?

South of Mount Wedza, in Mashonaland [one time Bukalanga], we find even today a tribe, industrious as iron-workers, and calling themselves pa-Marara (or pa-Malala, as some Natives pronounce it [that is, Ba-Malala]), and the particular country inhabited by them is known as mu-Tekedza. Is it, then, nothing more than a coincidence that there should somewhere be a tradition of Kalangas having come down towards Natal, and that we should actually find there tribes commonly known to the Zulus as AmaLala, and their particular speech said to be to ‘tekeza’?

The statement that Kalangas once came down into Natal would be still more intelligible and acceptable to us if it could be shown that there was some linguistic affinity between the Kalanga and Tonga [i.e. Tsonga] peoples. For there does seem to be, or originally to have been, some recent intimate connection between the Lalas of Natal and [many] of the widely-spread Tonga tribes. Owing to the scarcity of our information, we could not indicate at present any likely spot, though we may say we have observed a marked similarity between the Shitswa dialect, spoken by certain Tonga Natives in the neighbourhood of Inhambane, and that of the Natal Lalas - thus,  Shitswa, imbywa (dog), Lala, imbwa; S. tihomo (cattle), L. itiyomo; S. ihosi (chief),  L. ihosi and iyosi; S. tinyane (birds), L. itinyoni, and so on. The single Lala word imbwa for ‘dog’ is itself evidence of much. So far as we can trace, this root, though almost universal in the more northern Bantu languages from the Swahili to the Herero, nowhere else exists among the extreme south-eastern tribes save among these Lalas and Tongas. Manifestly, then, the former could not have adopted it from any of their  present neighbours, but must have brought it with them from some more northern source and that, to wit, nowhere south of Inhambane (Bryant 1905, Online).

Bryant’s position on the likely Bukalanga origins of the AmaLala and the disappearance of their speech, which if indeed they were originally Kalanga, would have been one of the Kalanga Group Languages, is seconded by Clement M. Doke, one time Professor of Bantu Studies at Wits University. He wrote in The Bantu Speaking Tribes of South Africa in 1937 concerning the early history in Natal and of the Nguni and AmaLala that:

The Nguni are markedly a “cattle people”; and the presence of “click” sounds in their language seems to be due, almost undoubtedly, to contact with that purely pastoral people, the Hottentots. The problem is how, where, and when such contact was effected. The existence of this problem is by itself sufficient to cast serious doubt on the speculations of writers about early Nguni  history, for they do not account for what we actually find. The presence of the clicks in all the Nguni dialects - even those of the Transvaal Ndebele, who have been living in that province for at least three to four centuries, seems incomprehensible except on the assumption of a focus point of Nguni development far in the South, where contact with the Hottentots was possible. All this is not in accord with the theories hitherto put forward as to the way in which the Nguni came down from the North and occupied their present home. The accepted chronology tentative of course also does not appear to meet the case. There is a third grave difficulty: the Lala enclave which used to occupy approximately the present Southern Natal. The Lala were largely wiped out a hundred years ago, but enough remnants are left which may be studied. Not very much of true Lala custom and speech has survived to be recorded, but even this has not yet been done, and so we know almost nothing about them. It is claimed for them that they were of Shona origin, and some features of their language certainly are reminiscent of Shona or Tonga; but beyond that nothing definite can really be said [as shall be seen later, Professor Doke was using the word Shona to include the Kalanga]. In addition, an almost impenetrable veil was drawn over the past a century ago. In the Cape Colony destructive frontier wars were waged, while in Natal it seems that hardly a tribe was fortunate enough to be left undisturbed during Shaka’s reign. Whole tribes vanished, and everywhere traditions, culture, and material possessions were lost (Doke 1937, Online).

There is also the evidence presented by Samuel Kadyakale, a Maseko-Ngoni from Malawi who describes himself as somebody passionate about all things Nguni. He sourced his information from W. H. J. Rengeley’s 1978 book, History of the Angoni or Ngoni People, who inturn sourced his information from Portuguese documents of the 16th and 17th centuries. In detailing Kalanga migrations and settlements into Natal he writes:

The AbaMbo … crossed the Zambezi River in 1575 and on other occasions at about that time, together with a part of the AmaZimba tribe. Most of these AmaZimba stayed on the south bank of the Zambezi River until defeated by the Portuguese, when the survivors returned to the north bank of the river. The AbaMbo, however, did not delay at the Zambezi River. Having crossed the river, accompanied by a portion of the AmaZimba tribe, they moved up into the higher country to the south, and settled for a few years under an AbaMbo chief named Sonza between the Sabi and Limpopo Rivers in order to grow crops. Finding themselves too near the powerful Makalanga Kingdom of Munumutapa and the soils of the area where they settled too poor and the rainfall too erratic, they moved on again and by 1620 had reached Natal.

