Swazi people

The Swazi are an African ethnic group of Bantu. They belong to the subgroup of the Nguni. They live in southern Africa.

History

In the 19th century, the Swazi came increasingly under the pressure of the invading Europeans. While the pressure from the outside led to internal rivalries among the neighboring Zulu, opposite trend was visible in the Swazi. The external threat was a network of close ties between the various chiefdoms and the end of the 1840s even a monarchy arise, which strengthened the position of the Swazi. They could significantly increase their ancestral territory 1856-1865. A year later they regulated in a contract with the Boers the details of the boundary between the Transvaal Boers and the land of the Swazi, which was commonly known as Swaziland.

The peace held for two years. 1868 annexed the expanding British Swaziland. The Swazi came on the one hand by incoming prospectors and the other by the military might of the British increasingly violent under pressure. In the Pretoria Convention of 1881 recognized the British, however, the independence of Swaziland. Four years later, the British policy of peace returned already changed back to back; they tried to gain more control of the area. So it was in 1889 to the fall of the Swazi king by the British. 1895 Swaziland was declared a protectorate of Great Britain controlled by the South African Republic. The power of the legislature, the judiciary and the administration thus went over to the British.

• Ethnicity in Africa
• Ethnic group in Swaziland