ct to be promptly executed, which was indeed what happened. This was ordered by Mzilikazi, and conducted according to the understanding that no royal blood be spilled. The prince, who was at that time aged between 13 and 15, was either garrotted or his neck was broken. The same fate was also ordained for other princes, the first of which, uBuhhlelo, was executed in a similar manner, although the youngest, Lobengula, was secreted away by the Induna Gwabalanda, who hid the child, and at enormous risk reported back to Mzilikazi that he too had been executed. In the meanwhile the bloodletting continued with the execution of the mothers of the three boys, which tends to add credence to their involvement ion a conspiracy.
The reasons for such a sweeping and demonstrative response to any threat to Mzilikazi’s leadership, although clearly unjust to the many who had remained loyal, and had acted perhaps on a justifiable need for defined leadership in difficult circumstances, are clear in the context of the times, and certainly in the light of Mzilikazi’s style of leadership itself. The amaNdebele at that time were made up of a heterogeneous mixture of peoples whose bonds of mutual loyalty, although apparently firm, had never been truly tested. The exodus and division had been traumatic with bonds of loyalty stretched to a breaking point. If even the merest germ of divided loyalty had been allowed to take root in the soil of their new home the cohesion of the amaNdebele could not long hope to survive. Both clan and individual survival depended on strong and decisive leadership, and as unfairly as this may have fallen on otherwise loyal subjects, dedication to the common goal of national survival superseded any individual rights. It was this that was sought, and once achieved Mzilikazi relaxed and applied himself then to the healing of his shattered nation.
The fate of nKulumane, meanwhile, and the events that followed Mzilikazi’s execution order, although apparently resolved at that time, did not in fact conclude with this affair, but re-emerged later and remained one of the great mysteries of amaNdebele mythology. The momentum of controversy has persisted only because, upon the death of Mzilikazi, and as the question of succession was pondered, an unexpected voice from Natal, that of a certain individual named Kanda, claimed to be, if not nKulumane himself, then at least a son of Mzilikazi. The story was then circulated that the Induna uMncumbata intervened during the bloody events of the reunification and secreted the boy to Natal where he was placed under the care of Natal colonial administrator Theophilus Shepstone. The potential that nKulumane did indeed survive the wrath of his father does exist, but a far greater likelihood is that he did not. What is certain, however, is that Mzilikazi youngest potential heir Lobengula did survive, and was at a later date re-introduced to his father, who appeared by then more tranquil and forgiving, after which Lobengula became something of a favoured son.
Mzilikazi in the meanwhile put the unpalatable events of the reunification behind him and set about rebuilding the nation. By then both he and his people had established a custom of consolidation that involved the defensive positioning of military kraals and the creation of pacified zones some 150 miles wide in every direction. Thereafter the amaNdebele settled into the by then well established routine of cattle husbandry and predatory attacks on their less warlike neighbours. The latter involved a preliminary reconnaissance of the human landscape before the potential strength and wealth of the inhabitants of the country were gauged. The new country inhabited by the amaNdebele was not utterly unknown, and had been a peripheral raiding ground in the past, although not in the wholesale manner now planned.
What the amaNdebele found on the central plateau and in the regions surrounding their current settlements was an inter-related language group that they named the Mashona, or aMaTswina. The latter reference literally refers to the Tswana w