Meanwhile, other groups of AmaZimba and AbaMbo had moved direct through the country occupied by the BaTonga [Tsonga] and had probably already reached and settled along the seaboard of Natal which they found then occupied by the pygmy BaTwa and the click-speaking Bushmen. While in the country of the Makalanga, the host of Sonza incorporated large numbers of AmaKalanga into the AbaMbo tribe, and also annexed Makalanga cattle…

In 1589, Manoel de Faria e Sousa described a tribe he called the Virangune as inhabiting the country inland from Delagoa Bay. These were part of the AmaZimba host who did not tarry at the Zambezi River nor accompany Sonza, but had moved direct through the BaTonga country to Natal, and were probably at that time still moving south, but they may equally well have been the AmaZimba division of the AbaMbo host of Sonza which had already separated under their chief Nguni, as the name Virangune or AmaNguni would appear to make the more likely … The AmaKalanga incorporated into the AbaMbo tribe of Sonza and his AmaZimba satellites during their stay in the Makalanga country have given rise to the present-day AmaLala, and many of the clan names of the AmaLala are those of the AmaKalanga (Rengeley, in Kadyakale, 2009 Online).[12]

Further evidence that indeed Bukalanga Peoples did settle in what is now KwaZulu-Natal and the Mpumalanga Provinces of South Africa as well as Swaziland is to be had from the Swedish missionary, the Reverend Henry Junod. Junod was a member of the Swiss Romande Mission, living in Lourenco Marques [modern-day Maputo] during 1885-1895 and again from 1907-1921 among what was called by his generation of writers the Thonga tribes. We know them today as the Tsonga. From his research work spanning about a quarter of a century, Junod wrote his two volumes, The Life of a South African Tribe, Volumes I and II. In the introduction to the first volume, Junod tells us that his informants were all over the age of eighty years at the turn of the 20th century, which means that they would have been born about the turn of the 19th century, somewhat close to the events that they were recounting in their discussions with the missionary. Describing the Tsonga, Junod wrote:

The Thonga tribe is composed of a group of Bantu peoples settled on the eastern coast of South Africa, extending from the neighborhood of St. Lucia Bay (28^o Lat. S.) on the Natal Coast up the Sabie River on the north. Thongas are to be found there in four of the present South African states: in Natal (Amatongaland), Transvaal (Leydenbourg, Zoutpansberg and Waterberg districts), in Rhodesia, and chiefly in Portuguese East Africa (Lourenco Marques [Maputo], Inhambane and Mozambique Company districts). The Thongas border on the Zulus and Swazis southwards; westwards on the Ba-Mbayi, Ba-Lauti and other Suto-Pedi clans in the Transvaal; northwards on the Vendas and Ba-Nyai in the Zoutpansberg and Rhodesia, and on the Ndjaos near the Sabie; and eastwards on the Thongas near Inhambane and on the Ba-Chopi, north of the mouth of the Limpopo … The name Thonga is a generic name for a number of tribes, addressed using various names such as: Ronga, Tsonga (also Hlengwe), Tjonga, and Shagaan or Tshangaan. They are divided into the following six groups: the Ronga, the Djonga, the Nwalungu, the Hlanganu, the Bila, and the Hlengwe (Junod 1927, 13, 16-18).

Recounting the legends of the Tembe and Ba-ka-Baloyi [or BaLozwi] who now live among the Tsonga and Zulu, Junod pointed out the following:

Almost every clan pretends to have come from afar, and strange to say, they came from all points of the compass. Two of their clans, without doubt, came from the north, the Ba-ka-Baloyi and the Tembe. The Ba-ka-Baloyi, they say, came down the valley of the Limpopo in very remote times … According to some of the Native historians, the Ba-Loyi came from the Ba-Nyai country along with the Ba-Nwanati (a Hlengwe group), who also belonged to the Nyai or Kalanga race. As regards the Tembe clan, it is said to have come down as far as Delagoa Bay from the Kalanga country by the Nkomati River on a floating island of payrus, and to have crossed the Tembe river and settled to the south of the Bay … The Tembe people, when they greet each other, sometimes use the salutation Nkalanga, i.e. man of the north or of the Kalanga country, and there is little doubt that, notwithstanding the legendary traits of this tradition, the fact itself of the northern origin of these clans is true (Junod 1927, 21-23).[13]

