There are mythologies that are scattered, broken up, all around us. We stand on what I call the terminal moraine of shattered mythic systems that once structured society. They can be detected all around us. You can select any of these fragments that activate your imagination for your own use. Let it help shape your own relationship to the unconscious system out of which these symbols have come.
Joseph Campbell, Thou Art That, p.86-87
Recently, the South African Post Office, issued a postage stamp portraying a young Khoikhoi woman named Krotoa, also known as Eva to the Dutch. Krotoa became an important figure in South African history. The recognition of Krotoa on one of our postage stamps was of considerable import to me personally as it must have been for many others.
Krotoa was a 9th great grandmother of mine and as such I have a special affinity with her. Indeed she is "mother" of countless South Africans of many races. Through her we are all connected. She embodies and reflects in many ways the "shattered mythic" essence of the South African psyche. Her story is our story.
The stamp, "designed by Lien Botha, features a drawing from the Western Cape Archives portraying Krotoa and a VOC (the Dutch East India Company) ship from a painting by Aernhout Smit (1683). These images are superimposed onto a contemporary photograph taken at Milnerton beach with Table Mountain in the background. The Commemorative folder cover also features the face of Krotoa, this time encircled by a wreath of tulips which alludes to the Company's Garden" (1,2)
Krotoa is probably the most written about woman in South African history. The Post Office Souvenir Folder (3) gives us a tantalising glimpse into the life of this remarkable but enigmatic young woman...
Krotoa was born in about 1642 on Robben Island, a decade before the arrival of Jan van Riebeeck. She was the first Khoikhoi woman to appear in the European records of the early settlement at the Cape as an individual personality who interacted socially and culturally with the Dutch settlers.
Krotoa's brother-in-law is said to have been Oudasoa, a chief of the Cochoquas. When she was young, she worked in the household of Jan van Riebeeck, the first governor of the Cape Colony.
As a teenager, Krotoa learned Dutch and Portuguese and like her uncle, Autshumao (known as Harry or Herrie by the Dutch) - a Coringhaicona Khoikhoi leader and trader, she worked as an interpreter for the Dutch who wanted to trade goods for cattle. Krotoa's role as interpreter extended beyond trading, as she was also instrumental in negotiating with the 'Peninsulars', whose foreman was Doman, regarding conflicts around land that erupted into formal war in 1659.
Since Krotoa travelled frequently between the Dutch colony and the Cochoquas, she came to embody the notion of an in-between figure, but found little happiness in either community. On 3 May 1662, she was baptised into the Christian religion by a visiting parson, Petrus Sibelius, in the church inside the Fort de Goede Hoop.
On 26 April 1664, she married Pieter van Meerhoff, a Danish surgeon. She was the first Khoikhoi to marry according to Christian customs, and this marriage is the first between a European and a Khoi at the Cape. In May 1665, the couple left the Cape for Robben Island where Van Meerhoff became superintendent. He died on 27 February 1668 on an expedition to Madagascar.
On 30 September 1668 she returned to the mainland with her children. According to VOC reports, she was suffering from alcoholism and left the Castle in the settlement to be with her family. In February 1669, she was imprisoned at the Castle and then banished to Robben Island for disorderly conduct. She returned to the mainland on many occasions just to find herself once more banished to Robben Island. Three of her children survived infancy. She died on 29 July 1674 at the Cape and was buried on 30 September 1674 in the church at the Fort.
Krotoa's eldest daughter, Pieternella, married Daniel Zaaijman, a friend of Van Riebeeck's.
They lived in Madagascar for a while, but returned to the Cape upon the departure of the VOC from the island. Because of Pieternella's documented descendants, Krotoa is regarded a significant ancestor for many South Africans across various races.Krotoa is described as an "in-between figure" reminding me of Brighid of the Celts (4).
Like Brighid, Krotoa is the 'Lady of the Shores'. She greets the European settlers as they come ashore. The shore is one of those magical in-between places that so fascinated the Celts and certainly the Strandlopers of the Cape. These in-between places, sometimes called "thin places", such as shorelines, fountains, wells, mountain passes, doorways and so on, are go-betweens, corridors. The shore is neither dry land, nor is it the ocean, yet it is the meeting place of both. In Krotoa, Africa and Europe meets. If we consider that the land represents our solid, material world, while the sea represents the Great Cosmic womb of all life, the intuitive side of our nature, we can see that the shore is a meeting place between one world and another and a young Khoikoi girl the bridge between Black and White South Africans.
oOo
Relationship Chart
Krotoa (Eva vd Kaap) - Colin Garvie
Acknowledgements:
1. Botha's interpretation of Krotoa was derived from; Sketches representing the Native Tribes, Animals and Scenery of Southern Africa, from drawings made by the late Mr Samuel Daniell, engraved by William Daniell, London, 1820, Courtesy of Western Cape Archives and Records Service - M1052 (photograph) and J 741 DAN (publication).
2. William Fehr Collection, Iziko Museums, Cape Town - ship from Aernout Smit painting of Cape Town, 1683. Carine Zaayman, Michaelis School of Fine Art, University of Cape Town.
3. Setempe, South African Stamp News, Vol.17, No.3, September - December 2012.
4. Wendy M. Reynolds, The Goddess Brighid, http://www.millersv.edu/~english/homepage/duncan/medfem/bride.html
Sources:
Karel Schoeman, 2009. Seven Khoi Lives. Cape Biographies of the Seventeenth Century. Pretoria: Protea.
Dan Sleigh, 1938, Eilande, recently translated from Afrikaans by Andre Brink (in Dutch: 'Stemmen uit zee'/in English: 'Islands').
SA Philatelic Services, Customer Services: http://www.postoffice.co.za, http://www.virtualpostoffice.co.za
Internet Resources:
http://v1.sahistory.org.za/pages/people/bios/krotoa.htm
http://chnm.gmu.edu/wwh/p/69.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krotoa
http://ancestry24.com/eva-krotoa-van-die-kaap/
http://www.geni.com/people/Krotoa-Eva-van-die-Kaap/
http://www.southafrica.to/history/history.html
©Colin G Garvie HomePage: http://www.garvies.co.za
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