Why did the Dutch establish a settlement in South Africa?

In the 1400s, Spain was absorbed by the Reconquista, Italy was divided, and Venice traded with the East. But Portugal was exploring the West coast of Africa in search of gold and slaves, and colonizing key archipelagos in the Atlantic.Reference Fernández-Armesto⁴ Kings João II (r. 1481–1495) and Manuel I ‘The Fortunate’ (r. 1495–1521) sponsored expeditions around Africa searching for a sea route to India and the Far East.

In 1487, Bartolomeu Dias (1451–1500) was appointed by João II to sail around the southern tip of Africa. Dias sailed from Lisbon to the Cape Verde Islands, then south-east across the Gulf of Guinea. He fought his way south, roughly along the west coast of Africa but ended up having to sail far into the Atlantic to find favorable winds and currents.Reference Fernández-Armesto⁵ He passed the tip of South Africa during a storm and dropped anchor at Aguada de São Brás (Mossel Bay) in February 1488. By mid-March, he erected a padrão (stone cross) at Kwaaihoek, some 700 km east of the Cape, not far from today’s Port Elizabeth. His crew then forced him to return to Portugal. Dias discovered the Cape on his way back and named it Cabo das Tormentas (Cape of Storms) for the violent storms and dangerous currents he encountered there for the second time. Dias would ultimately perish in the same waters in 1500. João II renamed it Cabo da Boa Esperança (Cape of Good Hope), hoping that it opened a sea route to India and the Far East.

Manuel I ordered Vasco da Gama (c. 1469–1524) to reach India by sea.Reference Velho⁶ Da Gama left Lisbon in July 1497 for Cabo Verde, this part of the journey with Bartolomeu Dias. He then sailed south-west, deep into the South Atlantic, seeking favorable winds before turning east.⁷ This long route took over 90 days. His crew experienced scurvyReference Fernández-Armesto^5, Reference Bown⁸, a terrible disease caused by vitamin C deficiency. This may be why he turned east too early and failed to pass south of the Cape as he intended. Instead, he reached the Atlantic coast of southern Africa at the Bay of Santa Helena, some 150 km north of the Cape, in November 1497. He then struggled against unfavorable currents and a storm before sailing around the Cape of Good Hope. By mid-December, he found the last marker left by Bartolomeu Dias. He then hugged the coast of Africa all the way to about Kenya before encountering monsoon winds, which pushed him across the Indian Ocean to CalicutReference Fernández-Armesto⁵ in India.

Neither Dias nor da Gama had any intention of establishing a settlement anywhere in South Africa. But both of them encountered the natives. In the east, a number of tribes spoke Bantu⁹ languages. In the west, the dominant groups were the San and the Khoikhoi who spoke Khoi-San¹⁰ ‘click’ languages. The San (‘Bushmen’ to the Europeans) were hunters-gatherers and lived inland. The Khoikhoi (‘Hottentots’¹¹ to the Europeans) were nomadic herders who lived along the coast. They were the first to encounter Dias and then da Gama. They would also be the first to suffer the consequences of contact with the Europeans: disease, land grabs, and sometimes slavery.

Vasco da Gama’s sea route¹² to India would be used by Portuguese and then English merchants for more than a century. It involved sailing south-west into the Atlantic before turning east, sail past the Cape of Good Hope, following the coast of south and east Africa, and catching favorable monsoon winds to cross the Indian Ocean. And then the Dutch entered the trade.

The 11 Provinces of the Netherlands and Southern Netherlands were first united by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, in 1433. They became part of the Holy Roman Empire following the marriage of Mary of Burgundy with Archduke Maximilian, a Hapsburg. In 1516, the Catholic Charles V (Charles I of Spain) inherited the region and established the Estates General of the Netherlands. But the Protestant Reformation was under way. Waves of Lutheranism, Anabaptism, and then Calvinism swept through the Northern Provinces.

In 1555, Philip II of Spain became the new ruler. He was much more dedicated to the Catholic cause than Charles, and soon started to suppress the political and religious freedoms that the Dutch so cherished. He sent Fernando Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alba, to enforce his will. This resulted in the Eighty-Years War (1568–1648), the first 50 of which involved only Spain and the seven Northern Provinces. At the Union of Utrecht (1579), these Provinces formed the United Provinces of the Netherlands, and then declared their independence from Spain in 1581. In 1618, the conflict grew to include much more of Europe (Thirty Years War). Spain finally recognized the independence of the Netherlands at the Treaty of Westphalia (1648), which ended that war.

The ongoing hostilities did not stop the Dutch from asserting their economic power. The firstReference Parthesius¹³ Dutch fleet to enter the competition for spices from the Far East¹⁴ – in defiance of the Treaty of TordesillasReference Bown¹⁵ – was sponsored by the private Compagnie van Verre (distant lands company). Four ships took to the sea in 1595, financed by nine Amsterdam merchants. From 1595 to 1601, a total of 14 fleets (65 ships) made the trip. For comparison, 59 Portuguese ships sailed to India between 1591 and 1601. At first, each Dutch expedition was an independent enterprise with its own shareholders competing with the Portuguese, English, and other Dutch expeditions.

It soon became obvious to the Dutch that such long trips – three years was typical – required a centralized organization. Ships needed repairs, crews had to be replaced, and fleets should be helping each other instead of competing. In 1602, the Dutch East-India CompanyReference Parthesius^13, Reference Bown¹⁶ was established. It was designed not only to centralize the command structure and eliminate internal competition, but also to counter the (English) East India Company¹⁷ which was established in 1600.

In 1611, the Dutch experimentedReference Fernández-Armesto^5, Reference Fernández-Armesto¹⁸ with a new sea route to South-East Asia, allowing them to save time and to avoid the Portuguese-English route along which they were at a disadvantage. The Dutch rounded the Cape of Good Hope but then sailed straight east toward Australia¹⁹ before turning north-east to reach Java and Sumatra (Figure 1).

Figure 1

Approximate Portuguese–English (solid) and Dutch (dashed) routesReference Fernández-Armesto⁵ (map: Jo Layne Skillman and T. Michael Gibbons).

Thus, the Dutch bypassed India altogether. But now, there was just one possible stopping point between two extended sea journeys: the Cape, where they could get fresh food, water, and supplies, repair ships, and refresh crews if needed. In 1652, the Dutch East India Company established a permanent settlement and victualling post at the Cape. For over two centuries, every European ship sailing to or from India and the South East stopped at the Cape. Thus, the country that became South Africa was founded by a private company for purely economic reasons.

For almost 150 years, the Cape Colony was only marginally affected by the turbulent events involving the Netherlands. In 1651, England imposed the Navigation Act which hurt the trade interests of the Netherlands. It triggered the First Anglo-Dutch war (1652–1654). It ended favorably for England with the Treaty of Westminster. The Navigation Act was left intact. The Dutch decisively won the Second Anglo-Dutch war (1665–1667) but badly lost the Third (1672–1674).