Junod’s report on the Bukalanga origins of the Tembe is also attested to by W.S. Felgate who, in The Tembe Thonga of Natal and Mozambique: An Ecological Approach, reports that the Tembe claim to have migrated from Kalanga country (Felgate, in Kloppers 1982, Online). The names of Mabudu/Mabhudu-Tembe chiefs given by the missionary A. T. Bryant in 1905 seem to confirm a Kalanga origin. We have such names as Sikuke (c.1692-1710), Ludahumba (1710-1728), Silamboya (1728-1746), Mangobe (1746-1764) Mabudu/Mabhudu (1764-1782), Mwayi (1782-1800) and Muhali (no reign).

In an abridged version of a document published in submission to the Nhlapho Commission opposing the claim by Eric Nxumalo that he should be installed as King of the Tsonga (and Shangaan people) in 2007, Mandla Mathebula, Robert Nkuna, Hlengani Mabasa, and Mukhacani Maluleke wrote that over the centuries, the Tsonga have assimilated other cultural groups who came to live with them in South East Africa, and among those were:

Tembe-Karanga (Kalanga), who were in the Delagoa Bay region by 1554. The Baloyi–Rozvi (Lozwi), were already in the N’walungu region during the time of the Dutch occupation of the Delagoa Bay (1721-31). Some Hlengwe oral traditions claimed that the Hlengwe were actually the ones who converted the Valoyi from Rozvi (Lozwi) into Tsonga in Zimbabwe and Mozambique. This probably happened after the death of the powerful king of Rozvi, Changameri Dombo [Tjangamire Dombo or Dombolakona-Tjing’wango] in 1696 (Mathebula, et al 2007, Online).

In my personal blog, www.ndzimuunamiblogspot.com, I have provided a list of AmaHlubi surnames (the AmaHlubi are a Nguni group) which shows that the surnames amongst them similar to the Kalanga ones given in this chapter have an external origin separate from the Nguni. The list was provided by Henry Masila-Ndawo in 1938. Masila-Ndawo was born in Matatiele amongst the AmaHlubi, and became a leading imbongi (praise poet) among the AmaXhosa. (Matatiele is located in southern KwaZulu-Natal, and that name is doubtless familiar to Zimbabweans through the SABC1 soapie, Generations, as the rural home of the Memelas).

From the list, the occurrence of animal and body parts name surnames is about 7%. Interestingly, when Masila-Ndawo goes into the detailed histories and praise-poetry (iziduko) of these people, those with animal name surnames begin to be shown to be what we may call ‘outsiders’ to the AmaHlubi nation. For example, the Msimanga, a Nguni variant of Nsimango (similar to Shoko and Ncube), Masila-Ndawo writes (in isiXhosa) that “aba bantu babonwa befika kwaMhlanga, bekunye nabaTwa. Bathi bangabaTwa nanamhla oku. Kodwa ke thina sibafumana bengamaHlubi ngqe” (trans. “these people were seen arriving kwaMhlanga together with the Khoisan. Even today they identify themselves as Khoisan. Though we now find them today identified as AmaHlubi”). The Mncube-Khambule [Ncube-im’Zilankatha] are shown to have formerly been an independent kindgdom from the AmaZulu, akin to the Mabudu-Tembe [the Dube-Mthembu] that we have referred to above. They were originally two independent groups - Mncube and Khambule - although they have now come to be viewed as one. They do have a Mlotshwa affiliation only through having once lived under that chieftainship.

Also of interest are the Ndlovu some of who now view themselves as the true AmaNtungwa (core-AmaNdebele), ooNdlovu zidl’ ekhaya ngokuswela umalusi. A look at Masila-Ndawo’s history seems to give the impression that they became AmaNtungwa by assimilation. They are the sons of Ndlovu, and Ndlovu is rarely if ever a first name among southern Bantu peoples. Even its rate of occurrence amongst Nguni surnames shows that it is not traditionally a first name, or name of a clan progenitor. Even more interesting is the fact that in his book, Uphoko, Dr Sipho R. Khumalo traces the Ndlovus in Zululand up north, tracing their origins among the Sotho, where we know that Bakalanga in the Maphungubgwe area and most of Limpopo Province were absorbed by the Sotho (Dr Khumalo has been quoted from the Ndebele website Inkundla at http://www.inkundla.com).

