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THE ‘INTERIOR WORLD’ OF THE NINETEENTH-CENTURY MALOTI-DRAKENSBERG MOUNTAINS*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 June 2017

RACHEL KING  and
SAM CHALLIS
RACHEL KING
Affiliation:
Centre of African Studies, University of CambridgeRock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand
SAM CHALLIS
Affiliation:
Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand
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Abstract

Over the last four decades researchers have cast the Maloti-Drakensberg Mountains as a marginal refuge for ‘Bushmen’ amidst constricting nineteenth-century frontiers. Rock art scholarship has expanded on this characterisation of mountains as refugia, focusing on heterogeneous raiding bands forging new cultural identities. Here, we propose another view of the Maloti-Drakensberg: a dynamic political theatre in which polities that engaged in illicit or ‘heterodox’ activities like cattle raiding and hunter-gatherer lifeways set the terms of colonial encounters. We employ the concept of the ‘interior world’ to refigure the region as one fostering subsistence and political behaviours that did not conform to the expectations of colonial authority. Paradoxically, such heterodoxies over time constituted widespread social logics within the Maloti-Drakensberg, and thus became commonplace and meaningful. We synthesise historical and archaeological evidence (new and existing) to illustrate the significance of the nineteenth-century Maloti-Drakensberg, offering a revised southeast-African colonial landscape and directions for future research.

Keywords

Maloti-DrakensbergBasutolandAmaTolaBaPhuthirock artinterior world
Type
Nineteenth-Century Reconstructions
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 58 , Issue 2 , July 2017 , pp. 213 - 237
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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Footnotes

*

We thank Lara Mallen, Mark McGranaghan, Peter Mitchell, and John Wright for comments on this article. This research was supported by grants from the South African National Research Foundation's African Origins Platform, a Clarendon Scholarship from the University of Oxford, the Claude Leon Foundation, and the Smuts Memorial Fund at Cambridge. Maps were created using ArcGIS® software by Esri. ArcGIS® and ArcMap™ are the intellectual property of Esri and are used herein under license. Copyright © Esri. All rights reserved. Author's email: rk547@cam.ac.uk

References

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