South Africa: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

The first people of the Cape

A story that began long before ships arrived.

For thousands of years, the Cape was home to the San, hunter gatherers whose rock paintings survive in the Cederberg and across the Western Cape, and the Khoikhoi, herders who grazed cattle and sheep on the slopes below Table Mountain. Their name for the mountain, Hoerikwaggo, means mountain in the sea.

Portuguese sailors reached the Cape first, with Bartolomeu Dias rounding it in 1488 and Vasco da Gama following in 1497 on his way to India.

The Tavern of the Seas

A refreshment station that became a city.

In 1652, Jan van Riebeeck landed for the Dutch East India Company to set up a supply station for ships sailing to the East. The Company's Garden he planted still grows in the city centre, and the Castle of Good Hope, completed in 1679, is the oldest surviving colonial building in the country.

The colony was built on the labour of enslaved people brought from Indonesia, India, Madagascar and East Africa. Their descendants, together with exiled Muslim leaders from the East Indies, formed the Cape Malay community. The Auwal Mosque in the Bo Kaap, founded in 1794, is the oldest mosque in South Africa, and Cape Malay cooking, music and language shaped the character of the city.

Britain took the Cape in 1795 and again in 1806. Slavery was abolished in 1834, with full emancipation in 1838. In 1910 the Cape became part of the Union of South Africa, and Cape Town its legislative capital, a role it still holds today.

• 1652 Dutch East India Company station founded
• 1679 Castle of Good Hope completed
• 1794 Auwal Mosque founded in the Bo Kaap
• 1834 Slavery abolished at the Cape
• 1910 Union of South Africa formed

Apartheid and the struggle for freedom

The history every visitor should understand.

In 1948, the National Party came to power and turned long standing segregation into apartheid, a system of laws that classified every South African by race. The Population Registration Act and the Group Areas Act of 1950 decided where people could live, work, study and even be buried, and millions were forced from their homes.

In Cape Town, the most painful example is District Six. A vibrant, mixed community of Muslims, Christians and Jews, of Coloured, Black, Indian and white families, close to the city centre, it was declared a white area in 1966. Over the following years more than 60,000 people were forcibly removed to the Cape Flats, and their homes were bulldozed. The District Six Museum, opened in 1994, tells their story through the voices of former residents.

Resistance never stopped. On 30 March 1960, about 30,000 people marched from Langa and Nyanga into the city in protest against the pass laws. In 1989, police turned a water cannon filled with purple dye on protesters in the city centre, and the slogan The Purple Shall Govern appeared on walls the next day.

Across Table Bay, Robben Island held political prisoners for decades. Nelson Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in prison there. When he was released on 11 February 1990, he walked out of Victor Verster Prison near Paarl and gave his first speech as a free man from the balcony of Cape Town City Hall, to a crowd that filled the Grand Parade.

On 27 April 1994, South Africans of every race voted together for the first time, and Mandela became president. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, began its work in Cape Town in 1996, the same year the country adopted one of the most progressive constitutions in the world.

• 1948 National Party elected, apartheid begins
• 1960 Langa march to the city against the pass laws
• 1966 District Six declared a white area
• 1989 The Purple Rain protest
• 1990 Nelson Mandela released
• 1994 First democratic elections on 27 April
• 1999 Robben Island named a World Heritage Site

Cape Town today

A city where history and creativity meet.

Thirty years after the first democratic election, Cape Town is one of the most visited cities in Africa. Table Mountain is one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature, the Cape Floral Region is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and in 2014 the city was named World Design Capital.

Old grain silos at the Waterfront now hold the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, the Bo Kaap keeps its traditions alive beside new galleries and restaurants, and the city has become a favourite location for international film and television.

The questions apartheid left behind, of land, of opportunity and of belonging, are still part of daily life. We believe the best way to understand Cape Town is to see all of it: its beauty, its scars and the people building something new.

Why it is called Cape cuisine

Every culture that ever reached the Cape, on one plate.

Cape cuisine is unlike any other food on Earth because it was created by everyone who ever arrived at this tip of Africa. The Khoikhoi brought their knowledge of local plants and game. The Dutch brought baking, preserving and stews. The French Huguenots brought their love of fine cooking, and the British their roasts and puddings.

Most of all, Cape cuisine was shaped by the enslaved people and exiles brought from Indonesia, India, Madagascar and East Africa. They carried the spice routes with them: cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, turmeric and chilli. In the kitchens of the Cape, their cooking became Cape Malay food, the sweet, fragrant and gently spiced heart of the city's table. Add African traditions like the braai, and you have a cuisine found nowhere else.

Great food, great value

Cape Town has become one of the most celebrated food cities in the world. Its chefs regularly earn international awards, and restaurants in the city, Constantia, Stellenbosch and Franschhoek appear on global best restaurant lists. Seafood comes straight off the boats in Kalk Bay and Hout Bay, and produce is picked the same morning in the surrounding valleys.

For international visitors, the value is remarkable. A tasting menu that would cost a fortune in London, New York or Dubai costs a fraction of that here, and a simple Cape Malay curry in the Bo Kaap is one of the best meals you will have anywhere. We are happy to reserve tables for you, from a famous chef's counter to a family kitchen only locals know.

Where Cape Town is heading

A young city looking forward.

Cape Town is home to one of Africa's fastest growing technology communities, often called the Silicon Cape, and to a generation of young entrepreneurs, chefs, designers and artists who are shaping how the world sees Africa.

In 2027 the Cape Town Marathon becomes Africa's first World Marathon Major, and Newlands hosts a Cricket World Cup semi final, putting the city on the world stage again. Conservation is a growing priority too, from protecting the African penguin to the fynbos that grows nowhere else on Earth.

The future of South Africa is still being written, and visitors are part of it. Every journey supports local guides, drivers, restaurants and communities.