The relationship between England and the Netherlands dramatically improved in 1688 when the British Parliament invited the Stadtholder of the Netherlands and his wife, William of Orange and Mary Stuart, to rule England as William III and Mary II. Of course, William first had to expel the reigning British monarch, James II (of England) and VII (of Scotland), who was William’s uncle and Mary’s father. This ‘Glorious Revolution’ had its roots in religion and Parliamentary power. James was a Catholic king ruling a mostly protestant England, while William and Mary were protestants. James demanded near absolute authority while the English Parliament wanted to control legislation and taxation.

William invaded with a large force; James fled to France and was deposed by Parliament for abandoning his country; William and Mary ruled. England then joined the German-Spanish-Dutch alliance against Louis XIV of France. Mary died in 1694 and William in 1702. The British throne then returned to the Stuarts (to Mary’s sister, Anne). The relationships between the Netherlands and England quickly soured again. The Fourth Anglo-Dutch War (1782–1784) marked the end of the Netherlands as a major power (Treaty of Paris).

The Dutch East India Company

The Dutch East India Company or Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie (VOC) was the first joint stock company financed by investors.²⁰ The ‘Indies’ or ‘East Indies’ referred to any land in South or South-East Asia, but conveniently included the tip of South Africa.

In 1602, the Estates General of the Netherlands reached a compromise with the Dutch merchants involved in the spice trade and established the VOC. It was granted a 21-year monopoly to carry out colonial activities in Asia with extraordinary powers and very little oversight. Among other privileges, the VOC was empowered to sign treaties, build fortifications, wage war, coin money, and administer any conquered lands. Financial accounting was due at the end of each decade. The overall control was in the hands of the Council of Seventeen, the Heeren XVII. They were gentlemen merchants from various cities chosen so that Amsterdam would not have a majority vote: Eight of them were from Amsterdam, four from Middelburg, one each from Delft, Enkhuizen, Hoorn, and Rotterdam, and the final member rotated from cities other than Amsterdam.

The first permanent VOC settlement was established in Bantam (Java) in 1603 but the headquarters were established in Batavia (formerly Jayakarta, now Jakarta, Java) in 1619. The VOC quickly outperformed the Portuguese, who soon abandoned the spice trade. But the English were still in competition. Some VOC officials were ruthless in their goal of achieving a monopoly on spices such as cloves, nutmeg, mace, and cinnamon. The most infamous incidentReference Bown^{16, 21} that resulted from this competition was the 1623 torture and execution of English (and Japanese working for the English) in Amboyna conducted by Herman van Speult. This massacre followed a bloody incident under Jan Pieterzoon Coen on Banda Island. VOC commanders were the law and often used their power to an extent that could not be tolerated today.Reference Hill²²

In colonies such as the Cape, the VOC had full control over the production of all goods, including wine. Nobody, not even free burghers, was allowed to conduct private business outside the Colony. Some of the production could be sold locally, but the rest had to go through the VOC. In 1762, Governor Tulbagh decreed: ‘This Colony was founded at great expense by our High Honourable Lords and Masters, and subsequently maintained with the greatest care, solely for the purpose of providing their ships with local produce on their long and difficult journeys, and the inhabitants are not in any way qualified to deprive their lawful lords of the produce of the land for the convenience of foreigners.’ In other words, the entire production belonged to the VOC. Such policies would have profound consequences for the Constantia wine.

By 1670, the Dutch controlled roughly half the total shipping of Europe, which was over 1 million tons. At the peak of its power from 1699 to 1730, the VOC had some 50,000 employees worldwide, a private army of 10,000 men, 150 merchant ships, and 40 large warships. After 1730, the power of the VOC gradually declined due to increased competition from the French and Danish East India Companies, decreased (VOC-controlled) intra-Asian trade, inefficiencies and corruption partly caused by low pay. Last but not least, the VOC’s generous dividend policy led to distributions of dividends far in excess of profits.

Following the disastrous Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, the VOC transferred its territories to the Dutch government (the Batavian Republic) in 1798. The VOC was dissolved in 1799, and its debt taken over by the Dutch taxpayer. The Dutch East Indies continued to operate under Dutch government rule until 1949.

The first South African Wine and the Early Years of the Cape Colony

In 1652, the VOC appointed Jan van Riebeeck (1619–1677) as the first Commander of the Cape Colony. He was instructed to build a fort, plant vegetable gardens, and befriend the Khoikhoi in order to obtain cattle from them.

Van Riebeeck’s three ships and 90 men landed at the Cape on April 6, 1652, and the construction of the fort began. He quickly realized that the area was appropriate for viticulture and ordered thousands of vitis vinifera cuttings from France and Germany. They arrived in 1655 and were planted on the Wynberg. The much-quoted entry in his diary for Sunday February 2, 1659, reads: ‘Today, praise be to God, wine was made for the first time from Cape grapes, mostly Muscadel, and other white round grapes, very fragrant and tasty.’ This harvest totaled 12 mengelen (just under 15 liters), proving that the longest journey begins with a small step.

By the time van Riebeeck left for Batavia in 1662, some 250 colonists lived at the Cape. They were mostly Dutch, with a few Germans and Scandinavians. The first slaves had been imported. Because the production of food was below the expectations of the VOC, nine men had been relieved of their contract with the VOC and been given small grants of land along the Liesbeek River to grow wheat. These were the first ‘free burghers’, frontier land-owners who would later be known as Trekboers (‘traveling farmers’) and then simply Boers.

Under the eight Commanders (1662–1679) who followed van Riebeeck, the Colony slowly grew. It is likely that vineyards were planted and wine made. But the author knows of no wine farm operating today that dates back to that period. The priority was to grow wheat, fruits and vegetables in order to meet the needs of VOC ships. The population of the Cape Colony consisted mainly of VOC officials and employees (there were about 500 of them in 1700). Many of them chose to stay at the Colony at the end of their contract. The slave population was growing as well.

The Van der Stel Era (1679–1712)

The founding father of South African wines is Simon van der Stel (1639–1712), the tenth Commander and then first Governor of the Colony (Figure 2). Simon’s father Adriaan was employed by the VOC as Governor of Mauritius. His mother was partly of Malay origin. Simon was therefore a mestizo (colored). His father was murdered in Ceylon in 1646 and his mother died shortly thereafter. Simon spent his teenage years in Batavia, and then moved to Amsterdam in 1659. On the way, his ship stopped at the Cape for a few weeks, Simon’s first visit to the Colony. For the next 20 years, he was employed by the VOC in Holland. He also made wine and brandy from two vineyards he owned at Muiderberg, about 10 miles west of Amsterdam. In 1663, he married Johanna Jacoba Six, the daughter of Willem Six, a prominent Dutch merchant. They had four sons: Willem Adriaan, Adriaan, Frans (François), and Hendryk.

