VAN MEERHOF, EVA
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Eva van Meerhof (née Eva Krotoa, and also known as “Eva the Hottentot”) (circa 1642-74) was a Khoikhoi (Hottentot) interpreter who married the Afrikaner explorer Pieter van Meerhof. She was the first black African to marry a South African white in a Christian ceremony.
PHOTO CAPTION: Eva van Meerhof. SOURCE: EA Library.
Belonging to a Khoikhoi band near Cape Town, she had been adopted into the household of Jan van Riebeeck as a servant. Learning Dutch and some Portuguese, she acted unofficially as an interpreter for the Dutch East India Company in its dealings with the Khoikhoi. She was baptized a Christian in 1664, and married van Meerhof in 1666; he died the following year.
After his death, she reputedly followed a dissolute lifestyle which brought her into disrepute with the Dutch community, and resulted in her losing custody of her children. South African whites came to regard her as a symbol of Khoikhoi degeneration. Some of her own people, however, saw her as a traitor and tool of the Dutch.
KEITH IRVINE
