Even though tribes of nomadic hunters lived in southern Africa for 40,000 years, they did not reach the Cape of Good Hope until about 2,000 years ago. By the 15^th century pastoral tribes had settled most of the available land.

After the explorer Vasco de Gama opened the Cape spice route in 1498, the area became a popular stop for European crews and was eventually settled by Dutch traders. The Dutch decimated the existing tribes on their move north with violence and disease. As their power began to fade near the end of the 18^th century the British moved in.

The Dutch Boers exited from British rule and established republics throughout the interior of the country. The British annexed these republics one by one until the middle of the 19^th century when diamonds were discovered in Kimberley. The Dutch resistance became stronger and the Anglo-Boer Wars began.

The first of the wars ended with a devastating Boer victory and the British retreated until another gold strike near Johannesburg. British greed started the second of the Anglo-Boer Wars, which drained conventional Boer resources by 1902. The Boers resorted to commando style raids throughout the countryside. The British quashed this resistance with horrific reprisals that eventually compelled the Boers to sign a peace agreement.

The Union of South Africa was established in 1910 and with it came a slew of racist legislation restricting black rights and laying the foundation for apartheid. Afrikaners controlled the country with their ultra right beliefs and domination over the black majority of the population. Blacks were restricted to so-called Homelands where they were forced to live irrespective of their birthplace and without any choice in the matter. These lands were to be self-sufficient self-governing states, but in reality they were incapable of supporting the population and became sites of intense suffering and squalid conditions.

Black resistance began in the form of strikes, protest marches, and acts of civil disobedience. International opinion was on the side of the protestors after 69 people were killed in a Sharpeville demonstration in the early 1960s and African National Congress (ANC) leaders including Nelson Mandela were jailed.

South Africa withdrew from the British Commonwealth in 1961 and became more isolated as other European powers withdrew from the African continent. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s black, sometime socialist states formed around South Africa's northern borders and the country's response ranged from limited military strikes to full-blown assaults.

Domestically, violent clashes in response to black protests led to United Nations economic and political sanctions. In the mid-1980s black on black violence escalated as bitter disputes arose between political rivals, tribal enemies, gangsters, and migrant workers. President P.W. Botha's method of dealing with the situation in which people were detained and tortured along with the effectiveness of economic sanctions led to the reformer, F.W. DeKlerk coming to power in 1989.

Apartheid restrictions were lifted and the movement toward a multi-racial government began. Free elections were held in 1994 and Nelson Mandela became the new president. South Africa rejoined the British Commonwealth several months later.