The Maphumulo Uprising: War, Law and Ritual in the Zulu Rebellion

In 1906 the authorities in the Colony of Natal put down with great loss of life, an uprising that has become known as the Zulu or Bhambatha rebellion. Accounts have concentrated on Bhambatha kaMancinza, the man who led the guerrilla war in the Nkandla forest, and this book shifts the focus to the Maphumulo area where two famous chiefs led their people in resistance to the colonial militia. This account also goes beyond the physical conflict. It examines the rituals that preceded the rebellion itself and the subsequent life and death struggles in the courts. The Maphumulo Uprising introduces many of the social and political issues around ethnicity, identity and nationalism that have been such a feature of the subsequent history of KwaZulu-Natal.