Samuel Maharero, by Gerhard Pool

Samuel Maharero, by Gerhard Pool. Gamsberg Macmillan Publishers. Windhoek, Namibia, 1991. 0868487385 / ISBN 0-86848-738-5

Samuel Maharero, by Gerhard Pool. Gamsberg Macmillan Publishers. Windhoek, Namibia, 1991. 0868487385 / ISBN 0-86848-738-5

Samuel Maharero's uprising 10 1904 left the German government speechless. How could it be possible that this Herero leader, with whom they had had the best of working relationships for fourteen years, could so suddenly and without previous warning, plunge the country into a bloodbath? Gerhard Pool found answers in the history of Herero culture.

Gerhard Pool  

Samuel Maharero's real Herero name was Uereani. (The Herero word "Ourihuuna" apparently means "barefoot" and is allegedly the Herero nickname for Samuel Maharero.) Amongst his fellow-Hereros Samuel was also known as Katjikumbua or Katjikurnua. His parents were the well-known Herero leader, Maharero, and his fourth wife, Katare. Although Uereani was only christened Samuel in 1869, we will, for clarity's sake, use the name Samuel, by which he gained his fame, from the beginning. There is disagreement about Samuel's date of birth. According to the church book of the Okahandja congregation of the Rhenish Mission Society he was born in approximately 1854. On the other hand, Reverend Johann Jakob Irle was of the opinion that he was only born in 1856. Although 1856 is also based on surmise, this date is the one that appears on Samuel Maharero's gravestone. To determine Samuel's exact date of birth is impossible, because the Hereros did not record the day and date of such events. Their custom was to determine age on the basis of events instead of dates. What complicates the matter further is the fact that everyone did not connect the same date to the same event. Even Herero experts, such as Reverend Irle and Reverend Heinrich Vedder who went to great lengths to record the early history of the Hereros, differed in their interpretation of dates. According to Irle, Samuel was born in 1856, that is in the year Ojanganda ja Hejuva, meaning "the year in which Jonker (Afrikaner) attacked and destroyed the werf of Hejuva." According to Reverend Dr. Heinrich Vedder, however, Jonker only attacked Hejuva in 1857. Thus the uncertainty about Samuel Maharero's date of birth continues. It is, however, of great significance that Samuel Maharero was born during Jonker Afrikaner's lifetime. In fact, at that stage this renowned Oorlam leader, like Samuel's father Maharero, and his grandfather, Tjamuaha, also lived in Okahandja. The Oorlams were descendants of Khoi who intermingled with Whites in the Cape Colony. They wore European clothing, spoke Cape-Dutch and were thoroughly acquainted with the lifestyle of the Whites. The Afrikaner-Oorlams were one of the various Oorlams groups from the Cape Colony who settled north of the Orange River at the end of the eighteenth century. Okahandja, where Samuel Maharero spent the greater part of his life, can, due to the events that took place there, almost be called the "historical" capital of Namibia. This little town has been known in history by various names. In 1827 Reverend Johann Hinrich Schmelen christened it Schmelenshoop (or Schmelensverwachting). Schmelen, a missionary of the London Missionary Society, was probably the first white to visit Okahandja. However, this name did not take root. The Namas called the place Gei-keis. This means "big sandy plain" and describes exactly how the river bed beside which the town is situated, looks for the greater part of the year. Finally, it was the Hereros who gave Okahandja its name. They called the river beside the town the Okahandja River, i.e. the "little (meaning short) and wide" river. The name portrays the river's character beautifully, because the Okahandja River is only about eight or ten kilometres in length - the distance between the confluence of the Kandu (Okamita) River and the Okakango River to where they flow into the Swakop River together. [...]

This is an excerpt from Samuel Maharero, by Gerhard Pool.

Title: Samuel Maharero
Author: Gerhard Pool
Genre: Biography, History
Publisher: Gamsberg Macmillan Publishers
Windhoek, Namibia, 1991
0868487385 / ISBN 0-86848-738-5
Softcover, 15 x 21 cm, 359 pages, several b/w photographs and map sketches

Pool, Gerhard im Namibiana-Buchangebot

Samuel Maharero

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Samuel Maharero (Deutsche Ausgabe)

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