Masila-Ndawo’s statements that some of the groups forming the AmaHlubi Nation came from outside is confirmed by the AmaHlubi King’s Planing Committee, AmaHlubi Royal Committee and the AmaHlubi National Working Committee. In a document titled Isizwe samaHlubi: Submission to the Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims, arguing that the AmaHlubi are a separate nation from AmaZulu, they state that certain groups such as the Nkomo, Msimang, Nkala, and others were incorporated into the AmaHlubi Nation, but were not originally part of it. They also argue that they were the largest segment of the AbaMbo who we learned that on their southward march they incorporated many Bakalanga into their ranks. They state that they settled in the territory marked by the Pongola River to the north-east, east of which were settled the Mabudu-Tembe of Chief Mthembu, which clan we have already encountered above. They also state that their language belongs to the tekeza or tekela variety of the AmaLala, a Kalanga group, though now identified as Nguni. All this shows that intermarriages and intermixtures between the AmaHlubi and Bakalanga cannot be ruled out, hence explaining what we believe to be typically Bukalanga surnames such as Nkomo, Ndlovu, Nkala, etc (the 2004 document referred to here is available online in pdf format under the title Isizwe samaHlubi).      

A complete list of Nguni clan names or surnames is also provided in my blog at http://www.ndzimuunami.blogspot.com for those readers familiar with Nguni languages. What will be noticed from that list is that the rate of occurrence of animal name surnames is just about 3% out of about 1400, showing that these surnames are traditionally not Nguni surnames. A list is also provided of Xhosa clan names. The occurrence of animal name surnames is only about 2.1% of the total of about 95 clan names, excluding the hundreds of sub-clan names. On the contrary, among peoples of Bukalanga stock - Bakalanga, BaNambya, some Venda - and the majority of those now called Ndebele - the occurrence of these type of surnames is about 100%, proving our position correct that Bukalanga is the source and origin of these surnames.[14]

A look at the Maseko-Ngoni in Malawi will reveal the same trend reported above. Samuel Kadyakale provides a fine list in his blog posting titled The Clans of the Ngoni According to G.T. Nurse, posted in October 2010. His material is sourced from G. T. Nurse’s 1978 book, Clanship in Central Malawi. Similarly there, the surnames we have identified as of people with origins in Bukalanga are identified too as Kalanga, with just a few slight variations. In fact, I have received emails from north of the Zambezi (Zambia and Malawi) confirming many of the claims made in my works, especially with regards to Bukalanga identity. Let me just quote two of those, starting with the one from Malawi. It reads:

I write [to] you from Malawi. I am Mzondi Moyo. I have read your articles on Bukalanga with interest. You are an amazing researcher, the type which would fill professors with envy. From my Totem you see that I am a Moyo. In fact I am Kalanga originally from your area. We were taken by the people under Zwangendawa and we are currently under Inkosi ya Makosi M’mbelwa. Zwangendawa preceded Mzilikazi of [the] Ndebele. To most people [in Malawi] Moyos are Ngoni, just like some people have mistaken you for the Ndebeles. In my country we have a lot of people who call themselves Kalanga, e.g., Tembo, Shumba, Shoko/Mafeni, Shaba, etc. A little more about myself. I am [a] male working as a District Education Manager, responsible for education delivery in my district [of Nkatha Bay].

From Zambia I received the following email from Barotseland, now Western Province:

Interesting piece on the Kalanga Nation. There are three clans of Bakalanga in Western Zambia or Barotseland. These are the Mananzwa, Manyai and Mahumbe. As should be expected these people are now Lozi or Rotse by acculturation. Their mother tongue is now Silozi and not iKalanga. I am a descendant of an ironsmith by the name of Machambuzi. Our village is also called Machambuzi. We still carry our Kalanga names such as Mbulayi, Mbulawa, Mbano, Siyanda, Mukundu, Galilo, Mulapesi, Tubapi, Chibu, Kwati, Lumbidzani, etc. (Email received on June 15th, 2012).

And how about among the Sotho in Limpopo and Gauteng Provinces?

A lot has already been said about BaLobedu or Bakgalaka who are resident in the Limpopo Province today, and indeed extend into Gauteng. The challenge that we face in connection with surnames is that there are many Basotho, or to be more specific, BaPedi, who carry what we have said are Kalanga surnames. We find here such surnames (or diboko) as Motaung (Sibanda), Motshweneng (Ncube), Mokoena (Ngwenya), Motloung (Ndlovu), Bafula-Kolobeng (wild pig), Banareng (Nyathi) Baphuting (Phuthi/duicker), etc. Can these people be also of Kalanga stock? The answer is yes. Let us hear from N. J. van Warmelo in his contribution to Professor Clement Doke’s The Bantu Speaking Tribes of South Africa. After arguing that among the Sotho are many groups with external origins, van Warmelo writes concerning the Transvaal Sotho (Pedi):

