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The Rise of the ‘Right-Hand House’ in the History and Historiography of the Xhosa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 May 2014

J.B. Peires
J.B. Peires*
Affiliation:
Rhodes University
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Extract

Among the Xhosa the institution of the ‘Right-Hand House’ acts both as a political charter and as an historical explanation. As a political charter it defines the relationship between the Ngqika Paramount (the Right-Hand House) of the Ciskei ‘Bantu Homeland’ and the Gcaleka Paramount (the Great House) of the Transkei Homeland. As it presently stands, the essence of this relationship is that the Ngqika Paramount recognizes the Gcaleka Paramount as his superior in rank, but without accepting any implications of practical political subordination. This position was defined by J.H. Soga, the standard authority on Xhosa history and customs, and himself an umNgqika, as follows:

By courtesy, matters affecting Xosa customs might occasionally be referred to a chief of the older [i.e., Gcaleka] branch especially when a precedent was involved, but this did not prevent the Right-Hand House from following its own line of conduct, irrespective of what that precedent might be, should it choose to do so. Laws promulgated by the court of the Gaikas [Ngqika] were not subject to interference by the Gcaleka chief.

In terms of historical explanation, secondary authorities from 1846 to 1975 have singled out the privileged status of the Right-Hand House as the principal cause of Xhosa political fragmentation.

Whereas historians of Africa normally agree that institutions and their myths of origin are, at least in part, susceptible to historical interpretation and reconstruction, they may justifiably be more doubtful of an historical approach which seeks to explain historical events by imputing to the past the continuous retrogressive operation of institutions which can be seen to be operating in certain ways in the present. In this regard the present exercise has two aims.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 2 , 1975 , pp. 113 - 125
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1975

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References

1. When used without qualification, the term ‘Paramount’ in this paper refers to the chief of the amaGcaleka of the eastern Xhosa. I have used the terms ‘amaRarabe’ and ‘amaNgqika’ more or less interchangeably throughout, generally using the latter term only for the period during or after the rule of Ngqika.

2. Soga, John H., The South-Eastern Bantu (Johannesburg, 1930), pp. 189–90.Google Scholar

3. H.H. Dugmore, “Papers,” first published in 1846 and reprinted in Maclean, John (ed.), A Compendium of Kafir Laws and Customs (Cape Town, 1866), pp. 8–33Google Scholar; Hammond-Tooke, W.D., Command or Consensus (Cape Town, 1975).Google Scholar

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9. “The Report of the Expedition of Heligert Muller and Jan Andries Holtshausen” in Kirby, P.R. (ed.), A Sourcebook on the Wreck of the Grosvenor (Cape Town, 1953), p. 171.Google Scholar

10. Although it is common practice to drop the prefixes of Bantu words, I have chosen to retain the prefix ‘ama-’ (sing, ‘urn-’) meaning ‘people of,’ e.g., amaNgqika, ‘subjects of Ngqika or his descendants,’ in order to avoid confusion with Ngqika (without prefix), the chief. The amaRarabe are today usually referred to as the amaNgqika since the majority chose to follow Ngqika rather than Ndlambe (whose followers are known as the amaNdlambe).

11. The most convenient sources for this period of Xhosa history are Moodie, Record, V, and Marais, Johannes S., May nier and the First Boer Republic (Cape Town, 1944).Google Scholar

12. Causes given include the assistance rendered by the Paramount Regent to the fleeing Ndlambe (this is recurrent in the sources but appears unlikely and possibly involves the telescoping of two events), a quarrel over grazing lands, and the murder of an umGcaleka by some amaNgqika (these seem to be either clichés or pretexts). Collins in Moodie, , Record, V, 12Google Scholar, considers the two events to be separate. For a full account of the war-incorrectly dated to 1818-see Soga, , South-Eastern Bantu, pp. 158–60.Google Scholar

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14. Lichtenburg, , Travels, 1:358–9Google Scholar, also spoke of the willing of paramountcy to the father of Ngqika.

15. Somerset to Bathurst, 24 April 1817, in Theal, GM. (ed.), Records of the Cape Colony (36 vols.: London, 1897–1905), 11:313Google Scholar; Kropf, A., Das Volk der Xosa-Kaffern (Berlin, 1889), p. 49.Google Scholar I have given an extended account of this period in my “Causes and Development of the War of 1818–19,” unpublished B.A. Honours extended essay, University of Cape Town, 1971.