Figure 2

Left: Jan van Riebeeck (1619–1677), first Commander of the Cape Colony, first to plant a vineyard and to produce wine from grapes grown at the Cape (photo: Wikipedia Commons). Right: Bust²³ of Simon Van der Stel, who gave grants of land for wine farms, founded the city of Stellenbosch, and established the Constantia estate. The bronze bust is now in Stellenbosch (courtesy: Leo van der Stel and Simon van der Stel Stichting).

In 1679, the VOC appointed Simon van der Stel as the tenth Commander of the Cape Colony. He sailed in October, accompanied strangely not by his wife but her sister Cornelia. Simon’s immediate goal was to expand agriculture. Within a month of his arrival, he had explored the Eerste River (First River), the first navigable river Simon encountered east of Cape Town. He navigated north from the coast (False Bay) and spent the night on a small island²⁴ in the river, for safety. This is where he founded Stellenbosch, the ‘bush [or forest] of Stel’ on November 6, 1679. Today, it is the heart of South Africa’s wine country. Simon also planted a vineyard at Rustenberg.

In order to increase the agricultural production, Simon van der Stel gave grants of land to free burghers and immigrants along the Eerste River and its tributaries, and in Paarl. The typical area granted was 60 morgen.²⁵ Influential people often received more than one grant of land, and the wealthiest ones purchased additional land. For example, Henning Hüsing was granted 86 morgen to raise sheep and cattle, and then another 140 for viticulture. He later acquired MeerlustReference Brooke Simons²⁶ and three other properties. A number of historic South African wineries date back to this period, for example De Waal and Blaauwklippen in 1682; Muratie in 1685 (granted to Lourens Campher, a soldier who would marry Ansela van de Caab, a slave later baptized and freed); Zorgvliet, and Rustenberg in 1692; Witteboomen (later High Constantia), Meerlust, and Saxenburg (to the free burgher Joachim Sax) in 1693; Rust en Vrede, and Diemersdal (to the free burgher Hendrik Sneewind) in 1694; or Hazendal (to the German Christoffel Hazenwinkel) in 1699.

Many of Simon van der Stel’s grants of land developed into substantial estates and wine farms. Their owners became the rural aristocracy at the Cape: Ferdinand Apple (Geduld, Vergenoegd), Petruys Kalden (Zandvliet), Gerhard van der Bijl (Vredenburg), Hüsing (Meerlust), just to name a few. Once established and organized, they sometimes opposed the power of the Governor, as Simon’s eldest son and successor Willem Adriaan would discover.

Simon van der Stel also provided grants of land as well as long-term loans and/or farm equipment to those who could not afford them. This was the case for most Huguenot refugees when they arrived at the Colony. The VOC was interested in them mainly as wine farmers.

‘Huguenot’ was the name²⁷ given to French Calvinists since about 1560. Henry IV’s Edict of Nantes (1598) offered them equal rights and free exercise of religion, except in Paris. The Edict was revoked by Louis XIV in 1685 (Edict of Fontainebleau) and Protestantism became illegal in France. The Huguenots fled. The memory of the 1572 Saint Bartholomew’s Massacre was still fresh. Many sought refuge in the Netherlands, which was religiously tolerant (except in regard to the Holy Inquisition). A small number of these Huguenots then relocated at the Cape Colony.

The first Huguenot at the Cape Colony was actually Jan van Riebeeck’s wife, Maria de la Queillerie. But she only visited the Colony. A few Huguenots came in 1671 and were given land near Stellenbosch. But the bulk of them arrived on seven ships in 1688 and 1689. The total number was of the order of 280 or 300, a substantial fraction of the European population at the Cape at the time (around 1000). They brought with them many useful skills, in particular viticulture, and their presence profoundly impacted the Colony. Simon van der Stel gave them grants of land²⁸ along the Berg River in Olifantshoek Valley²⁹ and at the foot of Simonsberg. For example, Boschendal was granted to Jean le Long in 1685 and then sold to Abraham de Villiers in 1715; Plaisir de Merle to Charles Marais in 1687; Laborie to Isaac Taillefert from La Bri in Poitou-Charentes in 1691; Vendome to Jean and Gabriel Le Roux from Vendôme in 1692; Fairview to Steven Verwey and Bellinchamp to Gerrit Janz van Vuuren and his Huguenot wife in 1693; Grande Provence to Pierre Joubert from La Motte-d’Aigues who then purchased La Motte from Hans Hattingh, and La Bourgogne to Pierre de Villiers in 1694; or Bonfoi to Jean le Roux from Blois in 1699. Many of these farms still exist today and produce superb wines.

The VOC insisted on integration. All official matters, including schooling, had to be done in Dutch.³⁰ Within a couple of generations, French was no longer used and French names had changed to Dutch-sounding ones. Around 1713, the Olifantshoek Valley became the De France Hoek, then FrenchHoek, and finally Franschhoek Valley (1805). The town was named FranschhoekReference Browne³¹ in 1860.

In 1685, Simon van der Stel received a grant of land south of Cape Town, in the District of Wynberg, an estate he badly wanted. Shortly after his arrival, he had baskets of soil collected and tested at regular intervals from the fort to the south, in order to identify the best agricultural area. The estate he was granted was huge: 891 morgen, about 15 times the size of the average farm. He named it ‘Constantia’, probably³² after Constantia van Goens, grand-daughter of Commissioner Rijckloff van Goens, to whom he owed the grant of land.³³

Simon spent increasing amounts of time working on his estate, partly using VOC resources. He purchased slaves, built a house, planted fruit trees and vegetables. He imported some 100,000 vine shoots from Europe and the most modern winemaking equipment available. The cultivars he planted are described as ‘Steen, Blue Muscadel, White Muscadel, a small blue grape, and crystal grape’. One cannot be sure which cultivars those are, but reasonable assumptionsReference Jooste³⁴ are that ‘Steen’ is the Chenin Blanc and the ‘Blue Muscadel’ or the ‘small blue grape’ is the Frontignac. The White Muscadel is the Muscat de Frontignan (Muscat à petits grains). In this paper, I will call it White Muscadel. The ‘crystal grape’ is most likely a minor cultivar that produced sweet table grapes.

In 1691 Simon van der Stel was promoted Governor. He retired to his estate in 1699. His son Willem Adriaan, who lived in The Netherlands at the time, succeeded him as Governor. He also granted land for wine farms, such as Groot Parys and Oude Compagnies in 1699; Bellevue in 1701; Meerendal in 1702; Allesverloren and Kloovenburg in 1704, and Theuniskraal in 1705. In 1700, Willem Adriaan was granted his own estate: 400 morgen, to which he added 200. He named it Vergelegen (‘lies far’) because it lies far away from Cape Town by horse-drawn carriage. He planted vines and raised sheep. His brother Frans was granted two farms near Vergelegen: Paardevlei and Parelvallei. By 1709, Vergelegen was the largest wine farm in the Colony, with about 500,000 vines (as compared to 100,000 at Meerlust and 70,000 at Constantia).