This sub-group consists of a large main body and several smaller members which, being numerically so weak, have not hitherto received much attention. The bulk consists of the tribes of the centre, viz. those of Sekukuniland, Pokwani [Polokwane], and neighbouring districts. These are the Pedi and those other tribes, either loosely called Pedi or speaking the Pedi language, which have been under Pedi control and influence for a long time, such as the Tau, Kwena (Mongatane and Kopa), Ntwane, Koni (both those offshoots of Matlala’s who migrated hither from Pietersberg, and those numerous other small groups with the totems tlou [Elephant-Ndlovu], phiri [monkey-Ncube], phuthi [Duiker], nare [Buffalo-Nyathi], kwena [Crocodile-Ngwenya/Ngwena], nkwe, tau [lion-Shumba/Sibanda] and thswene [Baboon-Ncube], which are of quite different origin), and the Roka from across the Olifants River.

Farther north, in Pietersburg district, are the tribes of Mphahlele, Thswene, Mathabatha, Matlala and Dikxale, all of them Koni from the East, who scaled the mountains round Haenertsburg and settled on the plains of Pietersburg. There are further the Molepo, the Tlokwa and some Birwa (from South-Western Rhodesia), and the big tribes of Moletse (Kwena) and Xananwa of Blauwberg. Smaller subsections of the Transvaal Sotho, showing various peculiar characteristics, are found in the extreme North-East and East of the Sotho area. In the North-East are the Phalaborwa, the tribes of Masisimala, of Mamidja and of Sekororo. The latter are, according to tradition, of Shona origin [actually Kalanga as shall be seen later in the book], and with them therefore the related Letswalo, who now live in the Woodbush. Finally there are the Kxaxa [Khaka], Mmamabolo’s people, and the half-dozen tribes of Lobedu who have the wild boar (kolobe) as totem and are more closely related to the Venda than any other Sotho tribes. In the extreme East is a subdivision formed by the Kutswe, Pai, and Pulana tribes, all except the first being represented by numerous small independent sections. They live in or just below the Drakensberg escarpment in Pilgrimsrest district (van Warmelo, in Doke, 1937).

Of course going back a little bit on the chapter we already know that the Koni or Kone, Matlala, Lobedu, etc, by their own admission, are people originally of Kalanga stock. Could it then be a coincidence that amongst such people should be found surnames (diboko, which van Warmelo calls totems) that are similar to those generally used by the Kalanga, and such people, although Sotho-speaking, claim Bukalanga origins? Shall we not conclude that although Sotho-speaking, those people are actually originally Kalanga? We cannot help it but reach that conclusion, for the evidence seems to be overwhelmingly in that direction. 

Indeed, we can safely conclude that the people who use animal and body parts name surnames all the way from Matabeleland to KwaZulu-Natal to Mpumalanga and Swaziland, and indeed across Southern Africa, are people of Kalanga stock. Perhaps, apart from our tribal names Bakalanga, BaNambya, Vhavenda, BaLemba, etc, there is no other more important way of identifying us than these our surnames, just like Jewry all over the world is mainly identifiable by their surnames, most of which end with berg, stein, vich/wicz, sky/ski, eller, eyer, baum, steiner, weig, eitner, heim, mann, etc!

Contrary to the claims of Sokhela and others, we can no longer claim that it is mere speculation that there are indeed people of Bukalanga stock who settled in the modern KwaZulu-Natal and generally along the east coast of modern South Africa. Neither can we still say it is a desperate attempt to deploy Kalanga ethnicity to other people without concrete historical facts. Whoever wants to dispute that will have to wrestle with the sources and tell us how and why they are wrong. We cannot help but admit that there is certainly a gem of truth in the assertion that there are people of Bukalanga stock settled in KwaZulu-Natal and indeed across Southern Africa. They are identifiable by their animal and body parts name surnames!

It is true that much of history will always remain shrouded in the mystery of the distant past. But we do not have much option than to work with the little available information that we can gather from the earliest sources to at least arrive at an understanding of what the past looked like. With what we have presented above, we cannot rule out the possibility of Kalanga migrations to and settlements in Natal in times past, before and/or cocurrently with the Nguni settlements.

