Assegai is Wilbur Smith's thirty-second novel, it follows The Triumph of the Sun in which the author brought the Courtney and Ballantyne series together. Assegai tells the story of Leon Courtney (son the Ryder Courtney) and is set in 1906 in Kenya. The events in the story are linked to and precede the outbreak of World War One.
Leon Courtney, the eldest son of Ryder Courtney leaves home after a fallout with his father, and joins the army with help from his uncle Penrod Ballantyne. Leon rises to become a second lieutenant in the King's African Rifles regiment based in Nairobi. During the period of the Nandi Resistance, Leon saves the life of Manyoro, one of his Maasai soldiers from a Nandi ambush, for which he is adopted as a son by Manyoro's mother Lusima, a shaman among the Maasai with powers of divination. After recovering from the battle at Manyoro and Lusima's village and returning to his base, Leon narrowly avoids being court-martialled by a vindictive superior officer, who accuses him of deserting his unit during the ambush, but he is cleared by Manyoro's testimony.
Despite his acquittal Leon's duties do nothing to improve his falling morale and he considers quitting the army to take up elephant hunting, based on a prediction made by Lusima. Penrod arranges for him to be placed as apprentice to professional hunter Percy Phillips in order to allow Leon to spy on movements of man and machine in German East Africa, as he suspects the Kaiser of preparing for war. Leon uses his contacts among the Maasai - gained from saving Manyoro's life - to establish a secret information and communications network between Nairobi and German East Africa, while Manyoro and Loikot, a young Maasai who had assisted Leon during his recovery, serve as his trackers.
Among Leon and Percy's clients are Theodore Roosevelt and his son Kermit, a fifty-two-year-old dominatrix German princess, and a crooked and cowardly English lord, who later gets Percy killed while fleeing from a charging buffalo. With Percy's death, Leon - whom Percy had come to see as a son - inherits his safari company and all of his assets. Penrod then uses his influence to arrange for Graf Otto von Meerbach, a wealthy industrialist connected to the German war effort, to hire Leon's services. Leon learns how to fly an aeroplane from Otto, and falls in love with Eva von Wellberg, Otto's mistress. Eva and Otto later use the safari to meet with Koos de la Rey, in which Otto agrees to support a Boer coup in South Africa, an act that would destabilize British power in the continent.
Otto later attempts to hunt a lion in the traditional Maasai way - with an assegai and shield - but he is mauled by a second lion during the hunt. Leon and Eva - who reciprocates Leon's feelings - flee to Lusima's village in the mountains, where they consummate their love for one another. Eva reveals that she is actually English, and that Otto had cheated her father out of the patents for his engine designs, driving him to poverty and suicide, after which Eva was recruited as a spy by the British government and sent to gather information from Otto by becoming his mistress. Leon and Eva briefly live together in Lusima's village, but Penrod discovers them and forces Eva to return to Otto, who has survived the lion's attack but lost his left forearm.
When World War I breaks out, Eva discovers that Otto plans to supply de la Rey with money and weapons transported via a large zeppelin named the Assegai, and passes the information onto Leon. Leon, Manyoro and Loikot use one of Otto's planes - left over from the safari - to intercept the Assegai and jam its engines with fishing nets, forcing it to crash. Otto and Eva both manage to bail out, and Eva attempts to kill Otto and avenge her father, only to be stopped by the crew of the Assegai. Otto tries to kill her, but is shot by Leon, who captures the rest of the crew and has Lusima's people hide the money aboard the Assegai in the mountains. After the war, Leon and Eva, now married, return and reclaim the hidden money.
Penrod Ballantyne
'Assegai' continues the Courtney series but still includes Penrod Ballantyne as a crucial character, not just to the plot but also to the main character - Leon Courtney. Though Penrod's role is not very large, his character has developed since the previous novel. In 'The Triumph of the Sun' he was a womanising but competent military officer and spy, in 'Assegai' he is a portly general in the king's army in British East Africa and a manipulative spymaster who exercises control over his agents.
