October 11, 1899 – May 31, 1902
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.
Guglielmo Marconi reports receiving a radio signal in Newfoundland transmitted from Cornwall across the Atlantic.
Ethiopian forces under Emperor Menelik II defeated an invading Italian army at Adwa, preserving Ethiopia's independence during the Scramble for Africa.
In German South West Africa (present-day Namibia), German forces suppressed uprisings in a campaign that killed most of the Herero and about half of the Nama people.
The Cape, Natal, Transvaal and Orange River colonies united as the Union of South Africa, a self-governing dominion of the British Empire.
From alpha-particle scattering experiments, Ernest Rutherford proposes that the atom has a small, dense, positively charged nucleus.
The South African Native National Congress, forerunner of the ANC, was founded in Bloemfontein to defend the rights of Black Africans.