The Van der Stel brothers took advantage of their situation in a way that angered many free burghers (who were greedy, too). Willem Adriaan unilaterally decided who could participate in the lucrative wine and meat monopolies. Frans was nicknamed ‘Mylord’ by the free burghers, which suggests that he did not get along with them either. There is no doubt that Willem Adriaan used VOC resources to his advantage at Vergelegen. But then, most VOC officials (at the Cape and elsewhere) looked after their own interests. A list of accusations, probably exaggerated,Reference Brooke Simons^26, Reference Colvin.^{35, 36} by 63 (of about 550) free burghers was smuggled out of the Cape directly to the Heeren XVII. These accusations had the intended impact as Willem Adriaan was replaced by acting Governor Johannes Cornelis d’Ableing. In 1708, Willem Adriaan and Frans were recalled in disgrace to Holland. But Willem Adriaan’s wife stayed at the Cape. In 1710, Vergelegen was divided into four farms and sold. After that, VOC employees were no longer allowed to own land in the Colony. But Simon remained at Constantia. He died in 1712. This marks the end of the Van der Stels in South Africa.

Eighteen VOC governors succeeded Willem Adriaan until 1795. Only a dozen new wine farms were created during these nine decades. One reason was the difficulty of transporting wines by ox cart from distant wineries to Cape Town. Few adequate roads were available until the 1850s.

In Europe, the Dutch encouraged the production of fortified wines. Such wines survive travel by sea much better than the lighter, more acidic wines typical of medieval times all the way to the early seventeenth century. Thus, the Dutch encouraged the distillation of dry wines for the production of alcohol, and the late harvest of other grapes in order to produce stronger and sweeter wines. It became normal to add one or two buckets of brandy to barrels of wine before shipping.³⁷ The same was probably true for wines shipped from the Cape. Large pot-stills exhibited at many historic South African wineries prove that some wines were distilled.³⁸ The alcohol could be used to make brandy, produce a port-type wine, as well as strengthen a wine before shipping.

With the exception of the Constantia wine, not much that is goodReference James³⁹ can be said about the quality of the wines produced at the Cape Colony under Dutch rule. The technology and hygiene used in wine-making were less advanced than in regions such as Bordeaux, which produced the highest-quality wine at the time. Neither the expertise nor the investment needed to update the equipment and processes were available. Some of the wine produced at the Cape was sold locally, but the bulk was sold to the VOC at a fixed price. This wine would be loaded on ships for transport to the VOC headquarters in Batavia or other Dutch settlements. Only a fraction of it ended up in Europe.

Thus, the free burghers had few incentives to invest time and money into the production of high-quality wines since they were not allowed to sell them on the international market, and the VOC dictated how much it was willing to pay locally. Most wine farmers were satisfied with a quality sufficient for VOC needs.

Slavery at the Cape

Since the early days of the Cape Colony, there was never enough manpower for all the work that needed to be done. The solution was slavery.⁴⁰ Between 1652 and the end of the slave trade in 1807, about 60,000 slaves were brought to the Cape Colony. They came from India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Madagascar, and the African coast – mostly Guinea, Angola, and Mozambique. Most African slaves were used for hard labor.

The first slaves imported from Angola and Ghana specifically to do farm work arrived at the Cape in 1658. They were often given a Christian name and the name of the month they arrived. Today, the phone book in Cape Town is filled with names such as February or September (but few July and August, winter time at the Cape, when fewer ships would arrive).

In the early days of the Colony, most of the imported slaves were owned by the VOC. Many of them were women, and the slave lodgeReference Shell⁴¹ at the Cape turned into a brothel at night. As a result, most of the slaves born at the Cape belonged to the VOC. Newborn slaves would be given a Christian name, often followed by Van de Caap (‘from the Cape’). A few lucky women slaves ended up marrying a VOC official or an immigrant, were manumitted, and contributed to the history of South Africa. One example is particularly relevant to the history of wine.

In 1655, Jan van Riebeeck bought Angela (or Ansiela) of Bengal and her three children from Pieter Kemp, a free burgher from Batavia. One of the children was Anna (later, the beautiful Anna de Koningh), born of an extra-marital relationship with a European. In 1662, van Riebeeck sold the family to Abraham Gabbema, who freed them in 1666 when he was transferred to Batavia. Anna received an education and married Captain Oloff Bergh who became the first owner of Constantia after the death of Simon van der Stel. When Oloff passed away, Anna inherited the estate.

The slaves owned by the VOC worked on the Fort, streets and buildings, maintained and expanded the vegetable gardens, loaded and unloaded ships. They also carried water where it was needed. A few VOC slaves were manumitted, in particular if they served as wet nurses. They had to be baptized, speak fluent Dutch, and either find a male slave to replace them or pay an amount of money equivalent to the price of a male slave.

Slaves were also owned by VOC officials. Many of these slaves were purchased from other VOC officials on their way back to the Netherlands, where slavery was illegal. Simon van der Stel bought his first slave this way in 1680. He owned 22 slaves in 1688 and 60 in 1706. Willem Adriaan admitted owning 250 slaves, but his critics claimed that the true number was much higher.

After 1710, most slaves at the Cape Colony were owned by free burghers. They were mostly male and often poorly treated, as it was cheaper to buy fresh slaves than to provide proper care to existing ones. They worked in farms, including viticulture. Finally, a small number of freed slaves owned slaves themselves.

For most of its existence, the slave population at the Cape Colony exceeded the total population of VOC officials, free burghers, and immigrants by as much as a factor of three. For most of these slaves, life was very tough. In 1754, Governor Tulbagh consolidated the many VOC regulations dealing with slaves into the Cape Slave Code, but this did little to better their lives.

The treatment of slaves improved somewhat during the First British occupation (1797–1803). But then the Cape returned to Dutch control during the days of the Batavian Republic. It is only during the second British occupation (1806–1814) that the fate of slaves improved markedly. In 1806, the British passed a set of Amelioration Laws that gave slaves some basic rights, such as allowing slave families to live together, receive reasonable food, shelter, and even some basic education. They also released the VOC-owned slaves from the infamous Slave Lodge.

England passed the Slave Trade Act in 1807. It made the slave trade illegal throughout the British Empire. Now, slaves could only be traded within the Cape Colony. Far fewer slaves were available for purchase, the sale prices went up considerably, and the treatment of slaves improved. Slavery was abolished in all British colonies in 1834 (Slavery Abolition Act of 1833). Ironically, financial compensation was given to slave owners, but not to slaves. Further, the slaves were forced into four-year ‘apprenticeships’. Thus, on December 1, 1838, some 39,000 slaves were finally freed at the Cape Colony. The vast majority of them had nowhere to go and no money to purchase land. Some remained employed by their former owner; others were evicted and forced into poverty.

