The Zulues in South-Africa

Nobody knows how long there have been people living in the


southern part of the African mainland. Experts dates foundings of


irontools in the Swaziland to the 4th century. Sailors who were


shipwrecked outside the coast of South-Africa had contact with people who


earned their living by farming and cattlebreeding. Later on when the


Europeans arrived to South-Africa, they found a people on the east coast


of Natal who called themselves" A ma zulu". These people were tall and


very atleticly build, they could take great effort in both hunting and war


and their knowledge to the nature was incredable.






The Zulu tribe was once one of South-Africas biggest and most


powerful tribes and they managed to stand up against the British until


they lost the Zulu war in 1897. The tribes defece system was wery simmular


to the system we have in Norway today. The troops were devided into


regiments according to their age. And they got military training in


diffrent parts of the country, just as we do in Norway today.


The Zulues want to keep their tradition and identity alive, but they have


a lot to struggle against. The lack of land and the demands from the


whites way of life has disturbed their old way of living based on


cattlebreeding and farming. The majority of the Zulues today live in the


villages near by the mines and the cities where they have their work,


others work on farms owned by whites.


The zulu society has lost a lot of its stability. But one thing they


havent lost is the solidarity to their fellow tribe members, and they are


all very keen on maintaining their old cultur, inheritated threw


generations.





The Zulues are traditionally polygame. They live on farms in huts


made of grass and each and every wife has one or two of the huts, one to


sleep in an the other...