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Cape Province

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Cape Province, former province, S South Africa. Under the South African constitution of 1994 it was divided into Eastern Cape, Western Cape, Northern Cape, and part of a fourth province, North West. The former capital and largest city was Cape Town Cape Town or Capetown, city (1991 pop. 854,616), legislative capital of South Africa and capital of Western Cape, a port on the Atlantic Ocean. It was the capital of Cape Province before that province's subdivision in 1994.
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 (now the capital of Western Cape). Other cities in the former province included Kimberley Kimberley , city (1991 pop. 167,060), Northern Cape, South Africa. Since the 19th cent. the city has been primarily a diamond-mining center, but underground mining, which had not been profitable for some time, was halted in mid-2005.
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 (now in Northern Cape) and East London East London, city (1991 pop. 240,474), Eastern Cape, SE South Africa, on the Indian Ocean. The city grew around a British military post founded in 1847. Its harbor was developed from 1886, and today it is a leading South African port.
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, Port Elizabeth Port Elizabeth, city (1991 pop. 670,653), Eastern Cape, SE South Africa, on Algoa Bay, an arm of the Indian Ocean. It is a tourist center and a major seaport that ships diamonds, wool, fruit, and other items.
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, and Uitenhage Uitenhage , town (1991 pop. 182,551), Eastern Cape, S South Africa, on the Zwartkops River. It is an industrial center, with large railroad workshops, wool washeries, textile mills, and motor vehicle assembly plants.
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 (all now in Eastern Cape).

History

Although the Cape of Good Hope was first circumnavigated in 1488 by Bartolomeu Dias and later (1497) by Vasco da Gama, the first European settlement of the region was only in 1652, when Jan van Riebeeck founded a resupply station for the Dutch East India Company on Table Bay Table Bay, inlet of the Atlantic Ocean, 6 mi (9.7 km) wide, lying off Western Cape, South Africa. Table Mt. overlooks the bay, which was visited in the late 15th cent. by Portuguese voyagers to India.
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; the station subsequently became Cape Town. At the time of Van Riebeeck's landing, Cape Province was inhabited by San (Bushmen) and Khoikhoi (Hottentots) in the southern and central areas, and by Bantu speakers on the northern and eastern fringes (see Bantu languages Bantu languages, group of African languages forming a subdivision of the Benue-Niger division of the Niger-Congo branch of the Niger-Kordofanian language family (see African languages).
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). The Dutch East India Company brought Dutch settlers to Cape Town, who farmed and raised livestock and were called Boers Boer [Du.,=farmer], inhabitant of South Africa of Dutch or French Huguenot descent. Boers are also known as Afrikaners. They first settled (1652) near the Cape of Good Hope in what was formerly Cape Province.
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 [Du.,=farmers]. In 1689, French Huguenots Huguenots , French Protestants, followers of John Calvin. The term is derived from the German Eidgenossen, meaning sworn companions or confederates. Origins


Prior to Calvin's publication in 1536 of his
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 began to arrive; they developed the wine industry. The company ruled the Cape until 1795, except for a brief period (1781–84) of French occupation. In 1779 the first of numerous frontier wars (continuing until 1877) between Europeans and the Xhosa (a Bantu-speaking people) erupted. These Xhosa Wars were mainly over land and cattle.

