86 NOTES ON THE EAST COAST BANTU OF EiGHTY YEARS AGO. 



The truth is, perhaps, that the territory of Butua was at 

 one time the home of the pygmies or the refuge of fugitive 

 Bushmen (one and the same race), and gave its name Batwa 

 or Vatwah to the broken and disorganised Bantu tribes who 

 afterwards made their way south from the interior, and thus 

 became attached by the Ama-Tonga to a portion of these tribes 

 upon their invasion returning from the South in 1820. It may 

 be noted that, at that period when Nathaniel Isaacs was in 

 Natal, the term " Botwas " was restricted to the native (Zulu) 

 elephant-hunters. These Botuas may have been a distinct clan 

 once renowned for its skill and prowess like the Aba-Tetwa, 

 but now their sole occupation was elephant-hunting. Under their 

 chief Fodo or Dumesa they had no fixed settlement, but moved 

 about in search of the elephant. When they found a herd of these 

 animals and succeeded in killing some of them they erected 

 temporary huts, and remained until they had consumed all the 

 flesh and secured the teeth, for the purpose of disposing of which 

 they would find their way to the frontier tribes, where they 

 would find a sale for their ivory.* 



Butua is, in Si-Ronga, still used as a name for the Zulu 

 count ry. 



Captain Owen states that the " people " of Delagoa Bay 

 also called the Zulus " Hollontontes." It is presumed that iie 

 refers to the white people residing there. If so, he is probably 

 right in his supposition that the name was " doubtless a cor- 

 ruption from ' Hottentot ' " as the Zulus came from the south, 

 which is considered the Hottentot country. But this only shows 

 to what guesswork the blunders of ignorance may reduce all 

 speculations of this kind. 



" This name | he adds] they must have been acquainted with when the 

 Dutch first settled in English River, about one hundred and twenty years back ; 

 [i.e., in 1720 a.d.] This tribe [i.e., the Zulu] does not appear to have long 

 possessed power dangerous to their neighbours, but some years ago subjugated 

 Mapoota." 



We are, of course, now well acquainted with the early his- 

 tory of the Zulu tribe, and know how it grew up from the 

 Mtetwa clan under Dingiswayo. and entered on its career of 

 bloodshed and conquest under Tshaka — the " Chaqua " of Owen 

 and the Portuguese settlers at Matoll. Henry Fynn gives a full 

 account of this in his posthumous papers published in Bird's 

 "Annals of Natal." It is noticeable that in this account he never 

 makes use of the term " Hollentont," although in an earlier des- 

 cription of Delagoa Bay. included by Dr. Theal in the " Records 

 of South-Eastern Africa,"! written apparently about 1823, he 

 refers to "Chaqua, King of the Orentonts." Lieutenant Fare- 

 well, at about the same date, gave Captain Owen a sketch of 

 " Chaka. King of Natal and of the Hollentontes." Of this tribe 

 he says : — 



" These, among the Africans are the bravest of warriors, being fearless of 

 death, at least when inflicted by the assegai ; but they have much dread of fire- 

 arms." 



* Isaacs, vol. ii 42. 

 tVol. ii, p. 479. 



