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Cattle, raiding and disorder in Southern African history

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 July 2017

Rachel King
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Abstract

Cattle raiding is iconic of the colonial frontier in Southern African history and historiography. Incorporating settlers and Africans as aggressors and victims alike, archives and ethnohistories depict raiding as thieving, subverting authority, and inciting conflict. Despite the in-depth anthropological attention given to ‘Bushman raiding’ and frontier commandos, comparatively little work has focused on the social and cultural function of cattle raiding within chiefdoms: that is, examining cattle raiding as socially embedded rather than simply transgressing authority and property ownership. This article explores how these narratives of ‘disorder’ have been constructed, and some alternative perspectives on nineteenth-century cattle raiding as a social institution. Through vignettes drawing on archival, archaeological, ethnographic and folkloric evidence, this article offers glimpses of what narratives of the recent past could look like if views of raiding-as-disorder were revisited and revised. I draw attention to where raids were illegal versus illicit, the role of cattle as social agents, and the logic underpinning designations of raiding as resistance. Developing a view of raiding as social practice permits us to interrogate archival perceptions of raiders as outlaws and raids as analogues for warfare, thus enabling more nuanced investigations of conflict in Southern Africa's past.

Résumé

Le raid de bétail est emblématique de la frontière coloniale dans l'histoire et l'historiographie du Sud de l'Afrique. Incorporant les colons et les Africains à la fois comme agresseurs et comme victimes, les archives et les récits ethnohistoriques décrivent le raid de bétail comme un vol, une subversion de l'autorité et une incitation au conflit. Malgré l'attention anthropologique poussée donnée aux « raids des Bushmen » et aux commandos frontaliers, relativement peu de travaux ont été consacrés à la fonction sociale et culturelle du raid de bétail au sein des chefferies ; autrement dit, à l'examen du raid de bétail comme ancré socialement, et non simplement comme une transgression de l'autorité et de la propriété foncière. Cet article explore le mode de construction de ces récits de « désordre » et d'autres perspectives sur le raid de bétail au dix-neuvième siècle en tant qu'institution sociale. À travers des croquis s'appuyant sur des données archivistiques, archéologiques, ethnographiques et folkloriques, cet article offre un aperçu de ce à quoi pourraient ressembler les récits du passé récent si on venait à revisiter et à réviser les opinions du raid de bétail en tant que désordre. L'auteur attire l'attention sur des cas dans lesquels les raids étaient illégaux plutôt qu'illicites, sur le rôle du bétail en tant qu'agent social et sur la logique sur laquelle repose la désignation du raid de bétail en tant que résistance. Développer une perspective du raid de bétail en tant que pratique sociale nous permet d'interroger les perceptions archivistiques des auteurs des raids comme hors-la-loi et celles des raids comme analogues à la guerre, et permet par là-même un examen plus nuancé du conflit dans le passé du Sud de l'Afrique.

Type
Livestock: mobility, raiding and the state
Information
Africa , Volume 87 , Issue 3 , August 2017 , pp. 607 - 630
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2017 

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