Constantia under the VOC

The first wine produced by Simon van der Stel at Constantia was white, but the first wine he exported (to Batavia, in 1692) was red. It was described as strong, sweet, and scented. But this was not the famous Constantia wine that was first produced in the 1720s. After Simon’s death in 1712, ConstantiaReference Burman^42, Reference Van der Merwe⁴³ returned to the VOC. It was divided into three parts (Figure 3) and sold in 1716.

Figure 3

Fate of Simon van der Stel’s Constantia (areas in morgen). The names of the key owners and key dates are given. Two unrelated estates are called Klein Constantia. High Constantia was not part of the original Constantia but of Witteboomen, also owned by Simon van der Stel (created by SKE on the basis of information in Ref. Reference Burman42).

The largest part, Bergvliet, consisted of 475 morgen. The second part (224 morgen) included the farm house and kept the original name Constantia. Finally, Klein Constantia was 184 morgen (it is not related to today’s Klein Constantia). Over the next 150 years, the various parts of Simon van der Stel’s Constantia have been renamed, divided, and sometimes expanded.

At the 1716 auction, Oloff Bergh purchased Constantia and the auctioneer, Pieter de Meyer (a VOC employee), purchased Bergvliet and Klein Constantia. He was not supposed to own land and promptly sold Bergvliet and most of Klein Constantia (614 morgen total) to Jan Brommaert as a single unit named Bergvliet. This sale covered his investment, and the remaining 45 morgen were pure profit. He sold them to Johan Jurgen Kotze as Klein Constantia. Kotze soon died and his widow inherited the property. She re-married to Johannes Colijn (Colyn or Coleyn) who managed the property after she died in 1720. Colijn is an important player in the present story.

Bergvliet became a wine estate, but the reputation of its wines did not match that of the wines produced at Constantia or Klein Constantia. In 1783, Bergvliet was split into three parts. The largest part kept the name Bergvliet, the second became Buitenverwachting (Beyond Expectation), and the third was named Nova Constantia. Much of Bergvliet consists of flat sandy soils that require irrigation (Constantia, Klein Constantia, and Buitenverwachting have much higher-quality soil). Nova Constantia contributed to the Constantia wine in the 1800s. Part of Buitenverwachting became Constantia View in 1894. The name changed to Constantia Uitsig in 1941. Around 1990, Buitenverwachting bought much of Constantia Uitsig.

Klein Constantia is where the famous Constantia wine was created by Johannes Colijn (1692–1743). It was at first a white wine from a blend of late harvest (almost raisins) White Muscadel and Steen. Later, he produced a red Constantia using Pontac grapes, with some Muscadel mixed with Steen. While virtually all v. vinifera grapes produce white juice (the color, in the skin, is extracted during the maceration), the juice of the Pontac berries contain deep red juice. Colijn kept his Constantia in sulphurated barrels in which Muscat nuts were burnt to add flavor to the wine. The wine was fortified if shipped in barrels, but usually not when shipped in bottles.

The Steen (Chenin Blanc) is a dry and crisp wine. Today’s South African Steens do not go through the malolactic fermentation and therefore contain some malic⁴⁴ acid. I do not know if the Steen wines produced in the early eighteenth century also contained malic acid but it is likely that they did as the malolactic fermentation is not always spontaneous. The combination of the very sweet and rich late harvest Muscadel (Figure 4) with the crisp and acidic Steen produces a fabulous dessert wine, which combines acidity with very-long lasting and delicate flavors (today’s Vin de Constance is pure White Muscadel with no Steen added). The wine is reminiscent of the Tokaji Aszú – which also involves a blend of acidic wine (mostly from the Furmint) and luscious sweet (noble-rot) aszú grains (normally Furmint as well). But the Constantia wine involves no noble rot.⁴⁵

Figure 4

Clusters of White Muscadel ready for picking. They are left to raisin on the vine until early April, about six weeks later than the normal harvest time. About 10 kg of such grains produce one liter of Vin de Constance (courtesy: Lowell Jooste).

In 1728, in order to access markets beyond the Cape Colony, Colijn offered to supply the VOC with ten to twelve leaguers⁴⁶ of red Constantia and twenty leaguers of white Constantia at below-market price. He quickly received orders for more wine than he could produce. He started farming at the adjacent (and at the time neglected) Constantia estate in order to increase production.

Even though Colijn was under no legal obligation to deliver Constantia wine to the VOC at a cheap price, the VOC soon came to expect annual deliveries from Klein Constantia as well as Constantia. Since Colijn produced wine from grapes grown on both properties, the VOC considered them to be one and the same. By 1733, the VOC asked for (but did not get) the entire production. In 1736, Colijn requested (and received) 100 Rix dollars per aum⁴⁷ of red Constantia and 50 per aum of white Constantia. Resale on the international market was about twice that amount, and this corresponded to about one week’s wages of a skilled laborer.

Johannes Colijn died in 1743 and his son took over management of the farm. The production from Klein Constantia and Constantia continued because of pressure from the VOC to supply a wine that was already in demand on the world market. In 1776, Klein Constantia was purchased by Johannes’ youngest son, Johannes Nicolaas Colijn, who renamed it Hoop op Constantia (Hope of Constantia). The fame of the red and white Constantia wines continued to grow for two more Colijn generations: Lambertus Johannes (1799–1819) and Nicolaas (1819–1857). The peak production occurred in 1825, with 160,000 vines and 52 leaguers of wine. Hoop op Constantia became insolvent in 1857.

The first two owners of ConstantiaReference Burman^42, Reference Van der Merwe⁴³ were the Swede Oloff Bergh (1716–1724) and then his widow Anna de Koningh (1724–1734). Oloff began his service for the VOC as a soldier and, after many misadventures, ended it as commander of the Cape garrison until his retirement in 1701. He did not do much for viticulture at Constantia. After his death, Anna neglected the property. Apparently, she was not interested in wine making at all. The next owner, in 1734, was Carl Georg Wieser. He married the sister of Johannes Colijn, owner of Klein Constantia. It is Johannes who controlled wine making at both Constantia and Klein Constantia. Wieser died in 1759 and Contantia was purchased by his stepson, Jacobus van der Spuij.

Jacobus did not involve himself much with winemaking, but did obtain an agreement from the VOC that the wines from Constantia and Klein Constantia would be sold separately so that each estate could get its share of the profit. Additional cultivars arrived in the Colony: The ‘Spanish muscat’ in 1769 (I am not sure which Muscat this is) and, in 1772, a cultivar from the city of Shiraz in Persia.Reference Schutte⁴⁸ André Jullien wroteReference Jullien⁴⁹ that this Persian grape was called ‘haenapop’ and produced excellent sweet wine. This is hanepoot, probably (related to) the Muscat Alexandria. Note that Jullien does not write ‘sweet wine’ but ‘vin de liqueur’ which imperfectly translates as ‘dessert’ or ‘sweet’ wine, but is also used to describe noble-rot and sometimes fortified wines.

