HOMESTEAD (SMALL AFRICAN SETTLEMENT)

In the southern African context, a homestead (Xhosa ''umzi'', Zulu ''umuzi'', Swati ''umuti'') is a cluster of several houses (singular indlu; plural Xhosa and Zulu 'izindlu', Swati 'tindlu') characteristic of the Nguni-speaking peoples of Africa. Each homestead will normally be occupied by a single extended family.

"Nelson Mandela was born in the Transkei region of South Africa, in the small village of Qunu - a collection of beehive-shaped huts with thatch roofs, known as rondavels. His mother had three huts and Mandela lived with her and his three immediate sisters. One hut was used for sleeping, another for cooking and the third for storing grain and other food. Everyone slept on mats on the ground, without pillows. His mother, as a married woman, had her own field to tend and her own cattle kraal - an enclosure for cattle made from thorn bushes." From Cool Planet by Oxfam

Contents

See also

See also

★ Compound (enclosure)

★ Kraal

★ Boma (enclosure)