Gazaland is the historical name for the region in southeast Africa, in modern-day Mozambique and Zimbabwe, which extends northward from the Komati River at Delagoa Bay in Mozambique's Maputo Province to the Pungwe River in central Mozambique.
Gazaland is the historical name for the region in southeast Africa, in modern-day Mozambique and Zimbabwe, which extends northward from the Komati River at Delagoa Bay in Mozambique's Maputo Province to the Pungwe River in central Mozambique.
It was a district of the former Portuguese East Africa. Its name was derived from a Swazi chief named Gaza, a contemporary of Shaka Zulu. [1] It covered most of present-day Gaza and Inhambane provinces, and the southern portions of Manica and Sofala provinces.
Refugees from various clans oppressed by Dingane (Shaka's successor) were welded into one tribe by Gaza's son Soshangane, his followers becoming known as Shangaan or Mashangane. A section of them was called Maviti or Landeens (i.e. couriers), a designation which persisted as a tribal name. Between 1833 and 1836 Soshangane made himself master of the country as far north as the Zambezi and captured the Portuguese posts at Delagoa Bay, Inhambane, Sofala and Sena, killing nearly all the inhabitants. The Portuguese reoccupied their posts, but held them with great difficulty, while in the interior Soshangane continued his conquests, depopulating large regions. Soshangane died about 1856, and his son Umzila, receiving some help from the Portuguese at Delagoa Bay in a struggle against a brother for the chieftain-ship, ceded to them the territory south of the Komati River. North of that river as far as the Zambezi, and inland to the continental plateau, Umzila established himself in independence, a position he maintained till his death (c .1884). His chief rival was a Goan named Manuel António de Sousa, also known as Gouveia, who came to Africa about 1850. Having obtained possession of a crown estate (prazo) in the Gorongosa District, he ruled there as a feudal lord while acknowledging himself a Portuguese subject. Gouveia captured much of the country in the Zambezi valley from the Shangaan, and was appointed by the Portuguese captain-general of a large region. [1]
Probably the first European to penetrate any distance inland from the Sofala coast since the Portuguese gold-seekers of the 16th century was St Vincent Whitshed Erskine, who explored the region between the Limpopo and Pungwe (1868-1875). Portugal's hold on the coast had been more firmly established at the time of Umzila's death, and Gungunyana, his successor, was claimed as a vassal, while efforts were made to open up the interior. This led in 1890-1891 to collisions on the borderland of the plateau with the newly established British South Africa Company, and to the arrest by the company's agents of Gouveia, who was, however, freed and returned to Mozambique via Cape Town. The border between the British and Portuguese colonies was set by the Anglo-Portuguese Treaty of June 11 1891. An offer made by Gungunyana (1891) to come under British protection was not accepted. In 1892 Gouveia was killed in a war with a native chief. Gungunyana maintained his independence until 1895, when he was captured by a Portuguese force and exiled, first to Lisbon and afterwards to the Azores, where he died in 1906. With the capture of Gungunyana opposition to Portuguese rule largely ceased. [2]
In the early 20th Century, Gazaland was one of the chief recruiting grounds for laborers in the South African gold mines. [1]
The geography of Mozambique consists mostly of coastal lowlands with uplands in its center and high plateaus in the northwest. There are also mountains in the western portion. The country is located on the east coast of southern Africa, directly west of the island of Madagascar. Mozambique has a tropical climate with two seasons, a wet season from October to March and a dry season from April to September.
Portuguese Mozambique or Portuguese East Africa were the common terms by which Mozambique was designated during the period in which it was a Portuguese colony. Portuguese Mozambique originally constituted a string of Portuguese possessions along the south-east African coast, and later became a unified colony, which now forms the Republic of Mozambique.
The Mfecane, also known by the Sesotho names Difaqane or Lifaqane is a historical period of heightened military conflict and migration associated with state formation and expansion in Southern Africa. The exact range of dates that comprise the Mfecane varies between sources. At its broadest the period lasted from the late eighteenth century to the mid-nineteenth century, but scholarship often focuses on an intensive period from the 1810s to the 1840s. The concept first emerged in the 1830s and blamed the disruption on the actions of Shaka Zulu, who was alleged to have waged near-genocidal wars that depopulated the land and sparked a chain reaction of violence as fleeing groups sought to conquer new lands. Since the later half of the 20th century this interpretation has fallen out of favor among scholars due to a lack of historical evidence.
Sofala is a province of Mozambique. It has a population of 2,259,248. Beira is the capital of the province, named for the ruined port of Sofala which is 35 kilometres (22 mi) to the south.
Gaza is a province of Mozambique. It has an area of 75,709 km2 and a population of 1,422,460, which is the least populous of all the provinces of Mozambique.
The Ndwandwe are a Bantu Nguni-speaking people who populate sections of southern Africa.