The fifth owner of Constantia was Jan Serrurier. He held the farm for much of 1778. He hoped for a healthy wine harvest to cover his debts, but severe hail ruined the crop. And then Hendrik Cloete purchased the estate. Constantia emerged into greatness under him and his descendants.

Hendrik Cloete Sr. (Groot Hendrik, 1725–1799) was the great grandson of a German settler at the Cape. He was a very wealthy and aggressive land owner. He purchased the dilapidated Constantia in 1778, rebuilt the house and the cellar, and replanted. Despite having been poorly maintained, the value of the Constantia farm had increased over the years. Wieser had purchased it for 20,800 gulden; Van der Spuij for 45,000; Serrurier for 53,000; Cloete for 60,000 plus 30,000 for all the movable equipment and 16 slaves.

Cloete expanded the techniques developed by Colijn to produce red and white Constantia. By 1788, Hendrik Cloete employed 60 slaves on his estate. He is believed to be the first to have produced a red Constantia that included some Pontac.⁵⁰ The original Frontignac–White Muscadel blend became a Pontac–White Muscadel blend. The Pontac was first referred to as the ‘Constantia grape’ in 1802. It was pruned close to the ground (no taller than 90 cm). The grapes were left to raisin on the vine and were kept free of bugs and insects (removed from the vines by hand by slaves).

Manure was buried in trenches cut parallel to the rows of vines. A hundred wagon-loads of dung were transported from Muizenberg to Constantia for that purpose.³² Harvest was done on a sunny day at midday, after the dew had evaporated. Rotting and half-dried grains were carefully removed. Three slaves treaded the grapes in each of four wine presses. The fermentation finished in casks, and then the juice and skins were separated. The wine, matured in sulphurized⁵¹ casks, was transferred into fresh sulphurized casks every three months in the first year. The use of slave labor was extensive. The Constantia wine was considered best when three to six years of age.

In 1784, Hendrik Cloete requested to be relieved from the expectation to deliver almost half of his production to the VOC at a cheap price. The VOC refused. In 1793, his argument was heard again at the Cape by Nederburgh and Frykenius, Commissioners General of the VOC. On April 2, 1793, Cloete signed a contract that obliged Constantia to deliver 15 aums each of the best red and the best white Constantia, annually, at a price forever fixed at 150 Cape guilders per aum.⁵² This obligation was registered against the Title Deeds of the property. In exchange, Cloete was allowed to sell or export himself any excess wine he could produce.

From a business perspective, this appears to be a monumental mistake. Why would he commit himself and future Constantia owners to sell such a large fraction of his very best wine, forever, at a fixed price? A collection of Cloete’s lettersReference Schutte⁴⁸ provides insight as to why Hendrik himself proposed this disastrous contract to the VOC. He was obsessed with not being free to sell any of his own wine himself, on the international market. The contract he signed allowed him to do just that. He probably hoped to be able to increase the production far beyond the 30 aums. He had no way of knowing that the British were about to take over and that the VOC would disappear within a few years. Further, the production of this wine relied heavily on slave labor and the days of slavery at the Cape were numbered. But the international reputation of the Constantia wine was nearing its peak, and Hendrik wanted to capitalize on that (Figure 5).

Figure 5

A 1791 Constantia, one of several bottles found at Alnwick Castle, of Harry Potter fame. I was told that the wine was superb. Chemical analysis revealed 12.8% alcohol, 145 g/l sugar, and 1.45 g/l total acidity. Today’s Vin de Constance has about 14% alcohol, 200 g/l sugar, and a similar acidity (courtesy: Groot Constantia; analysis information: Lowell Jooste; photo: SKE).

Hendrik Cloete Sr. retired after the death of his wife in 1799. His son, Hendrik Cloete Jr., inherited Constantia as well as the obligation to deliver every year much of his best wine to the Cape government at a cheap price.

In December, 1789, Joseph Russell, Jr. on his way to the Far East estimated that ‘Cape Town contained about 1,200 houses and 10,000 inhabitants, exclusive of the military and slaves, both of which are very numerous’. He was unhappy that ‘foreigners are obliged to pay twice as much as the inhabitants and 4 times what the company's ships and troops are charged’. But he also comments about wine. ‘They make a great deal of wine here of different kinds but the best in this country and I believe as good as any in the world is that which is made at Constantia [...] there is only about 10 or 12 acres which is capable of producing the proper grape, from this spot they make about 30 pipes of wine annually, which is worth here £70 Sterling per pipe [...] I think I never tasted any wine so delicious’.

The Early Years of British Rule

Following the 1789 French Revolution, France occupied the Netherlands which became the (pro-French) Batavian⁵³ Republic in 1795. William V of Orange, Stadtholder of the Netherlands, asked the British to take over the Dutch colonies for safekeeping, and ordered the VOC governors to comply (the so-called Kew Letters). The British gladly complied as they were concerned that Napoleon would take over the Cape and thus control the trade with the Far East. The British landed at the Cape in June 1795, encountering only token resistance. The total population was about 50,000. At least half of them were slaves. Along the Atlantic coast, the Cape Colony reached the current border with Namibia. To the East, it stretched past today’s Port Elizabeth to about East London. To the North, it was bounded by the arid plains of the Karoo.

Following the Treaty of Amiens (1803) between France and Great Britain, the Batavian Republic regained control of the Cape, but the British returned in 1806 as Louis Bonaparte (Napoleon’s brother) became King of the Netherlands, and then France annexed the country (1810–1813). At the Treaty of Vienna, following Napoleon’s final defeat at Waterloo in 1815, the Cape became officially a part of the British Empire.

The British promptly outlawed torture and the most brutal forms of execution.Reference Hill²² The VOC-style monopoly on goods produced at the Cape disappeared, but existing contracts were honored. Both Colijn and Cloete hoped to be freed from the disastrous 1793 contract, but the new authorities were all too happy to keep the contract just as it was. Instead of delivering to the VOC, Colijn and Cloete now had to deliver to the British Supreme Command at the Cape. Even though, since 1799, the VOC no longer existed, it was only after 1827 that the obligation to deliver wines at a price fixed in 1793 was no longer be enforced.

The first couple of decades of British rule at the Cape were a golden age for Constantia and other South African wines. English merchants imposed quality standards and the wine trade became much more sophisticated.Reference Retif⁵⁴ As early as 1807, the first permanent British governor, Alexander Du Pré organized agricultural shows that included wine exhibits. This generated competition among wine farmers and contributed to raising the quality of the wines. England became the major market for the best South African wines. The more common wines were consumed locally. But the wine and brandy production was insufficient for the local needs. From 1804 to 1814, the Cape Colony imported⁴⁶ some 5000 leaguers of wine and 400 of brandy from the Canary Islands and Europe.

