Remembering the Khoikhoi victory over Dom Francisco Almeida at the Cape in 1510

Abstract

The general issue of how key moments of anti-colonial struggle are remembered in different colonial and postcolonial contexts is considered in relation to the specific case of the Khoikhoi victory over Viceroy Francisco Almeida in Table Bay on 1 March 1510. The contrasting literary and historical versions of the Khoikhoi victory are examined in three contexts: first, in the sixteenth-century Portuguese writings of the poet Luis Vaz de Camões and the chroniclers João de Barros, Fernão Lopez de Castanheda, Damião de Goís and Gaspar Correa; secondly, in the writings of British intellectuals of the period 1770–1830, including Robert Southey, William Julius Mickle and William Robertson; and thirdly, in the writings of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Southern Africans, including historian George McCall Theal, novelist André Brink and South African president Thabo Mbeki.