How Did the Zulus Go From Tribe to Empire? | Rise of the Zulus (1790-1828)

Perhaps the most famous of Africa's tribes, the Zulus rose to prominence under their King Shaka at the start of the 19th Century on the Eastern seaboard of what's now South Africa. In the years following Shaka's death his successors would have encounters with the Boer Voortrekkers and more famously, with the British culminating in the Anglo-Zulu War (1879) where they managed to decisively defeat them at the Battle of Isandlwana before themselves suffering defeat at the now infamous Battle of Rorke's Drift. But in this video I'm not going to be talking about the much more well known story of the British Invasion of Zululand in the later 19th Century and the demise of the Zulu Empire, but rather about its origin and how it came about. In the 18th Century the Zulu as a people had only just become a separate entity, and certainly were not one of the major players on the scene before the time of Shaka. A series of factors played a role in their rise to power around the turn of the 19th Century, most notably the actions of Shaka himself as well as a shift in the way in which warfare was carried about by the tribes of the region and their interactions with European trading networks.

Useful Charts' Video on the Zulu Royal Family Tree:
   • Zulu Kings Family Tree  

Article on Warfare and the Rise of the Zulu State:
https://www.researchgate.net/publicat...

Related Videos of Mine:

The Great Trek:
   • What was The Great Trek?  

The First Boer War:
   • The Other Boer War - The First Boer War of...  

The South African Flag:
   • The History Behind and Meaning of The Sout...  

Is the Film "Zulu" Racist?
   • Is the Film "Zulu" Racist?  

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Music Used:
Eine Kleine Nachtmusik - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Expeditionary - Kevin MacLeod

"Sunday Dub” - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

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#Zulu #SouthAfrica #History