Great Trek

Great Trek, migration of Afrikaners, or Boers, from the Cape of Good Hope into what is now the northern part of South Africa, beginning in 1835 and lasting into the early 1840s. The Afrikaners, most of whom were of Dutch descent and spoke Afrikaans, became restless under British rule, which had been imposed on them in 1806. After the British emancipated the Afrikaners' slaves in 1833 and returned recently annexed land on the eastern border of the Cape Colony to African tribes in 1836, Boer families began moving north in large groups to escape British control. This migration by the Voortrekkers (“pioneers”) came to symbolize the independent spirit of the Afrikaners, and they regarded it as the most significant event in their history. Some of the Voortrekkers, led by Pieter Retief and later by Andries Pretorius, settled in Natal, on the east coast, which they took from the Zulu in 1838 and 1839. When the British annexed Natal in 1845, these Voortrekkers moved inland to join other Afrikaners who had settled north of the Orange and Vaal rivers. There they eventually established two republics, the South African Republic (see Transvaal) and the Orange Free State.