The Ndau are an ethnic Shona subethnic group which inhabits the areas in south-eastern Zimbabwe in the districts of Chipinge and Chimanimani in which they are natives. They are also found in parts of Bikita, in the Zambezi valley, in central Mozambique all the way to the coast and in central Malawi. The name "Ndau" is a derivation from the people's traditional salutation "Ndau wee!" in greetings and other social settings. When the Ngoni observed this, they called them the Ndau people, the name itself meaning the land, the place or the country in their language. Some suggestions are that the name is derived from the Nguni words "Amading'indawo" which means "those looking for a place" as this is what the Gaza Nguni called them and the name then evolved to Ndau. This is erroneous as the natives are described in detail to have already been occupying parts of Zimbabwe and Mozambique in 1500s by Joao dos Santos. The five largest Ndau groups are the Magova; the Mashanga; the Vatomboti, the Madanda and the Teve. Ancient Ndau People met with the Khoi/San during the first trade with the Arabs at Mapungumbwe and its attributed to the Kalanga people not Ndau. They traded with Arabs with “Mpalu” “Njeti” and “Vukotlo’’ these are the red, white and blue coloured cloths together with golden beads. Ndau people traded traditional herbs, spiritual powers, animal skins and bones.
Ngungunyane, also known as Mdungazwe Ngungunyane Nxumalo, N'gungunhana, or Gungunhana Reinaldo Frederico Gungunhana, was a tribal king and vassal of the Portuguese Empire, who rebelled, was defeated by General Joaquim Mouzinho de Albuquerque and lived out the rest of his life in exile, first in Lisbon, but later on the island of Terceira, in the Azores.
The Save River, or Sabi River is a 400 mi (640 km) river of southeastern Africa, flowing through Zimbabwe and Mozambique. The river has its source in Zimbabwe, some 80 km (50 mi) south of Harare, then flows south and then east, from the Zimbabwean highveld to its confluence with the Odzi River. It then turns south, drops over the Chivirira Falls, and flows down the western side of Zimbabwe's Eastern Highlands forming a dry river valley in the rain shadow of these mountains. It is joined by the Runde River or Lundi at the Mozambique border, forming a dramatic confluence at Mahenya. It then crosses Mozambique to flow into the Indian Ocean at about 21°S.
Cashel is a village in Chimanimani District of Manicaland Province, Zimbabwe. It is located near the Mozambique border, just north of the Chimanimani Mountains. Forestry, bananas, wheat, and various cash crops are grown in the area. It was originally called Penkridge but was changed to Cashel in 1957. It was named after Lt. Col. E. Cashel, a former member of the British South Africa Police and the Rhodesian Volunteers, who retired to this area after World War I. The Cashel valley is well known for radio and television commercials, which sought to extol the quality of its peas, beans and other agricultural products.
Soshangana KaZikode, born Soshangana Nxumalo, was the Founder and the Monarch of the Gaza Empire, which at the height of its power stretched from the Limpopo river in southern Mozambique up to the Zambezi river in the north. Soshangana ruled over the Gaza state from 1825 until his death in 1858. Soshangana was also known by the name of Manukosi.
The Pink Map, also known in English as the Rose-Coloured Map, was a map prepared in 1885 to represent Portugal's claim of sovereignty over a land corridor connecting their colonies of Angola and Mozambique during the Scramble for Africa. The area claimed included most of what is currently Zimbabwe and large parts of modern Zambia and Malawi. In the first half of the 19th century, Portugal fully controlled only a few coastal towns in Angola and Mozambique. It also claimed suzerainty over other almost independent towns and nominally Portuguese subjects in the Zambezi valley, but could rarely enforce its claims; most of the territory now within Angola and Mozambique was entirely independent of Portuguese control. Between 1840 and 1869, Portugal expanded the area it controlled but felt threatened by the activities of other powers.
The Chopi are an ethnic group of Mozambique. They have lived primarily in the Zavala region of southern Mozambique, in the Inhambane Province. They traditionally lived a life of subsistence agriculture, traditionally living a rural existence, although many were displaced or killed in the civil war that followed Mozambique's liberation from Portuguese colonial rule in 1975. In addition, drought forced many away from their homeland and into the nation's cities.
The Gaza Empire (1824–1895) was an African empire established by general Soshangane and was located in southeastern Africa in the area of southern Mozambique and southeastern Zimbabwe. The Gaza Empire, at its height in the 1860s, covered all of Mozambique between the Zambezi and Limpopo rivers, known as Gazaland.
King Mzila Nxumalo, Mzila kaSoshangane Nxumalo, Umzila, Muzila, or Nyamende was the son of Soshangane kaZwide, the founder of the Gaza empire, which at the height of its power stretched from southern Mozambique to the Limpopo River. He defeated his brother Mawewe kaSoshangane in 1861 to ascend to the Gaza throne which he ruled from 1861 to 1885. He was father of King Ngungunyane Nxumalo Gungunhana|Ndungazwe who was deposed by the Portuguese invasion Portuguese Empire.
St Vincent Whitshed Erskine, Surveyor General of South Africa, was an early explorer in Gazaland and was the first European to travel down the length of the Limpopo river to its mouth.
The Bight of Sofala/Swamp Coast is a marine ecoregion along the eastern coast of Africa, characterized by extensive mangrove swamps and coastal wetlands. It extends along the coast of Mozambique, from Angoche to the Bazaruto Archipelago. It adjoins the East African coral coast ecoregion to the north, and the Delagoa ecoregion to the south.
The Urema Valley, also known as the Urema Graben, is a lowland valley in Sofala Province of central Mozambique.
The following is a timeline of events during the Mozambican Civil War as well as subsequent RENAMO insurgency (2013–2021).
