KWANE
- 3 Min Read
Kwane (circa 1640-1709), a councillor of Tshiwo, chief of the Ama-Xhosa, who ruled about 1685, was a noble-hearted commoner who founded the Ama-Gqunukwebe ethnic group, a sub-group of the Ama-Xhosa. At that time the Ama-Gqunukwebe were regarded by the Ama-Xhosa as alien origin, and not of true Ama-Xhosa stock, because they were partly Khoi Khoi (Hottentot).
The Gqunuqwa group of Khoi Khoi occupied the almost impenetrable country around the Mgay and Mgazana rivers, west of the St. John’s River. These people gave sanctuary to fugitives from chief Tshiwo’s justice. Tshiwo had handed some of his subjects who were condemned of sorcery over to Kwane, who was his executioner.
Kwane, however, being noble-hearted and compassionate, confiscated all their cattle, on behalf of the Chief Tshiwo, but spared their lives. He then secretly conveyed them and their families to the inaccessible country of the Gunuqwa across the river. After a number of years he had accumulated enough people to constitute a formidable fighting force. Meanwhile these fugitives, through intermarriage with Khoi Khoi women, had formed the basis of the Ama-Gqunukwebe ethnic group.
To what clan of the Ama-Xhosa, if to any, Kwane belonged is not known. It is estimated that he must have been at least 45 years old when he served as Chief Tshiwo’s councillor. Kwane’s rapid rise to fame and to an important place in history came at a crucial period when Tshiwo was engaged in one of many internecine conflicts with a neighboring ethnic group. At a critical moment Kwane called upon those he had saved from execution to help his chief. This they gladly did, thereby tipping the scales against the enemy.
When the war was over, Kwane presented the warriors to the chief, explaining that they were the wizards and their sons whom Tshiwo had duly sentenced to death. In recognition of Kwane’s loyalty and good service, Tshiwo appointed Kwane as chief over the group, and bestowed on him a territory 70 miles in length and 12 miles in breadth, located on the sea coast. At that time he said to him: “I adopt you as a son; you are now of the Ama-Tshawe (clan of the chief), and should a son of mine raise his assegai against you, raise yours against him, for you are his equal.”
The new group thus formed, with Kwane as its leader, then took the name Ama-Gqunukwebe. It was unusual in that it had been formed under the leadership of a person not of royal blood. In time it came to occupy coastal territory stretching from Walvis Bay, in what is now Namibia, in the north, down to the mouth of the Orange River, round the Cape of Good Hope, and eastward to Pondoland.
ENOCH W.D.DUMA