16. The three key dates to which reference is occasionally made are ca. 1780 (accession of Ndlambe as Regent and the commencement of the rise of the Right-Hand House); 1807 (Ngqika's defeat by Ndlambe which led to the amaNgqika faction accepting inferior status as a Right-Hand House within the Xhosa polity); and 1847 (western Xhosa territory became the Crown Colony of British Kaffraria, annexed a few years later to the Cape Colony).

17. Hammond-Tooke, , The Tribes of King William's Town District (Pretoria, 1958), p. 84.Google Scholar

18. See the biographies in Kunene, Daniel P. and Kirsch, Randall A., The Beginnings of South African Vernacular Fiction (Los Angeles, 1967).Google Scholar

19. Soga, , South-Eastern Bantu, p. xi.Google Scholar

20. See note 15 above.

21. Hammond-Tooke, , “Segmentation and Fission,” pp. 149–52Google Scholar; idem, “The ‘Other Side’ Of Frontier History” in Thompson, Leonard M. (ed.), African Societies in Southern Africa (London, 1969), p. 239.Google Scholar This second article includes a number of quotations from the missionaries mentioned in the text.

22. Wilson, Monica, “Nguni People,” p. 119n4Google Scholar; Harinck, G., “Interaction between Xhosa and Khoi” in Thompson, , African Societies, pp. 147–49Google Scholar; Omer-Cooper, J.D., The Zulu Aftermath (London, 1966), pp. 19–20Google Scholar; Derricourt, R., “Settlement in the Transkei and Ciskei before the Mfecane” in Saunders, Christopher T. and Derricourt, R. (eds.), Beyond the Cape Frontier: Studies in the History of the Transkei and Ciskei (London, 1974), pp. 39–82Google Scholar; W.M. Freund, “Thoughts on the Study of the History of the Cape Eastern Frontier Zone” in ibid., pp. 83–100.

23. Hammond-Tooke, , “Segmentation and Fission,” p. 164Google Scholar, with emphasis in the original.

24. Ibid., p. 154.

25. Ibid., p. 163.

26. Soga, , South-Eastern Bantu, pp. 438–45.Google Scholar

27. Ibid., pp. 322–24.

28. Hunter, Monica, Reaction to Conquest (2nd ed.: Oxford, 1961), pp. 379–80.Google Scholar

29. Hammond-Tooke, , “Segmentation and Fission,” p. 161Google Scholar; Brownlee, F. (ed.), The Transkeian Native Territories (Lovedale, 1923), pp. 25–26.Google Scholar

30. Hammond-Tooke, , “Segmentation and Fission,” p. 154.Google Scholar

31. Dugmore, “Papers,” Maclean, , Compendium, p. 16Google Scholar, and Soga, , South-Eastern Bantu, pp. 125–27Google Scholar, the main primary sources which support Hammond-Tooke's theory, identified Langa and the amaMbalu as an independent unit.

32. For Gwali and Mdange see Soga, , South-Eastern Bantu, pp. 120–23.Google Scholar

33. For Gasela see Hammond-Tooke, , Tribes of King William's Town District, p. 83Google Scholar; for Nukwa see Maclean, , Compendium, p. 134Google Scholar; for the tradition of Ngqika and Ntimbo see N.C. Mhala, “Ukuvela kwama-Ndlambe” in Bennie, Imibengo; for the tradition of Anta and Ntimbo see Soga, , South-eastern Bantu, p. 149.Google Scholar

34. The fact that Mdushane inherited the entire amaNdlambe on his father's death has been overlooked by historians, but it is quite clear from Kay, S., Travels and Researches in Caffraria (New York, 1834), p. 73Google Scholar, and Hammond-Tooke, (ed.), The Journal of William Shaw (Cape Town, 1972), p. 143.Google Scholar For the sons of Ndlambe see also Hamond-Tooke, , Tribes of King William's Town District, pp. 73–75, 93–95.Google Scholar

35. Barnes, J.A., Politics in a Changing Society (2nd ed.: Manchester, 1967), p. 57.Google Scholar

36. Derricourt, , “Settlement,” p. 45.Google Scholar

37. See, for instance, Freund, , “Thoughts,” p. 93.Google Scholar