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History of South Africa

Can you answer these questions about the history of South Africa?
Quiz by Aaron197
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Last updated: August 12, 2020
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First submittedSeptember 29, 2019
Times taken15,642
Average score63.2%
Rating4.59
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Question
Answer
What event did South Africa host in 2010?
FIFA World Cup
What political party has ruled South Africa since 1994?
African National
Congress
What disease significantly lowered life expectancy in South Africa between
1991 and 2005?
HIV / AIDS
Who became the first black President of South Africa in 1994?
Nelson Mandela
On what island was that person once imprisoned?
Robben Island
What Anglican archbishop won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984?
Desmond Tutu
What type of weapons did South Africa successfully develop in the 1970s?
Nuclear Weapons
What surgery was first performed by South African doctor Christiaan Barnard in 1967?
Heart Transplant
What was the name of South Africa's formalized system of racial segregation?
Apartheid
What South African company once controlled over 90% of the global diamond trade?
De Beers
What future world leader began his career as an activist while living in
South Africa between 1893 and 1914?
Mahatma Gandhi
What notorious type of "camp" was invented by the British during the
Second Anglo-Boer War ?
Concentration Camp
What was discovered near Johannesburg in 1886?
Gold
What country in the interior was founded by Boer settlers in 1854?
Orange Free State
What warrior-king led the Zulu kingdom to a period of expansion in the early 1800s?
Shaka
What country established the Cape Colony in 1652?
Netherlands
What European country became the first to reach South Africa in 1488?
Portugal
What ethnic group, which includes Zulus and Xhosas, migrated into
South Africa around 300 AD?
Bantu
What group of South African people form a branch of human genetics that
split from all others over 100,000 years ago?
San (Bushmen)
19 Comments
+15
Level 78
Oct 27, 2019
No question about the Springboks rugby team? A major omission in my view.
+2
Level 71
Apr 2, 2020
I agree, the 1995 tournament or last summer's world cup victory against England (and the odds), and after the typhoon should give plenty of material.
+1
Level 77
Oct 28, 2019
I think Khoisan should also be accepted for the San question, it is a broader term for the non-Bantu indigenous people of South Africa and I believe it fits the genetic divergence clue.
+2
Level ∞
Oct 28, 2019
Okay. I think the Khoi didn't come into the area until much later, but obviously there has been a lot of admixture and many people in that group have L0 mitochondrial DNA:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_L0_(mtDNA)

+1
Level 84
Dec 24, 2019
Is it also sometimes spelled "Khoe"?
+3
Level 85
Dec 24, 2019
Would be wary using questions like the last one, considering it's based on one single paper. Doesn't mean it's not true, just that it's not corroborated by other evidence.
+2
Level 57
Apr 21, 2020
Concentration camps of a kind were first used in the Americas at the end of the 19th century. Perhaps the British ones were different in some ways (I don't know) but it's a stretch, I think, to say that they "invented" them.
+2
Level 81
Sep 24, 2022
The 2nd Anglo-Boer War was also at the end of the 19th Century. Where in the Americas were they used? (honest question)
+1
Level 57
Sep 24, 2022
Ha - I've only got this from Wikipedia so it might be wrong, although I think I've heard it elsewhere as well! Apparently the term "concentration camp" was first used to describe camps used in Cuba by the Spanish in the 1860-70s, a good 20 years before the Boer wars. Wikipedia also seems to think they were used in the Philippine-American War around the same time, although I didn't know about that.
+1
Level 60
Sep 26, 2022
The Spanish had been concentrating population to exert control since the beginning of their American empire. It was done to end resistance and support the encomienda system.
+3
Level 81
Sep 24, 2022
It's fascinating to me how the San people look sort of African, sort of Asian, sort of European... I've read that they have as much genetic diversity as the rest of the world combined, don't know how accurate that is, and also that they're the closest thing alive today to the proto-humans that first evolved in Africa hundreds of thousands of years ago, before humans wandered off the continent, got cut off from one another in pockets here and there reducing their genetic diversity across subsequent generations.
+2
Level 57
Sep 24, 2022
There's also a great deal of genetic uniqueness about plants in the far south of the Cape (the "Cape Floral Kingdom"), which the South Africans seem quite understandably proud of. It can't be a coincidence that those two areas of extreme genetic separateness are in the same area, but I can't think why it should be there in particular.
+4
Level 76
Sep 24, 2022
I get that the thumbnail is a former flag of South Africa, but the choice is a little like choosing the Confederate flag for a quiz about the history of the US South.
+5
Level 81
Sep 25, 2022
Which would make perfect sense...
+5
Level 68
Sep 25, 2022
Using the former apartheid flag in the thumbnail is a poor choice and offensive. Symbols carry strong meaning.
+7
Level 90
Sep 25, 2022
I mean it is a history quiz and like it or not, it is part of South African history. But then again, I don't think people would be comfortable having the Confederate flag as a thumbnail for a quiz on the U.S. Civil War.
+2
Level 81
Sep 29, 2022
Why not?
+1
Level 68
Sep 29, 2022
This is more like using a confederate flag for a general quiz about US history, or using the fleur-de-lys flag in a general quiz about France (which jetpunk also sometimes does). It's not wrong, but I agree that it is a weird choice.
+1
Level 84
Aug 22, 2024
I'd like to speak to the manager! There's history in this history quiz!