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Summaries · Grade 7 History › Slavery at the Cape: work, resistance and freedom
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Slavery at the Cape: work, resistance and freedom

Slavery at the Cape: work, resistance, Islam, freedom and its legacy. Read one part at a time and tap “I know this”. Then test yourself in the quiz.

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On a timeline

1652+The VOC brings enslavedpeople to the Cape1794The Auwal Mosque, the firstin South Africa1807Britain bans the slave trade1808Louis of Mauritius’srebellion1825Galant’s rebellion in theKoue Bokkeveld1834Slavery abolished (1December: Emancipation Day)1838End of the ‘apprenticeship’
Many freed people struggled after 1838: they had no land or money of their own.

Former owners were promised compensation from Britain, but they had to claim it in London (it was paid from 1835) and received much less than the value of the enslaved people. Emancipation: being set free from slavery. A slave bell on old farms started and stopped work.

The Slave Lodge in Cape Town is a museum today.
The Slave Lodge in Cape Town is a museum today.
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Legacy

  • Their speech helped form early Afrikaans; Cape food like bobotie, koesisters and bredie comes from this history.
  • Sources: inventories, court records and baptism registers; the Slave Lodge museum in Cape Town.
  • We say “enslaved people” to remember they were people first. Slavery left deep inequality.
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Remember this and test yourself

Remember this: your summary
  • The VOC brought enslaved people from Madagascar, India and the East Indies for labour on farms and in homes.
  • Farms: ploughing, harvesting, vineyards. Town: housework, building and skilled trades.
  • Manumission: freed by an owner. Drosters: enslaved people who ran away; punishment was harsh.
  • Galant led a rebellion in the Bokkeveld in 1825.
  • Islam grew strongly; the Auwal Mosque (1794) in the Bo-Kaap was the first; Tuan Guru wrote out the Qur’an from memory on Robben Island.

Write these points in your book. Read them again the night before the test.

Memory trick

1-8-3-4: 1 December 1834 — freedom day, but first four years of ‘apprenticeship’.

Flash cards · Tap to turn over

Important words

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Test yourself · Part 2

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