Our Blended Heritage

The entrance to the Castle of Good Hope

Since Eidul-Adha*, or the Feast of Sacrifice, falls on Heritage Day this year, I thought I would share a little of our Cape Malay history.

The Slave Lodge 

Soon after Jan van Riebeeck arrived in the Cape, slavery was introduced to satisfy the Dutch East India Company’s need for labour. After an initial shipment of slaves from West Africa, slaves were imported from the east coast of Africa, Madagascar, Mauritius, Ceylon, India, the Malay Peninsula and the islands that make up modern Indonesia. 

For the following 180 years, South Africa was a slave state. Although the slaves were not associated with Malaysia, they spoke Malay, a kind of universal language from the area. The Nationalist Party government in all their wisdom introduced the Population Registration Act in 1950, whereby they divided the “coloured” people into seven (yes, 7) subgroups, one of which was the Cape Malay group.

Some early 20th century  Muslims in the Cape
(courtesy of the Simonstown Heritage Museum)

Many of them were political exiles and skilled craftsmen – carpenters, tailors, and cooks, who were able to earn a living and eventually buy their freedom and settled in the area known as the Bo-Kaap. Many of the slaves managed to hold onto their Muslim faith and culture and even though there was intermarriage, their religion and culture kept them together. 

Young Bo-Kaap residents

Bo-Kaap street 

Perhaps most representative of the blended history of the Cape is Malay cuisine – predominantly Indonesian in origin, the dishes have been influenced by India (curries, rotis, samoosas), Netherlands (baked puddings tarts and biscuits, e.g. melktert to which they added their own nutmeg or cinnamon), and the French Huguenots (preserves); exotic spices have been added to create dishes like bobotie, pickled fish and sosaties and accompaniments of sambals and blatjangs.

*Eidul-Adha, or the Feast of Sacrifice is celebrated about 70 days after Ramadan at the completion of the hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca - . A young goat or lamb is sacrificed to commemorate Allah’s command to the prophet Ebrahim (or Abraham), to sacrifice his son. The meat from this animal is distributed to the needy, family and friends. 

Read more: 

Echoes of Slavery: Voices from South Africa’s Past by Jackie Loos, published by David Philip 

The Cape Malay Cookbook by Faldela Williams, published by Struik

For more on Heritage in this blog, see also:
The Slave  Route Challenge 
Celebrating Africa
Lavender, Potjiekos and Travel 
Orpheus in Africa 
Walking through History 

Walking through History - Celebrating our Heritage

I have no problem with Heritage Day turning into Braai Day. After all, cooking over a fire goes back to the days when man first discovered that fire might make his food taste better and cuts across many cultural boundaries - that's quite a heritage to celebrate. But I do believe that we still have a lot of work to do in order to get to know each other in this country.

In that spirit I was happy to see that Footsteps to Freedom City Walking Tours had joined IzikoMuseums and the Taj Hotel to offer free walks exploring the places of historical significance in the city centre during Heritage week. It seemed an appropriate way to spend Heritage Day and I invited an Australian visitor along. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the crowd of about 40 people who turned up consisted of mostly South Africans, eager to learn more of their own heritage. 

Traders on Greenmarket Square

Old Town House

We started off in Greenmarket Square, the second oldest public space after the Grand Parade, which served as a general meeting place and where water was collected from the public water pump which stood in the centre of the square. I didn’t know that the front door of the Old Town House, which stands on the edge of the square, is the place from which you measure distance in Cape Town. 

Pincushion Proteas or Waratahs

Next was the colourful flower market, Trafalgar Place, where there were beautiful pincushion Proteas on sale. My Australian friend pointed out that she knew them by a different name back home – Waratahs (yes, the name of one of their rugby teams). 

The City Hall

The Bell tower of the Groote Kerk

The Slave Memorial on Church Square

A slave memorial, consisting of slave names engraved on marble slate, has been erected on Church Square.  Slaves socialized here while their owners attended church services in the Groote Kerk. Opposite the memorial and church is The Slave Lodge which housed slaves, convicts and political prisoners between the 17^th and 19^th centuries. 

Government Avenue used to be the place to see and be seen.  

Our walk continued down Government Avenue past Tuynhuis where guests of the colony used to stay and which is now the president’s office. A blocked-up water channel which was originally dug by slaves runs in front of this house. We were reminded that the fresh water which runs down from Table Mountain was the main attraction of the Cape as a halfway stop on the way to the east. It seems a pity that we are not harnessing this water for use instead of letting it all flow into the sea. 

View of Table Mountain from the Company Gardens

Statue of Sir George Grey in front of National Library

The statue of Governor George Gray is the first statue of a person to be erected at the Cape. At the end of his term he donated his books to start the National Library. We ended our tour in front of St. George’s Cathedral which I remember as a safe place to gather during the apartheid years. Opposite the cathedral, in front of the Mandela-Rhodes building, is a piece of the Berlin Wall which was presented to Nelson Mandela on his first state visit to Germany in 1996.

Our guide was knowledgeable and fed us many interesting tidbits like the fact that the floor of the Groote Kerk was originally sand so that it could be dug up in order that members of the congregation could be buried there. 

I highly recommend this tour to locals and visitors alike. It was a worthwhile way to spend two hours.