Shaka Zulu - Great Military Thinker

by Read Listen Learn

In the early eighteenth century, a large African tribe, the Zulu, settled with their many cattle in south-west Africa. To the east was the Indian Ocean; to the west were the Drakensberg Mountains, cold and snowy; north, where the Zulu came from, was home to many old enemies; south lay the Great Fish River and the white newcomers, Dutch-speaking farmers called 'Boers'. The Zulus could not move in any direction and, as space ran out, the many Zulu tribes fought each other constantly. Into this world of war, Shaka was born.

Let's jump a couple of decades to a day when Shaka, now leader of his people, found himself in difficulties. A couple of different tribes had come together to attack the Zulu. They were now in Shaka's lands, virtually at the gates of his capital. Shaka was already known as a fine soldier and leader. The coming battle would be the test. The Zulus were outnumbered by enemy warriors. Before they arrived, Shaka ordered the women and children to hide in the forest with the all-important cattle, the wealth of the tribe. He ordered his warriors to go to the top of a nearby hill to form a ring three men deep to stand and wait for the enemy to attack.

This was a new idea. Shaka also made most of the men on the hill lie down so that the enemy would think there was only one thin line of Zulus defending the hill. When the enemy first attacked, the men lying down only stood up when the enemy army was about thirty metres away and running fast towards the Zulu line. Suddenly seeing that the Zulu numbers were much greater than they thought, the attackers turned and ran. Shaka and the Zulu warriors had broken the first charge before there was even any fighting.

The attackers never really recovered their nerve and all their charges failed, with many of them lying dead on the hill. Also, the day was hot. Shaka had planned well and taken a lot of water up the hill for his men. It was given to them in the line by special boy soldiers who also cared for the wounded and ran messages. The enemy was now very thirsty but had no water. More and more of the men began to break away to walk back to the river over a kilometre away to drink.

In the end, the invading army fell apart. The Zulus came down the hill and drove them across the river, killing hundreds as they did so. The battle was over, the result was clear. Now other tribes would think carefully before attacking the Zulu. And, in the peace that followed, the young chief, Shaka, built up his army and trained his warriors well. Perhaps, the best form of defence would be to attack.

The Zulu were a small tribe but they went far past their traditional borders, setting up a large Zulu empire in southern Africa. How did they do this?

Much of the sudden Zulu success can be put down to certain key, military innovations introduced by Shaka Zulu. He increased the length of military service for Zulu men, who remained full-time soldiers until they were forty. He also changed the standard weapon. All Zulu warriors carried three or four throwing spears, long and with a small, iron head. Now the Zulus began to use just one, short spear. It had a short handle but a long and wide blade for stabbing the enemy at close range. It was more a sword than a spear, in effect, and much more deadly than the old weapon.

War in Zululand became lethal as warriors closed with each other and fought to kill by stabbing the enemy deep in the ribs. Many more of the enemy died and now the defeated tribe was taken into the Zulu one. The women were married off to Zulu men and the surviving men went straight into the Zulu army. In this way, the number of people who thought of themselves as Zulu grew very quickly.

Of course, in such a situation, laws were very strict to keep order and many people were put to death, usually by having their neck broken or, more cruelly, by having wooden sticks hammered into their bowels to cause a slow and painful death. Long, universal military service also helped to keep the Zulus together as a nation.

Where had this new leader, Shaka, come from? His past hid a secret: he was illegitimate. His mother became pregnant with him after sleeping with an already married chief from another tribe. This made Shaka the outsider among his mother's people where she had gone to live when Shaka's father had rejected her and his new son. When he was growing up, other boys would laugh at him about his birth and his unusual looks (he was quite ugly). They also insulted his mother in front of him.

The young Shaka became sure that he wanted to be the best warrior, take over as king of the tribe and take revenge on everyone: his father, the other boys in the village, his cousins and anyone who had spoken badly of his mother. He made all these things happen before he was thirty. He had all his boyhood enemies killed when he came to power.

Shaka soon became an excellent warrior and, when he became chief of the Zulu, he put his brilliant new military ideas into practice. With the new style spear and now fighting barefoot for speed, the Zulus were soon the most feared fighters in southern Africa.

However, Shaka lost much of his popularity when his mother died. He was so sad about the loss that he made all his people go hungry and kill their cattle as sign of their sadness at his mother's death. Anyone who smiled, had sex or drank alcohol was killed immediately. After some months, the terror stopped but, when Shaka himself died a few years later, it is said that the Zulu people were pleased because they had come to fear him more than they loved him.

He left behind an empire that would continue until the 1880s when a series of British attacks and the spread of white colonists began to break it up.