Countries / Sub-Saharan Africa
20 notable historical events in South Africa, in chronological order.
Bantu-speaking peoples from west-central Africa gradually spread across eastern and southern Africa over millennia, bringing agriculture and ironworking.
The Portuguese navigator Bartolomeu Dias became the first European to sail around the southern tip of Africa, proving the Indian Ocean could be reached by sea.
Vasco da Gama's fleet left Lisbon, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, sailed up the East African coast and reached Calicut, opening a direct sea route between Europe and Asia.
Shaka became king of the Zulu, reorganised its army and built the Zulu Kingdom into the dominant power of southern Africa, amid the upheavals known as the Mfecane.
The Zulu king Shaka was assassinated by his half-brothers Dingane and Mhlangana; Dingane succeeded him.
During the Great Trek, a party of Voortrekkers defeated the Zulu army of King Dingane at the Ncome River in Natal.
In the Anglo-Zulu War, a Zulu army defeated a British column at Isandlwana, one of the worst defeats of the British army by an indigenous force.
Boers of the Transvaal rose against British annexation and regained self-government after their victory at Majuba Hill.
The British Empire fought the Boer republics of the Transvaal and Orange Free State; the war ended with the Treaty of Vereeniging, after tens of thousands of civilians died in concentration camps.
The Cape, Natal, Transvaal and Orange River colonies united as the Union of South Africa, a self-governing dominion of the British Empire.
The South African Native National Congress, forerunner of the ANC, was founded in Bloemfontein to defend the rights of Black Africans.
Nelson Mandela, anti-apartheid leader and South Africa's first Black president, was born in the village of Mvezo.
The National Party won South Africa's general election and began enacting apartheid, a legally enforced system of racial segregation that lasted until the early 1990s.
South African police opened fire on a crowd protesting pass laws at Sharpeville, killing 69 people; the ANC and PAC were subsequently banned.
Christiaan Barnard performs the first human-to-human heart transplant at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town.
Black schoolchildren in Soweto protested against compulsory instruction in Afrikaans; police opened fire, and the ensuing crackdown left hundreds dead.
After 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela walked free from Victor Verster Prison, opening the way to negotiations to end apartheid.
South Africa held its first election with universal suffrage across all races; the ANC won and Nelson Mandela became president, marking the end of apartheid.
The African Union was formally launched in Durban, replacing the Organisation of African Unity.
Nelson Mandela, South Africa's first Black president and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, died in Johannesburg at the age of 95.