Similarities with other Wilbur Smith characters and novels
The setting for 'Assegai' is similar to 'A Time To Die' by the same author. Both protagonists are sons of a wealthy businessmen, and now professional hunters / military officers whose missions are complicated by their love interests, whom they met through a client.
Graf Otto von Meerbach - the villain, is also similar to Osman Atalan - Penrod Ballantyne's nemesis from 'The Triumph of the Sun'. Both antagonists are larger-than-life characters, even stronger alpha-males than the protagonists seem to be. They are war-mongerers but subjects of the greater evil which is being dealt with by the British army in Africa.
The Kipsigis, are one of Kenya's 47 tribes and together with Nandi, Tugen, Marakwet, Sengwer, Pokot and Sebei make up the Kalenjin ethnic identity. It is observed that the Kipsigis and an aboriginal race native to Kenya known as Ogiek have a merged identity. The Kipsigis people speak the Kipsigis language; a Nilotic language which falls under the Nandi-Markweta cluster of the Kalenjin languages. The Kipsigis are the most numerous of the Kalenjin. The latest Census population in Kenya put the kipsigis at 1.972 Million speakers accounting for 45% of all kalenjin speaking people.They occupy the highlands of Kericho stretching from Timboroa to Mara River in the south, the west of Mau Escarpment in the east to Kebeneti in the west. They also occupy, parts of Laikipia, Kitale, Nakuru, Narok, Trans Mara District, Eldoret and Nandi Hills.
Wilbur Addison Smith was a Zambian-born British-South African novelist specialising in historical fiction about international involvement in Southern Africa across four centuries, seen from the viewpoints of both black and white families.
The Uganda Railway was a metre-gauge railway system and former British state-owned railway company. The line linked the interiors of Uganda and Kenya with the Indian Ocean port of Mombasa in Kenya. After a series of mergers and splits, the line is now in the hands of the Kenya Railways Corporation and the Uganda Railways Corporation.
The Kalenjin are a group of tribes designated as Highland Nilotes and are descended from Maliri people (thus related to Daasanach of Ethiopia.) The Kalenjin are cousins with Datooga people of Tanzania and Malawi. In contrast, their designation groups them with other Nilotes including Maasai, Luo,Turkana and Nuer, Dinka among others. They are indigenous to East Africa, residing mainly in what was formerly the Rift Valley Province in Kenya and Eastern slopes of Mount Elgon in Uganda. Upon their arrival in the forest region of Mau, the Kalenjin assimilated the aboriginal hunter-gatherer people known as Okiek. They number 6,358,113 individuals as per the Kenyan 2019 census and an estimated 300,000 in Uganda mainly in Kapchorwa, Kween and Bukwo districts. They have been divided into 11 culturally and linguistically related tribes: Kipsigis, Nandi (937,000), Sebei Keiyo, Marakwet, Sabaot (296,000), Pokots, Tugen, Terik, Sengwer, and Ogiek. They Kalenjin speak the Nadi-Marakweta languages but can also be inclusive of Akie language in Tanzania and Pokot language spoken in Kenya; all being classified collectively as Kalenjin Language; while in combination with Datooga languages of Tanzania, this cluster is called Southern Nilotic languages.
The Orkoiyot occupied a sacred and special role within the Nandi and Kipsigis people of Kenya. He held the dual roles of chief spiritual and military leader, and had the authority to make decisions regarding security particularly the waging of war. Notable Orkoiik include Kimnyole Arap Turukat, Koitalel Arap Samoei and Barsirian Arap Manyei.
Kimnyole was the Nandi Orkoiyot who predicted the arrival of Europeans and the railways ; two events that were to forever alter Nandi.
Hugh Cholmondeley, 3rd Baron Delamere,, styled The Honourable from birth until 1887, was a British peer. He was one of the first and most influential British settlers in Kenya.
