The Sunday News
WHEN groups migrated from one place to another the chosen route was determined by, among other considerations, the sources of perennial water. This was particularly so for a people who kept large herds of livestock. Water was also needed for domestic uses. A migrating group sought to avoid another group which was already living in the general direction of its course.
Certainly this was the case when King Mzilikazi led his people from KwaZulu-Natal. Both Sotshangane and Zwangendaba had moved out ahead of him. Both chose more easterly routes. In order to avoid collision with these two groups, King Mzilikazi struck a more westerly route which took him over the Drakensberg Mountains into the Highveld where he came into contact with the BaSotho tribes some of whom he incorporated into his migrant kingdom.
The above observation with regard to the choice of route of migration was true in the case of both Queen Nyamazana’s followers and those of King Mzilikazi. As indicated in the last instalment, Queen Nyamazana’s group followed the course of the Gwayi River which pours its waters into the mighty Zambezi River. However, once at that river’s confluence with the Mbembesi River, they chose to follow the course of the latter.
It was the Mbembesi River that would take them into the heart of what would later be the heart of the Ndebele State. The Mbembesi River has its source at Gadade, Ntabazinduna. The Swazis of Nyamazana seem to have settled down at Kokolombeni where they began to reconnoitre the surrounding lands. This they did in order to locate pockets of resistance to their rule and also the availability of natural resources such as water, good pastures for their livestock and timber for construction purposes and rich soils for agriculture.
When the Swazis arrived they were moving into occupied country. The BaLozwi were ruling over a large area with several related ethnic groups. The Lozwi ruler, addressed as Mambo, lived on Manyanga Hills. This was a number of granite hills a short distance north of present- day Inyathi Mission. The name of the royal seat was Manyanga on account of stockpiles of ivory that was paid by hunters as tribute to the monarch. Mambo controlled trade in ivory which was taken to the East Coast to the Arab and Swahili traders.
The Swazis would not countenance the presence of Mambo’s authority. It was a potential threat to their rule. They decided they were going to attack Mambo. Indeed, the Swazis went to the hill where Mambo lived. According to Antony Magagula, the Swazi called out, “Mambo, Mambo!” The defiant Mambo would not respond to the call. Instead, word was sent to the Swazis, “Ndiyani anodana Ishe?” Who is he that calls the king?
The Mambo did not heed the Swazi call to come out. The Swazi soldiers then went up the hill and dislodged him. They held him by his arms and pulled in different directions. One of the arms was severed in the process. The bottom line though is that the Swazi killed Mambo a few years before the arrival of the Ndebele under King Mzilikazi.
It ought to be noted though that there are various versions of how the Mambo met with his death. There is an account that he was ordered to jump down from the rock precipice and died in the process. Be that as it may, the truth remains — that the Swazi were responsible for the fate of the Mambo.
A few days ago a friend phoned inquiring about the name of the last Mambo who ruled with King Mzilikazi. I was quick to point out that there were never two bulls in the same pen, akunkunzi mbili ezahlala sibaya sinye. It was precisely the reason that the Swazi killed Mambo to avoid two bulls living in the same pen. By the time King Mzilikazi appeared on the scene the last Mambo was already dead —killed by the Swazi of Queen Nyamazana.
There is a common song that goes like this, “Kudala kwakunganje, umhlaba uyaphenduka, kwakubusa uMambo loMzilikazi. Sawela uTshangane saguqa ngamadolo, inkos’ uLobengula yasinyamalala.” Things were not like this in the past. The world is changing. King Mzilikazi and Mambo used to be the rulers. We got to the Shangani (river) and knelt down on our knees. Then King Lobengula disappeared.
Some have taken the song to suggest the two monarchs ruled conjointly. That is not the substance of the song which merely points out that this country was, in the past, ruled by Mambo and then later by King Mzilikazi. In fact, the song is a historical rendition of events in their chronological order. Mambo is mentioned ahead of King Mzilikazi. Indeed, as we do know he preceded King Mzilikazi and the Ndebele as rulers of the same country.
King Mzilikazi was succeeded by his son King Lobengula whose rule was terminated by the British in 1893. We do know that the king fled north and got to the Shangani River. The kneeling part is generally ignored by history. From an Afro-centric angle kneeling down carries some significance. The beleaguered Ndebele sought spiritual intervention. They propitiated the ancestors and that is done by kneeling down in deference to the ancestors.
Again, the Ndebele will tell the story of one Dakamela Ncube, a famed traditional doctor, who performed some ritual that caused heavy rains to fall and the Shangani River flooded overnight. That kneeling down and what it brought about was critical to subsequent events. The flooded river made sure the Allan Wilson Patrol which had crossed earlier in pursuit of the king could not receive reinforcement’s at the most critical time when the Ndebele, early in the morning of the following day, launched a spirited attack on the patrol. There was no survivor — all the 34 white soldiers were killed.
It was after the event that King Lobengula is said to have disappeared. As I have argued before, he who has disappeared cannot be said to be dead. If indeed the king had died, his close advisors and aides would have known. There would have been no reason to say he disappeared. To say he disappeared is a Ndebele figure of speech which in essence dismisses further questions on the matter. It closes the subject without closure.
King Mzilikazi was aware of the military capability of the Swazi. The term the Ndebele used as acknowledgement of the fact was, “ugodle ekhwapheni.” This was to say, literally, she and her followers had weapons of note in the armpit. Marriage arrangements were a social measure resorted to in order to avoid war between two powerful nations.
All accounts indicate that King Mzilikazi married Queen Nyamazana. Most accounts do not ever mention that the marriage produced some offspring. However, Magagula says there was a son out of that marriage — one Makhulambila. Certainly, there is a son of King Mzilikazi by that name. His progeny is found in Matabeleland South, among other places. He himself lies buried within the grounds of the Roman Catholic Church’s Empandeni Mission.
