Griqua people
The Griquas are a subgroup of mixed-race heterogeneous formerly Afrikaans-speaking nations in South Africa with a unique origin in the early history of the Dutch Cape Colony. Like the Boers, they migrated inland from the Cape and in the 19th century established several states in what is now South Africa and Namibia. The Griqua consider themselves South Africa’s first multiracial nation with people descended directly from Dutch settlers in the Cape, and local peoples.
History
The Griqua was a mixed-race culture in the Cape Colony of South Africa, dating back to the 17th and 18th centuries. They were also known as Hottentots before Europeans arrived, living in close-knit family groups. The Griqua people’s multiple historical backgrounds have been interwoven with apartheid classification and identity politics. They are a racially and culturally mixed people who are primarily descendants from European colonist men and Khoikhoi slaves. The Griquas could trace their forefathers to two clans, the Koks and Barendse, the first was made up mainly of Khoikhoi and the second of mixed European descent. Genetic studies in the 21st century have shown these people also had Tswana, San, and Xhosa ancestry. Later, the Europeans chose mixed-race women of the Khoikhoi, who were living in the Cape during the 17th and 18th centuries. As time went on, mixed-race people began to marry among themselves, establishing a distinct ethnic group that tended to be more assimilated to Dutch and European ways than tribal peoples in separate villages. During apartheid, the Griqua were racially classified under the broader category of "Coloured".Throughout the 18th century, new communities characterized by race, culture, religion, and unequal access to property and power started to form; they came to be connected by spoken word. The term "Bestards" was used to describe one of these groups of people; it referred to the descendants of marriages between Europeans, slaves, and Khoisan. The word was also applied to subordinate blacks who were proficient in Dutch, could ride horses, and could shoot. Bestards, or Basters, worked on farms owned by White people in more specialized roles as craftsmen and transport riders. Later, they travelled into the interior bearing these abilities. Originally, the term "Bestards" referred to people who were more "civilized" and religiously devoted than the Khoikhoi or slaves.
Slavery was practiced in the Dutch East India Company-controlled Cape Colony, and the mixed-race groups that developed in the early Cape Colony as a result of white settler interaction with captured Khoi people who began to work around the farms, eventually opted different names for themselves, including "Bastards", "Basters", "Korana", "Oorlam" or Oorlam Afrikaners, and "Griqua". Like the Afrikaners, or "Boers" as they were known in that time, many of these groups migrated inland when the British took over the colonial administration. The Khoisan and the Mozambiquans were the one group of people that was often looked down onto as the jobs given to them and the way they lived was not up to standards. The word "Afrikaner" itself was originally used as a description for not white Boers but a mixed-race bastard child. The terms "Baster" and "Bastards" were not derived from the English word "bastard", but rather the Dutch word meaning "hybrid".
It was only around 1876 that a group of Boer intellectuals, who named themselves "The fellowship of real Afrikaners", decided to use the term as a new means to describe the Boer people, as part of the project to create a new national identity for pioneer Boer people during the First and Second Boer Wars and for more powerful political legitimacy. This is why today many Afrikaans-speaking white people are still known as Afrikaners, as this message was powerfully conveyed as a national identity during the times of the South African Union and the apartheid years of the Republic of South Africa.
According to the 18th-century Dutch historian Isaak Tirion, the Khoi name "Griqua" is first recorded in 1730 about a group of people living in the northeastern section of the Cape Colony. In 1813, Reverend John Campbell of the London Missionary Society used the term Griqua to describe a mixed-race group of Chariguriqua, Bastaards, Korana, and Tswana living at the site of present-day Griekwastad. Klaarwater was the first Griqua settlement which emerged in the early 19th century in what is now the Northern Cape province of South Africa. Established by the Griqua leader Adam Kok I, Klaarwater served as a refuge and trading hub for Griqua communities, as well as for other indigenous groups and European settlers. The settlement grew rapidly, attracting people from various backgrounds seeking economic opportunities and protection from conflicts in the region. Klaarwater's strategic location facilitated trade routes between the interior of Southern Africa and the Cape Colony, contributing to its significance as a cultural and economic center. Despite facing challenges such as colonial expansion and land dispossession, Klaarwater played a pivotal role in the history of the Griqua people and remains an important symbol of their resilience and cultural heritage. The British found their "proud name", "Bastaards", offensive, so the LMS called them Griqua. The term Bastaards refers to a group of people of mixed origin. The Bastaards were not given legal status because of them being "Mixed". The Griquas were not happy about this and built a force of their own. The Bastaards joined the Khoi and San and the Bastaards made sure that they were skilled men in combat tactics. When it came to war the Griquas decided to flee the Dutch and live the way they wanted to, the way their foremothers had lived.