In the early 1800s the fame of the Constantia wine was at its peak. The production could not cope with the demand. Constantia, Hoop op Constantia, and Nova Constantia were the major contributors. But the production of the Constantia wine was labor-intensive and always small. In 1813 and 1819, the grape harvests failed.

Hendrik Cloete Jr. died in 1818. His widow, Anna Catharina Scheller, took charge. In 1823, she divided Constantia for her two sons. The smaller part, sold to Johan Gerhard Cloete, was named Klein Constantia. This name had not been in use since the original (Colijn’s) Klein Constantia had become Hoop op Constantia in 1776 (Figure 3). The larger part, sold to Jacob Pieter Cloete, officially became Groot Constantia in 1824.

Orders for red and white Constantia were pouring in from New Zealand, India, England, France, and other countries. The most popular wines in the United States at the time came from Madeira.⁵⁵ But the Constantia wine was known there as well. Among the artifacts discovered in the Severn (sunk in 1774 and found in 2004: the Roosevelt Inlet shipwreck), was a bottle fragmentReference Van den Bossche⁵⁶ of Constantia wine (Figure 6).

Figure 6

Bottle fragment from the Severn with the old Constantia seal,⁵⁵ ‘Constantia Wyn’ (c. 1760). More recent seals were marked ‘J.P. Cloete – Constantia Wine’ to distinguish them from the lookalike wines produced by van Reenen at High Constantia (Courtesy: Lowell Jooste).

Thomas Jefferson planted American and hybrid vie cuttings at MonticelloReference Johnson^57, Reference Hatch⁵⁸ but was unsuccessful with v. vinifera.⁵⁹ There is no evidence that he purchased or planted any cuttings from South Africa even though he was familiar with Cape wines. Some confusion about the grapes planted by Jefferson at Monticello is related to his (successful) efforts with the Alexander,⁶⁰ a hybrid he received from Peter Legaux in 1802. The Alexander was known under names such as ‘Tasker’s’, ‘Constantia’, ‘Schnykill’, ‘Cape’, and even ‘Cape of Good Hope Grape’, even though it is unrelated to the Constantia grape (Pontac).

One of the most famous lovers of Constantia wine was Napoleon. A General Statement of Wines Supplied for General Bonaparte’s Establishment (October 1816–June 1817) showsReference Roux⁶¹ that the monthly tally was the equivalent of about 30 bottles of Constantia during his exile at St. Helena. The Count de Las Cases reported that on his deathbed, Napoleon refused any food but a glass of Constantia. This may or may not be true, but probably isn’t. Indeed, Las Cases was expelled from St. Helena by Governor Sir Hudson Lowe in 1816, long before Napoleon’s death in 1821. Las Cases was actually at the Cape when Napoleon died. I have found no mention of Napoleon’s last drink in the account of his (slow) death.Reference Antommarchi⁶²

Letters from Downing Street to Constantia discuss organizing a shipment of 60 casks of Constantia for King George IV. When emissaries for King Louis-Philippe of France arrived at the Cape in 1833, they ordered over 1200 liters of red and over 1000 liters of white Constantia. Thus, Louis-Philippe briefly became the largest buyer of Constantia wine.

Constantia was not just famous among the wealthy and powerful. It was known at all levels of society. It is mentioned in Chapter 30 of Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility (‘My dear, said she, entering, I have just recollected that I have some of the finest old Constantia wine in the house that ever was tasted...’). It is in Chapter X of Charles Dickens’ The Mystery of Edwin Drood (‘…the blooming old lady made all haste to the dining-room closet, to produce from it the support embodied in a glass of Constantia and a home-made biscuit’). It is also found in French literature, as in Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal, poem XXVI: ‘Je préfère au constance, à l'opium, au nuits, // L'élixir de ta bouche où l'amour se pavane...’. In 1866, JullienReference Jullien⁴⁹ wrote that the vineyard of Constantia produced dessert wines among the best in the world, ‘immediately after those of Tokay’ (the Tokaji Aszú from Eastern Hungary, not the Alsatian tokay grape now called pinot gris).

Meanwhile, at the Cape Colony, any farmers who produced sweet Muscat wine borrowed the Constantia name, even though these wines were of much lesser quality. This compromised the reputation and price of the true Constantia wine on the British market. Competition was particularly fierce with High Constantia (Figure 3), located immediately north of Groot Constantia. This property was purchased by Sebastiaan Valentijn van Reenen, Jr. in 1822. He planted thousands of Pontac, White Muscadel, Frontignac, and Steen vines, produced a wine similar to the Constantia, and sold it as the real thing. He could also sell it much cheaper since he was under no obligation to deliver a large fraction of his wine to the Cape government at a low price.

Harriet Low Hillard was one of (many) visitors to Constantia. Her commentsReference Low Hillard⁶³ about her visit in 1834 give us a snapshot of the situation at the time. She visited Jacob Cloete’s Groot Constantia ‘where all the celebrated Constantia wine is made.’ This is where she met ‘… a miss van Reenen’, probably the daughter of Sebastiaan van Reenen who competed so fiercely with Constantia. Hillard wrote that only 30 leaguers⁴⁶ of the real Constantia were made annually. The estate produced ‘… different kinds of Constantia wine, the white Muscadel and the red, the Frontignan made of a light-colored grape, and the Pontac which is the most expensive and the most rare. There are now several other places built near Mr. Cloete to which they have given the name of Constantia, but this is the real one.’ She concludes with ‘They have a great many slaves who do the work of the farm.’

The red Constantia was made of shriveled Pontac, Muscadel mixed with Steen, and a dash of hanepoot. The white Constantia was one-third white Muscadel, two-thirds Steen, and a dash of hanepoot. Even though some of the wine was sold in half aum barrels, we get an idea of the volume of wine produced from the orders of wine labels for the part of the production sold in bottles.⁶⁴ In 1844, Jacob Cloete ordered 3000 labels printedReference Van der Merwe⁴³ by the newspaper De Zuid-Afrikaan. In 1847, the order was for 500 ‘Frontignan’, 500 ‘Pontac’, 1000 ‘Red’, 1000 ‘White’, 200 ‘Sparkling’; in 1848, 600 ‘Frontignan’, 600 ‘Pontac’, 600 ‘Red’, 800 ‘White’; in 1849, 1000 ‘Red’ and 1000 ‘White’.

The End of an Era and the Road to Modern South African Wines

Modern South African Wines

The political and economic pressures as well as continuing social unrest provided abundantly clear indications that a government based on Apartheid could not survive in the long run. It was not a matter of ‘if’ but rather ‘when’ and ‘how’ a peaceful or bloody transition would take place. Secret negotiations between P.W. Botha and Nelson Mandela started in 1989. One year later the ban on the ANC was lifted and Mandela was freed. The first truly democratic elections in South Africa took place in 1994. The ANC won in a landslide. Mandela became President in 1995. Apartheid was no more. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, provided the much needed mechanism to heal the deep wounds of decades of racial injustice.

