Mokopane, formerly known as Potgietersrus, is a town in the

Limpopo Limpopo () is the northernmost Provinces of South Africa, province of South Africa. It is named after the Limpopo River, which forms the province's western and northern borders. The term Limpopo is derived from Rivombo (Livombo/Lebombo), a ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. The town name was changed to Mokopane in 2003 in honour of a local Ma Nrebele leader, King Mghombane Gheghana, who ruled the area before being conquered by the Voortrekkers. Mokopane is the

Northern Sotho Sepedi, also known as Northern Sotho, is one of South Africa’s twelve official languages and belongs to the Bantu language family, specifically the Sotho-Tswana group. The language is spoken mainly in Limpopo Province, and to a lesser exten ...

form of the king's name and is hence erroneous, even though the majority language in the area is Northern Sotho. Five kingdoms in the vicinity of the town are Kekana (Moshate), Langa (Mapela), Lebelo (Garasvlei), and Langa (Bakenburg). It is still referred to as Potgietersrus or "Potties". Two hours from

Gauteng Gauteng ( , ; Sotho-Tswana languages, Sotho-Tswana for 'place of gold'; or ) is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. Situated on the Highveld, Gauteng is the smallest province by land area in South Africa. Although Gauteng accounts f ...

by road, the town acts as a getaway destination and as a stop-over for travelers "en route" to

Botswana Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory part of the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the sou ...

Zimbabwe file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...

and

Kruger National Park Kruger National Park () is a national park in South Africa covering an area of in the provinces of Limpopo and Mpumalanga in the country's northeast. It extends from north to south and from east to west. The administrative headquarters are i ...

. The area is typical

bushveld The Bushveld (from Afrikaans: ''bosveld'', Afrikaans: ''bos'' 'bush' and ) is a Tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands, sub-tropical woodland ecoregion of Southern Africa. The ecoregion straddles the Tropic of Capricorn ...

with many

Vachellia ''Vachellia'' is a genus of flowering plants in the legume family, Fabaceae, commonly known as thorn trees or acacias. It belongs to the subfamily Mimosoideae. Its species were considered members of genus '' Acacia'' until 2009. ''Vachellia'' ...

and

Senegalia ''Senegalia'' (from Senegal and '' Acacia senegal'' (L.) Willd.) is a genus of flowering plants in the family Fabaceae. It belongs to the Mimosoid clade. Until 2005, its species were considered members of ''Acacia.'' The genus was considered po ...

trees (formerly part of the

acacia ''Acacia'', commonly known as wattles or acacias, is a genus of about of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. Initially, it comprised a group of plant species native to Africa, South America, and Austral ...

genus) as well as

aloe ''Aloe'' (; also written ''Aloë'') is a genus containing over 650 species of flowering plant, flowering succulent plant, succulent plants.WFO (2022): Aloe L. Published on the Internet;http://www.worldfloraonline.org/taxon/wfo-4000001341. Acc ...

s, which blooms in June and July. The Zebediela Citrus Estate, 55 km to the southeast, is one of the largest citrus farms in the southern hemisphere.

History

In 1852, Mokopane was called Vredenburg, which means "the town of peace" thus named by the Voortrekkers, a pioneering group of

Boers Boers ( ; ; ) are the descendants of the proto Afrikaans-speaking Free Burghers of the eastern Cape frontier in Southern Africa during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. From 1652 to 1795, the Dutch East India Company controlled the Dutch ...

who had trekked north-eastward from the

Cape Colony The Cape Colony (), also known as the Cape of Good Hope, was a British Empire, British colony in present-day South Africa named after the Cape of Good Hope. It existed from 1795 to 1802, and again from 1806 to 1910, when it united with three ...

in the 19th century into South Africa's interior. Later, in 1858, the Voortrekker legacy continued when the town was renamed "'Pietpotgietersrust'" (), in honour of Piet Potgieter, who had been fatally wounded in the Makapan Cave attack that took place four years prior. He was the eldest son of the Voortrekker leader Andries Potgieter. The memorialised town name was later shortened to Potgietersrus. As the years progressed, many factors, such as malaria and hostility between the Voortrekkers and the Ndebele people, caused the trekkers to abandon the Potgieterus settlement in 1870. Later, the site was re-occupied from 1890 onward. The historic and archaeologically significant

Makapansgat Makapansgat () (or Makapan Valley World Heritage Site) is an archaeological location within the Makapansgat and Zwartkrans Valleys, northeast of Mokopane in Limpopo province, South Africa. It is an important palaeontological site, with the loca ...

caves are 15 km north of the town. Recovery of "

Homo habilis ''Homo habilis'' ( 'handy man') is an extinct species of archaic human from the Early Pleistocene of East and South Africa about 2.4 million years ago to 1.65 million years ago ( mya). Upon species description in 1964, ''H. habilis'' was highly ...

" habitation has been made at these caves. The remains of "

Australopithecus africanus ''Australopithecus africanus'' is an extinct species of australopithecine which lived between about 3.3 and 2.1 million years ago in the Late Pliocene to Early Pleistocene of South Africa. The species has been recovered from Taung, Sterkfontei ...

