Mpande's - University of Zululand Institutional Repository

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be built up a grandiose nation rnled
by a imperious despot. "43
This justifies a general consensus amongst historians that the beginning of
the 19 th Century witnessed the transformation of clan-based chieftaincies
into stratified, centralised kingdoms. The emergence of kingdoms
entailed not simply an increase in the size and in the degree of
militarisation of political units, but also comprehensive changes in the
nature ofpolitical, social, ideological, and to some extent, economic
relations between rulers and ruled. 44
Thus, the Zulu domains as a kingdom began with Shaka who reigned
between 1816 and 1828. He was able to apply his military and political
genius fully." It was he who brought together the people from different
clans as one mighty sovereign nation with the clan name of king Shaka as
a collective identity.
4'
44
4'
AT Bryant: Olden Times in Zululand and Natal, pp. 70 -71; 1.SA, Vol. I, Evidence
ofBaleni, 13 May 1914, p. 28; K.c., Stuan Papers, file 57, Notebook 7, Evidence of
MgidbJana, 23 February 1912, p. 5.
1. Wright and C. Hamilton: "Traditions and nansfonnations: the Pbongolo ­
Mzirnkhulu region in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, ef. A. Duminy
and B. Guest (Eds): Natal and Zululand - from earliest Times to 1910, pp. 49 - 82.
M.G. Buthelezi: King Shaka Day - Speech, Glebelands Stadium, Durban,
23 September 1984, p. 2.