An insignificant amount of Bastaards groups were formed in the Northwestern and eastern border suburbs of Colesberg, Roggerfeld, Namaqualand, and Hantam. They had European names and were able to speak Afrikaans, and their children were baptized in churches. They have their own church, which is Protestant in South Africa, and that is where their children most likely got baptised. They were informed of commando services.
The actual name was derived from the Chariaguriqua people whose princess became the wife of the first Griqua leader, Adam Kok I. Adam Kok was a liberated slave, who figured out how to acquire burgher rights and a ranch close to the present Piketberg, established the most incredible blended local area. Because of a common ancestor named Griqua and shared links to the Chariguriqua, the people officially changed their name to the Griqua. Legend has it that in the 1750s, Adam Kok married the daughter of the Chariguriqua, chief of the Khoikhoi clan. Kok was a former slave who managed to rule the Griqua nation and he led his people across the country, South Africa to settle next to the Orange River. He was referred to as the chief of the colored people.
Adam Kok I's father was Cornelius Jacobz who worked for the VOC and his mother was a slave. His father believed that the Cape was The Garden of Eden and this is how Adam got his name. His surname 'Kok' comes from the Dutch word kok which means cook, or chef, an occupation Adam once fulfilled. Kokstad was named after the Griqua chief Adam Kok the Third who settled there in 1863.
File:Griquatown - Griqua 1820 SA.jpg|thumb|An 1820 drawing of a street scene in Griquatown, Griqualand West.
Cornelius was the son of Adam Kok III and got baptised by the missionary John Phillip in 1800. This was the beginning of Christianity amongst the Basters. The missionaries did not agree with the degrading name, basters. The Griquas accepted their new name and this is how the mission town Klaarwater's name changed to Griquatown.
The Boers arrived in the area of Griquatown after Natal was taken over by the British. They acquired land from the Griqua, buying it in exchange for horses, liquor, firearms and ammunition. Trouble started when the Kok arrested a Boer accused of ill-treating his people, and the trekker community tried to take over his entire territory. A British force stationed at Colesberg quickly crossed the Orange River and defeated the Boers at Zwartkoppies.
The chief's land was divided in two, one side was to keep the chief and his people busy and the other side was for the Boers who paid rent to the chief and the Cape government.
The arrival of the Boers and the colonial masters to the area known as Griqualand West denied the Griquas the opportunity to follow their own development paths. They lost their land and traditional resources and were tossed into a sea of rapid social change which saw them lose the independence they had searched for in the Orange Free State area. They were disheartened and had to relocate. The Dutch East India Company did not intend for its Cape Colony possessions at the southern tip of Africa to develop into a political entity. As the colony expanded and became more successful, its leadership did not worry about its frontiers. As a result, the frontier of the colony was indeterminate and ebbed and flowed at the whim of individuals. While the VOC undoubtedly benefited from the trading and pastoral endeavours of the Trekboers, it did little to control or support them in their quest for land. The high proportion of single Dutch men led to many taking indigenous women as wives and companions, producing mixed-race children. These multiracial offspring gradually developed as a sizable population who spoke Dutch and were instrumental in developing the colony.
These children did not attain the social or legal status accorded their fathers, mostly because colonial laws recognised only Christian forms of marriage. This group became known as Basters, derived from bastaard, the Dutch word for "bastard". As part of the European colonists' paramilitary response to insurgent resistance from Khoi and San peoples, they conscripted Basters men into commando units. This allowed the men to become skilled in lightly armed and mounted skirmish tactics. In the winter of 1831, a Ndebele commando attacked a Griqua commando led by Gert Hooyman who intruded the Ndebele territory and stole many of their cattle. Hooyman warned the Griqua troops to be vigilant because the Ndebele might come for revenge at any time. They ignored him and on this night the Ndebele attacked the Griquas while they were still feasting on their stolen cattle. Around 1000 Griqua men were killed on the now famous hill called Moordkop. But many recruited to war chose to abandon Dutch society and strike out to pursue a way of life more in keeping with their maternal culture. The resulting stream of disgruntled Dutch-speaking marksmen leaving the Cape hobbled the primarily Dutch colonists' ability to crew commando units. It also created belligerent, skilled groups of opportunists who harassed indigenous populations along the Orange River. Once free of colonial rule, these groups referred to themselves as Oorlam. In particular, the group led by Klaas Afrikaner became notorious for its exploits. They attracted enough attention from the Dutch authorities that Afrikaner was eventually rendered to the colony and banished to Robben Island in 1761.