During the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars (1792–1815), Britain occupied the Cape from 1795 to 1803, when the Dutch regained control; Holland formally ceded it to Great Britain in 1806. The British named the territory Cape of Good Hope Colony and encouraged immigration from England. The new British settlers soon conflicted with the Boers over anglicization of the courts, control of farm- and pastureland, and slaveholding. Beginning in 1835 many Boers left Cape Colony (see Trek, Great Trek, Great , the journey by Afrikaner farmers (Boers) who left the Cape Colony to escape British domination and eventually founded Natal, Transvaal, and the Orange Free State. Trek is an Afrikaans term, originally meaning a journey by ox wagon.
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), seeking more land and escape from British rule. The Boers founded a temporary republic in Natal (see KwaZulu-Natal KwaZulu-Natal , province (1995 est. pop. 8,713,000), 33,578 sq mi (86,967 sq km), E South Africa, on the Indian Ocean. Formerly Natal province, in the constitution of 1994 it was renamed KwaZulu-Natal.
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) and longer-lasting republics in the Transvaal Transvaal , former province, NE South Africa. With the new constitution of 1994, it was divided into Eastern Transvaal (now Mpumalanga), Northern Transvaal (now Limpopo), Pretoria-Witwatersrand-Veereeniging (now Gauteng), and part of North West prov.
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 and Orange Free State (see Free State Free State, formerly Orange Free State, province (1995 est. pop. 2,782,000), 49,866 sq mi (129,153 sq km), E central South Africa. It was renamed Free State shortly after the 1994 constitution went into effect.
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).

In 1850, Cape Colony had about 140,000 residents of European descent. In 1853 the colony was allowed to elect a legislature to advise the governor, and in 1872 it received internal self-government. In 1867 diamonds were discovered in the Kimberley region, which in 1880 was annexed by the Cape. The British and the remaining Boers generally cooperated until the 1890s, when the British, and especially Cecil Rhodes Rhodes, Cecil John , 1853–1902, British imperialist and business magnate. Business Career


The son of a Hertfordshire clergyman, he first went to South Africa in 1870, joining his oldest brother, Herbert, on a cotton plantation in Natal.
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 (then prime minister of Cape Colony), sought to unite the Transvaal and the Orange Free State with the Cape and Natal. In 1895–96, L. S. Jameson Jameson, Sir Leander Starr, 1853–1917, British colonial administrator and statesman in South Africa. He went to Kimberley (1878) as a physician, became associated with Cecil Rhodes in his colonizing ventures, and was appointed (1891) administrator of
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 staged an unsuccessful raid from Cape Colony into the Transvaal, which greatly increased tension between Britons and Boers. The South African War South African War or Boer War, 1899–1902, war of the South African Republic (Transvaal) and the Orange Free State against Great Britain.
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 (1899–1902) followed soon thereafter. In 1910 the Cape Colony joined with Natal, the Transvaal, and the Orange Free State to become a founding province of the Union (now Republic) of South Africa.


Cape Province

 or Cape of Good Hope, formerly Cape Colony

Former province, South Africa. Occupying the southern extremity of the African continent, it comprised the southern and western portions of South Africa; its capital was Cape Town. The black state of Ciskei and parts of two others, Transkei and Bophuthatswana, lay within its boundaries. Its name refers to the Cape of Good Hope, 30 mi (50 km) south of Cape Town. The original inhabitants included Bantu, San, and Khoekhoe peoples. Bartolomeu Dias, en route to India in 1488, became the first European to visit the area. A colony was founded by the Dutch at Table Bay in 1652; it was ceded to the British in 1814. It joined the Union of South Africa in 1910 and the Republic of South Africa in 1961. The province ceased to exist in 1994, when it was split roughly into Eastern Cape, Northern Cape, and Western Cape provinces.


Cape Province
a former province of S South Africa; replaced in 1994 by the new provinces of Northern Cape, Western Cape, Eastern Cape and part of North-West. Capital: Cape Town


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The Cape Province is one of the most beautiful areas of South Africa for walking, with rolling vineyards, craggy mountain slopes, a glistening coastline and brightly coloured flowers Its diversity makes it ideal for long and varied walks, wandering through vineyards, dry desert plains, forests and beaches The Cape Province is one of the most beautiful areas of South Africa for walking, with rolling vineyards, craggy mountain slopes, a glistening coastline and brightly coloured flowers.
PetroSA was already looking for sites for a proposed liquified natural gas (LNG) offloading facility in South Africa's Western Cape province, estimated to cost $250 million.
The petrol bombing of a Chinese-owned business in Eastern Cape province, which has largely escaped the xenophobic violence, helped undermine the confidence expressed by the government that the unrest has been contained.
 
 
 
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