I actually always find it a bit ironic that people who deny the possibility of Bukalanga settlements in Zululand don’t find it questionable that the Zulu themselves are spread all the way from KwaZulu-Natal to Tanzania. Neither do they take into consideration the fact that the Khoisan communities, who are known to have settled Africa south of the Zambezi before the Kalanga, are found all the way from Angola down to the Western Cape Coast. I think it is a result of ignorance of Kalanga history (deliberate or not deliberate) combined with an underestimation of how big a Nation this once was. When one considers the fact that the borders of the Bukalanga kingdoms swept from the Zambezi River to the Makhado Mountains, and by some accounts even had influences extending to the Orange River in the modern Free State Province, it should not be difficult to imagine the Kalanga being spread across all of Southern Africa, and perhaps, if it is to be rediscovered and rebuilt one day, it will be found to be one of the largest Nations in Southern Africa. This is the nation that this book is concerned with. With that said, let us now turn to an identification of the Ndebele themselves, who are they, how are they to be known?

Identifying the Ndebele, the so-called AmaNdebele Oqotho

Now that we have settled the question of Bukalanga identity by way of tribal identity and surnames, let us now proceed to identify the real Ndebele and answer the question: how do we differentiate the Ndebele from the Kalanga? This are important questions to answer because the so-called Ndebele nation is nothing more than a bastardization of the Kalanga Nation through claiming Bakalanga, BaNambya and Vhavenda for a Ndebele sub-ethnicity. To answer the question of Ndebele identity, let us take a look at the clan-names of the Ndebele. We have already pointed out in a footnote above that the Ndebele, like all Nguni groups, traditionally do not use animal or body parts names for their surnames. What they use instead, is the name of the clan progenitor or ancestor.

Unless otherwise clarified in this book or any of my related works, we are using the terms Matebele, AmaNdebele or Ndebele with reference to those people who bear the surnames provided below, those who in the Ndebele state were classed as abezansi. These are they that left Zululand under the leadership of Mzilikazi, and they are identifiable by their Nguni surnames. We are not using the names Matebele or AmaNdebele with reference to the so-called political classification which says that all who live in Matabeleland are Ndebele, as if ‘Matebeleland’ is a name that predates the inhabitants of the region. Instead, we are using the terms with reference to those people who crossed the Limpopo already bearing the name Matebele, from which we get the name AmaNdebele, a name they got as far away as the Free State Province in modern South Africa. 

The list of these Ndebele surnames given below was provided by the previously mentioned Rev. Mtompe Khumalo and recorded by Dr Neville Jones in his book, My Friend Khumalo. The list is as follows:

     

Khumalo	Danisa	Mbambo	Nxumalo
Xaba	Mahlobo	Siwela	Dlamini
Masina	Hlabangana	Mafu	Zitha
Ndiweni	Mtupa	Dlela	Thebe
Mahlobokazi	Gwebu	Dlodlo	Thwala
Mzizi	Mthethwa	Gumede	Dlomo
Magutjwa	Mphoko	Fuyane	Maduma
Mathema	Mkhwananzi	Masuku/Zikode	Sitsha
Dumane	Tjili	Mlotshwa	Zikhali
Mhlanga	Hadebe	Khanye	Tshabalala
Sigola	Sithole	Gunene	Gama
Tjabangu	Hlongwane	Mathe	Ngxongo
Dladla	Cala	Sigcaba	Makhwelo
Manyathelo	Gasela	Zimba/Mhlophe	Nzima
Matjazi	Hlatjwayo	Mlangeni	Maseko
Magagula	Mavundla	Ndimande	Thabethe

The reason I had to go into so much detail on what surnames are Ndebele and which ones are Kalanga is because there is a lot of confusion in Zimbabwe, especially in Matabeleland, regarding who is Ndebele and who is not. The peoples of Bukalanga - Bakalanga, BaNambya, Babirwa, and Vhavenda - as well as the Khoisan and Tonga, are bandied up together and identified as AmaNdebele, many times against their own will. Too many a time, it is the Nguni - the real Ndebele - who are pushing the idea that Bakalanga, Banambya and Vhavenda are Ndebele with the obvious intention of boosting their numbers. The question is: who gave them that prerogative to decide for us what identity we want to take on. And why precisely must we accept one tribe, which settled in our land whilst fleeing from the Tshakan wars, to impose its identity upon us after finding us already a nation with a 1800 year history in this land? It is not beyond any dispute that the Ndebele identity is an imposed one, for the Ndebele crossed the Limpopo already called by the name Matebele, precursor to the name AmaNdebele. That name was not invented in Zimbabwe as some today would have us believe. In fact, they were identified by that name as far away as what is now the Free State Province of South Africa. 