Tarzan and the Lost Safari is a 1957 action adventure film featuring Edgar Rice Burroughs' famous jungle hero Tarzan and starring Gordon Scott, Robert Beatty, Yolande Donlan and Betta St. John. Directed by H. Bruce Humberstone, it was the first Tarzan film released in color, Eastman Color. It was also MGM's first Tarzan film since 1942 and filmed in Nairobi, British East Africa. The character of Jane does not appear in this motion picture.
The Thika River flows through Kiambu County in central Kenya and is a tributary of Tana River. The River forms a psychological boundary between the counties of Murang'a and Kiambu. The Thika River is a significant source of hydroelectric power in Kenya and provides most of the water supply for Nairobi, Kenya's capital and largest city.
The Courtney Novels are a series of seventeen novels published between 1964 and 2019 by Wilbur Smith. They chronicle the lives of the Courtney family, from the 1660s through until 1987. The novels can be split into three parts; the original trilogy of novels follow the twins Sean and Garrick Courtney from the 1860s until 1925. The second part is five books which follows Centaine de Thiry Courtney, her sons and grandchildren between 1917 and 1987. The third part, the most recently written, follows the Courtney family from the 1660s through until 1939, focusing on successive generations of the family. There are also two books that follow the third series. As well, there are three additional Courtney books.
Safari is a 1956 British CinemaScope adventure film directed by Terence Young and set during the Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya. It stars Victor Mature, Janet Leigh, Roland Culver, John Justin, and Earl Cameron, and was intentionally cast to attract an American audience—both the hero and the lead female character are Americans, played by American actors.
Donald Ker was a famous Kenyan white hunter, safari guide and conservationist of British descent. As a young man he teamed up with Sydney Downey to create Ker and Downey Safaris Ltd., one of the first guide companies to transition from hunting to photographic safaris. He is also known for leading two long expeditions with Edgar Monsanto Queeny for the American Museum of Natural History which resulted in the production of several nature documentaries and in Ker's own dedication to conservation.
The Angels Weep is a 1982 novel, the third in Wilbur Smith's series about the Ballantyne family of Rhodesia. The first part of the book is set immediately before and during the Second Matabele War, then the second part jumps forward to the final days of the Rhodesian Bush War.
A Time to Die is a 1989 novel by Wilbur Smith. Set in 1987, it is chronologically the last of the 13 Courtney Novels. Smith did not regard it strictly as a Courtney novel, however, claiming "it's just got a Courtney name in it. It's not in the mainstream of the series."
Golden Fox is a novel by Wilbur Smith, one of the Courtney Novels. It is set from 1969 to 1979 and touches on the South African Border War and the revolution in Ethiopia.
Birds of Prey is a 1997 novel by Wilbur Smith set in the late 17th century. The novel was the first in the third sequence of the Courtney series of novels, and as of 2013 was chronologically the first in the entire series.
The Triumph of the Sun is a novel by Wilbur Smith set during the Siege of Khartoum. Smith himself said the following about the novel:
"That incident had all the elements of a great story setting because you have the captive characters who are having to interact with each other because there is no escape – siege conditions. Also the river. I’m fascinated by the great rivers of Africa. Played against that was a sort of island setting in the desert. Then it had such powerful influences at work – the British Empire against the revolting Mahdists, the conflict of religions, Gordon and the Mahdi, both of them totally fanatical, believing that they spoke directly to God, and unbendable and unbending."
The Nandi Resistance was a military conflict that took place in present-day Kenya between 1890 and 1906. It involved members of the Kalenjin ethnic group, mainly from the Nandi section, and the British colonial administration. The close of the 19th century, a time referred to as the "pacification period" by Matson, saw a number of local populations that resisted British colonial rule. Of these, the Nandi resistance would stand out for being the longest and most tenacious.
Courtney's War is a 2018 novel by Wilbur Smith and David Churchill.
Mutai is a term used by the Maa-speaking communities of Kenya to describe a period of wars, usually triggered by disease and/or drought affecting widespread areas of the Rift Valley region of Kenya. According to Samburu and Maasai tradition, two periods of Mutai occurred during the nineteenth century. The second Mutai lasted from the 1870s to the 1890s.
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