The international embargo against South Africa was lifted. This had an enormous impact on South African wines (Figure 7). This renaissance started as early 1990 with a sharp increase in foreign investment, the number of wineries and wine labels, and ‘flying winemakers’ bringing their knowledge and experience from Europe and North America to wineries in South Africa.

Figure 7

Number of new wine farms (in VOC and British days) and wineries or wine labels (in modern days) established per year.Reference Platter⁷⁷ The small star in the early 1800s marks the short years of the Batavian Republic. The numbers are approximate after 1990 as numerous wineries have been sold, merged, and/or renamed (figure: T. Michael Gibbons).

In 1991, the quota system imposed by the KWV was abolished, thus opening the door to the establishment of new viticultural areas and the expansion of existing ones. In 1997, the KWV changed from a cooperative to a company. It stopped buying excess production for distillation, thus forcing winemakers to produce higher quality wines. While in 1990 only about 30% of the grapes ended up becoming wine (the rest being distilled or sold as fruit juice or table grapes), almost 70% of the grapes became wine in 2003.

In 2002, the KWV split into the VinPro cooperative, which promotes producers’ interests, and KWV Ldt which promotes trade. Today, many historic wine farms have become highly successful wineries and the estates include excellent restaurants and sometimes hotels or even resorts.Reference Platter⁷⁷ Groot and Klein Constantia now produce some of the very best South African wines and successfully compete in the world market.

The Wine and Spirit Board, established by the Liquor Products Act of 1989, is appointed by the Minister of Agriculture and consists of 12 members. Four of them are producers, four are wholesalers, two are Department of Agriculture officials, and two are involved in wine and viticultural research. An independent chair is appointed. The Board appoints the members of a dozen committees, which have specific tasks such as the implementation of the WoO system.

The WoO system designates production Regions, Districts, Wards, and Estates. Their original boundaries were often based on those of municipalities rather than on viticultural conditions. Once established, such boundaries are difficult to change. Most Wards are subdivisions of a District or Region with a distinct microclimate, soil, or type of wine. The origin of the grapes must be confirmed by the Cellar Master. Estates are single property or multiple contiguous properties run as a unit. The grapes must be pressed (but not necessarily fermented) on site. There were only 14 Estate wines when the WoO system was established in 1973, and about 70 a decade later. But today, the concept of Estate has lost much of its appeal, as customers rely more on the reputation of the winery than on the complexity of the label.

The best South AfricanReference James³⁹ red wines tend to be ‘traditional European’ in style, by which I mean more emphasis on tannins from the fruit than from the oak. Besides some excellent dinner white wines such as macerated chardonnay or viognier wines, South Africa produces many wonderful crisp white wines that do not go through the malolactic fermentation.

Today, South Africa is the eighth largest world wine producer (about 4% of the world’s production by volume) with about 3500 primary wine producers. Over 100,000 hectares are under vine (wine grapes) producing over 870 million liters of wine (excluding brandies and grape juice). White cultivars account for about 55% of the total.

The dominant cultivars (area in parenthesis, in 1000 ha) are as follows. In white: Chenin Blanc (18.2), Colombar (11.7), Sauvignon Blanc (9.5), Chardonnay (7.9), Muscat Alexandria (2.0), Semillon (1.2), Viognier (0.9), Muscat de Frontignan (0.7), and others (3.1). In red: Cabernet Sauvignon (11.8), Shiraz (10.5), Pinotage (6.9), Merlot (6.3), Ruby Cabernet (2.3), Cinsaut (1.9), Pinot Noir (1.1), Cabernet Franc (0.9), and other (3.3).

The sharp increase in foreign investment in the early 1990s has now largely diminished. Wine growers hesitate to plant new vineyards and sometimes fail to properly maintain existing ones. Much of this is caused by political uncertainty. The government has yet to formulate medium- and long-term goals with a clear plan and timetable to achieve specific milestones. Serious issues related to crime, corruption, and education are not being addressed.

The history of wine in South Africa is far from finished. It is in a rapidly-evolving phase, and many of the data in the last section of this paper will need to be updated in the future.

The largest to smallest wine regions (the area of wine grapes is in 1,000 hectares) are Stellenbosch (16.5), Paarl (16.2), Robertson (14.6), Malmesbury (13.7), Breedekloof (12.8); Olifants River (10.1), Worcester (8.7), Orange River (4.8), and Little Karoo (2.6).

The wine Regions of the geographical unit Western Cape, with Districts and (Wards) are as follows (Figure 8).

Figure 8

Selected wine regions (CAPS) and districts (italics) near the Cape. Constantia is a ward (map: Kristin Reid and Jo Layne Skillman).

Breede River Valley:Breedekloof (Goudini and Slanghoek), Robertson (Agterkliphoogte, Bonnievale, Boesmansrivier, Eilandia, Hoopsrivier, Klaasvoogds, Le Chasseur, McGregor, and Vinkrivier), Worcester (Hex River Valley, Nuy, and Scherpenheuvel).

Cape South Coast:Cape Agulhas (Elim), Elgin, Overberg (Elandskloof, Greyton, Klein River, and Theewater), Plettenberg Bay, Swellendam (Bulleljags, Malgas, Stormsvlei), Walker Bay (Bot River, Hemel-en-Aarde Ridge, Upper Hemel-en-Aarde Valley, Sunday’s Gle, Upper Hemel-en-Aarde Valley, Stanford Hills). Three wards are not in a district: Herbestsdale, Napier, and Stilbaai East.

Coastal Region:Cape Point, Darling (Groenekloof), Franschhoek, Paarl (Simonsberg-Paarl and Voor Paardeberg), Stellenbosch (Banghoek, Bottlelary, Devon Valley, Jonkershoek Valley, Papegaaiberg, Polkadraai Hills, and Simonsberg-Stellenbosch), Swartland (Malmesbury and Riebeekberg), Tulbagh, Tygerberg (Durbanville and Philadelphia), Wellington. Constantia and Hout Bay Wards are not part of a district.

Klein Karoo:Calitzdorp and Langeberg-Garcia. Five wards are outside these districts: Montagu, Outeniqua, Tradouw, Tradouw Highlands, and Upper Langkloof.

Olifants River:Citrusdal Mountain (Piekenierskloof), Citrusdal Valley, Lutzville Valley (Koekenaap). Three wards are not part of a district: Bamboes Bay, Spruitdrift, and Vredendal.

Ceres Plateau (Ceres) is not part of a region, and Cederberg, Lamberts Bay, Prince Albert Valley, and Swartberg are wards not associated with a district or region.

The geographical unit Northern Cape has no region, two districts (Douglas and Sutherland-Karoo), and three wards (Central Orange River, Hartswater, and Rietrivier FS).

The geographical unit Eastern Cape has just one ward, St Francis Bay.

The geographical units Kwazulu-Natal and Limpopo have no region, district, or ward.

The Boberg region appellation is used for fortified wines from Paarl and Tulbagh.