" have also been found in the caves. The Arend Dieperink Museum portrays the history of the town, from the ape-man at Makapansgat,

Bushmen The San peoples (also Saan), or Bushmen, are the members of any of the indigenous hunter-gatherer cultures of southern Africa, and the Indigenous peoples of Africa, oldest surviving cultures of the region. They are thought to have diverged fro ...

paintings and early activities in the area up to the

South African War The Second Boer War (, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, Transvaal War, Anglo–Boer War, or South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer republics (the South African Republic and ...

and more recent times.

Culture

The stunning bushveld environment and influences from North Sotho, Ndebele, Tsonga, Afrikaans, and English cultures give Mokopane a unique character. There are also ancient caves, the "Big Five", San

rock painting In archaeology, rock arts are human-made markings placed on natural surfaces, typically vertical stone surfaces. A high proportion of surviving historic and prehistoric rock art is found in caves or partly enclosed rock shelters; this type al ...

s, curios, bushveld food and drinks such as

biltong Biltong is a form of air-dried, cured meat which originated in Southern Africa. Southern African countries include South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Zambia, Malawi, Botswana, Lesotho and Eswatini. Various types of meat are used to produce ...

(dried meat) and mampoer (a potent alcoholic drink), tropical gardens and traditional dancing. In the adjacent township of

Mahwelereng Mahwelereng is a township in the Mogalakwena Local Municipality of the Waterberg District Municipality of the Limpopo Province of South Africa, It is about 2 km from Mokopane. The township is a product of Apartheid South Africa's policies ...

, traditional lifestyles, set against the spectacular Waterberg, can be observed. Mokopane also offers outdoor activities ranging from hiking, camping, and 4 × 4 trails to

birding Birdwatching, or birding, is the observing of birds, either as a recreational activity or as a form of citizen science. A birdwatcher may observe by using their naked eye, by using a visual enhancement device such as binoculars or a telescope, ...

angling Angling (from Old English ''angol'', meaning "hook") is a fishing technique that uses a fish hook attached to a fishing line to tether individual fish in the mouth. The fishing line is usually manipulated with a fishing rod, although rodless te ...

, and game viewing. Mokopane is home to the Arend Dieperink Museum which once served as a school and now houses a remarkable cultural-historical collection of Voortrekker and African (Pedi and Ndebele) items. From the so called 'ape-men' in Makapan's Cave to the Anglo-Boer War and more modern times, the museum depicts the history of the town and its environs.

Economy

The economy of Mokopane was primarily based on agriculture until the opening of Anglo American's platinum mine. Currently, the mine is the biggest contributor to the local economy. Recently, interest has been displayed by other mining companies to start up, but community resistance around mining remains the main reason for the slow growth in mining. The Mokopane area is one of South Africa's richest

agricultural Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created f ...

areas, producing

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

tobacco Tobacco is the common name of several plants in the genus '' Nicotiana'' of the family Solanaceae, and the general term for any product prepared from the cured leaves of these plants. More than 70 species of tobacco are known, but the ...

cotton Cotton (), first recorded in ancient India, is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure ...

beef Beef is the culinary name for meat from cattle (''Bos taurus''). Beef can be prepared in various ways; Cut of beef, cuts are often used for steak, which can be cooked to varying degrees of doneness, while trimmings are often Ground beef, grou ...

maize Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago from wild teosinte. Native American ...

peanut The peanut (''Arachis hypogaea''), also known as the groundnut, goober (US), goober pea, pindar (US) or monkey nut (UK), is a legume crop grown mainly for its edible seeds. It is widely grown in the tropics and subtropics by small and large ...

s and

citrus ''Citrus'' is a genus of flowering trees and shrubs in the family Rutaceae. Plants in the genus produce citrus fruits, including important crops such as oranges, mandarins, lemons, grapefruits, pomelos, and limes. ''Citrus'' is nativ ...

. The area around Mokopane is rich in minerals with the mining of

platinum Platinum is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a density, dense, malleable, ductility, ductile, highly unreactive, precious metal, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name origina ...

diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Diamond is tasteless, odourless, strong, brittle solid, colourless in pure form, a poor conductor of e ...

, and

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

Climate

Mokopane lies 1,150m above sea level. Its climate is a local steppe climate with little rainfall throughout the year. Köppen and Geiger classified this location as BSh. The average temperature in Mokopane is 27.3 °C , 81.14 °F. The annual rainfall is 495 mm , 19.5 inches. Precipitation is the lowest in July, with an average of 1 mm , 0.0 inch. Most precipitation here falls in January, averaging 94 mm , 3.7 inch. January is the hottest month at an average temperature of 23.4 °C , 74.1 °F. June is the coldest month, with temperatures averaging 13.0 °C , 55.4 °F

Notable People

Daniel Heese Carl August Daniel Heese (24 February 1867 – 23 August 1901) was a South African missionary murdered during the Second Boer War. Although two officers of the Bushveldt Carbineers (BVC) were tried in connection with the murder and acquitt ...

*Thapelo Molomo (Idols 2022 winner)

References

External links

Mogalakwena municipality infosite
accessed 27 August 2014. {{Authority control Populated places in the Mogalakwena Local Municipality