I contend therefore that many so-called AmaNdebele in Zimbabwe are actually Kalanga people, identified by their Kalanga surnames as opposed to the clearly Nguni Ndebele surnames. Many Bakalanga especially, out of lack of knowledge, understanding and appreciation of their own history, heritage and identity, identify themselves as AmaNdebele who came from Zululand, whereas their identity is nothing of that sort. This is especially the case amongst the younger generation. What they do not understand is that they became AmaNdebele by militarily forced subjugation at the expense of their own national identity. The choice was between submission to uMzilikazi and his Ndebele and death at the hands of his assegai-weilding impis. Finding nothing taught in school about Bukalanga, many Bakalanga, especially, shun their identity and hide themselves in Ndebelehood, in the process forefeiting the great heritage of their Fathers who established the greatest civilization ever established Africa south of the Sahara - the Zimbabwe Civilization. Many times this happens because some think that the Kalanga are a Shona group; and some Ndebele, especially as represented by the Mthwakazi movement, are on the frontlines of using this strategy of trying to ‘scare’ Bakalanga into Ndebelehood as a result of the very dishonorable Shona record with regard to the Kalanga, mostly highlighted in the Gukurahundi Genocide.

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[1] Whilst Bukalanga is a large Nation of some Twelve Tribes, throughout most of this book we shall be mentioning Bakalanga, BaNambya and Vhavenda because they are the largest and most visible Bukalanga tribes today. That is not meant to minimize the importance of the other tribes of Bukalanga such as BaLobedu, BaLemba, etc.

[2] These are further divided into a number of sub-groups speaking dialects of TjiKalanga - BaLilima, BaJawunda, BaPfumbi, and BaTalawunda. Some linguists argue that even BaNambya are a sub-clan of Bakalanga since TjiNambya can be rightly classified as a dialect of TjiKalanga.

[3] The groups from the Congo are probably the Ngona and Mbedzi who, according to Professors David Beach and Fortune, are the core-Venda, with the remainder being the ones of Bukalanga origin. These are Vhadau, Vhatavhatsindi, Vhanzhelele/Vhalembethu, Vhatwamamba, Vhanyai, Vhalaudzi, Vhalemba and Masingo. Also note that by the 1700s, all of the land called Zimbabwe today was then referred to as Bukalanga, hence Massie’s reference to “Mashonaland, the country of the Makalanga”.

[4] According to Pathisa Nyathi, the Birwa, though now identified as Sotho, are of Bukalanga too (see below). Also, as has been indicated in a previous footnote on the Venda from the Congo, not all Vhavenda are necessarily originally a people of Kalanga stock. There are indeed elements such as the Ngona and Mbedzi who originate in the Congo region. We are told by Stayt that the Venda are “a composite people … the tribe is composed of sibs and groups of unrelated people, who have, in varying circumstances and localities, came into contact with a small homogenous nucleus and have become identified with it” (1931).

[5] It may be of interest to know that this is the group to which the Olympic medalist Caster Mokgadi Semenya belongs to, in addition to the previously mentioned Mukoni Ratshitanga and Professor Mathole Motshekga. Also, as we shall see later, the Muvhango SABC2 drama series actor, Nthabiseng Mphahlele (Meiki), also belongs to this group, as well as former ANC Youth League president Julius Sello Malema, now Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party president.  

[6] The Shona, who some researchers such as Professor David Beach have referred to as the Central and Northern Shona to distinguish them from the Kalanga and Karanga groups in the south, for their surnames mainly use their chidawo (honorificus) or name of clan progenitor, as opposed to animal names like we find among the Kalanga and some Karanga in the south and southwest of the country. Whilst they might yera (hold it taboo) this and that other animal, they generally do not use animal names as their surnames. A look at Shona and Kalanga oral traditions shows that this has always been the case (see Bullock 1927:96-115). The same applies to the Sotho-Tswana.

The Nguni, like the Shona, also use the name of clan progenitor for their surnames. See The Historiography of Southern Africa: Proceedings of the Experts Meeting held at Gaborone, Botswana from 7 to 11 March, 1977, “On the other hand one is struck by the fact that all these other groups observe totems to mark descent, and the Nguni, as a rule, do not” (Unesco 1980: Online).

[7] The list above is corroborated in the work of the Reverend Mtompe Khumalo as constituting the surnames of the so-called “AmaHole”, which was reference to Bakalanga, BaNambya, Vhavenda and others then. According to Dr Neville Jones, a friend the Rev. Khumalo, Khumalo was a member of the Matabele Royal House and distantly related to the Ndebele King Lobengula. He was hereditary adviser to the King and would have held a position of considerable authority had Lobengula been living during Kumalo’s mature years. He [Khumalo] was born in the royal kraal at eNyathini in the area of present-day Burnside, Bulawayo. He was a cattle herdsman at the time of the battle of the Shangani Patrol, so would have been born between 1875 and 1880. He grew up near Hope Fountain where he later attended the mission school there. After working for a transport-rider and as a miner, he entered the Tiger Kloof Institution near Vryburg [South Africa] in 1914 to study for the ministry. Three years later he was ordained as minister at Hope Fountain Mission where he remained until his death. Dr Jones tells us that Khumalo had a vast knowledge of the lore and history of the Matabele and was concerned that it might be lost for all time. He then prevailed upon his friend and associate, Dr. Jones, to undertake the writing of a work in collaboration with him detailing the history, customs and culture of the Ndebele. According to Dr. Jones, Khumalo was also a “good linguist” who spoke Sechuana (Setswana), Sekalanga (TjiKalanga), Shona and English as well as his native Sindebele (Jones 1944, 4). We therefore cannot help but accept the Reverend Khumalo as a reliable source in connection with Ndebele and Bukalanga history in this regard, especially bearing in mind that he was born within fifty years of the arrival of the Ndebele in Bukalanga, now erroneously called Matebeleland.

[8] This surname is now commonest among Nyanja or Chewa people, and whilst I have not yet been able to establish the source, the Wikipedia entry for Chewa language and Chewa people points to historical links between these people and the mediaval kingdoms of Bukalanga, especially the Monomotapa Kingdom.      

[9] I suspect that this change of surnames might have its origins even centuries before the coming of the Ndebele. This would have been somewhere about the turn of the 17th century when the Nguni AbaMbo from the north swept through Bukalanga incorporating large numbers of the Kalanga into their ranks. Since that move went with it untold destruction, it is likely that it would have had the same effect as the 19th century Nguni migrations from the south to the north.

[10] Not to be confused with the Xhosa AbaThembu (or AbaThimbu) of Nelson Mandela’s clan. These are Tembe people. “Historically they settled in the region that spans from Maputo Bay in Mozambique in the north of the Mkuze River in the south, and the Pongola River in the west in the middle of the 16th century (Kloppers 2001 - The History and Representation of the History of the Mabudu-Tembe). The Tembe people are named after Chief Mthembu, who arrived from Zimbabwe around 1554 and settled in the region around Maputo Bay” (www.upetd.up.ac.za/../02chapter2). Kloppers notes that the incorporation of the Tembe into the Zulu nation has been a result of the recent Zulu expansion in the 19th century, otherwise prior to that they had always been an independent kingdom separate from the Zulu. The Tembo north of the Zambezi, a similar people group with the Mthembu or Tembe, crossed with Zwangendaba on his flight from what is now Zululand during the mfecane wars.   

[11] It has been pointed out by Dr Theal that “a few [tribes] were called after some perculiarity of the people, but in some cases the titles were originally nicknames given by strangers and afterwards adopted by the tribe itself” (Theal 1896:42-43). 

[12] It is true that Kadyakale does sometimes use the term Makaranga, but we know from the original documents like the Portuguese officer Diogo de Alcacova’s letter written to the King of Portugal in 1056 concerning the “Kingdom of Bukalanga” that it is a reference to the Kalanga, of the which some of the Karanga are a 1700s offshoot.

[13] The Delagoa (or Maputo) Bay is located just to the north of the St. Lucia Bay and the Mkhuze River which is just to the south of Maputo and the Lebombo Mountains. It is east of Swaziland, receiving its waters from the Mkhomazi/Nkomati, Matola and Tembe Rivers. All this region is now generally Zulu and Swati-speaking. That the BaLoyi and the BaLozwi are one and the same people please see Posselt (1935, 143).    

[14] The Venda, we are told (Stayt, 1931) are ‘a composite people…the tribe is composed of sibs and groups of unrelated people, who have, in varying circumstances and localities, come into contact with a small homogenous nucleus and have become identified with it’. (Robinson 1958: 108-120). The Ngona and Mbedzi are not of Kalanga origin, but are the group that came straight from the Congo (Beach 1994: 180) and ‘before entering the Transvaal…probably made a long stay in … the country of the “Makalanga”’ (Massie 1905: Online). Also, as a result of discriminatory tendencies in Botswana by the Tswana, Bakalanga in that country have now by and large moved to the use of ancestral names - mostly in Setswana - like the Tswana, as a means to avoid discrimination (Werbner, 2004).