Klaas Afrikaner ( Nama name: ǃGaruhamab, born before 1760, died after 1800) was the second Captain of the

Orlam The Oorlam or Orlam people (also known as Orlaam, Oorlammers, Oerlams, or Orlamse Hottentots) are a subtribe of the Nama people, largely assimilated after their migration from the Cape Colony (today, part of South Africa) to Namaqualand and Dam ...

Afrikaners, first in the

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

, then in South-West Africa. Klaas became leader of his tribe after his father Oude Ram died in

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...

at around 1760. Under his leadership the Afrikaner Clan left the Cape in the 1770s and moved northwards into the area that is today southern

Namibia Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...

. This happened at first with the consent, possibly even under the order, of the South African Cape Government. Later he is credited as one of the founders of Namibia's first systematic settlement in an engineering sense,

ǁKhauxaǃnas ǁKhauxaǃnas (Khoekhoegowab: ''passively defend people from an enemy'', Afrikaans / Dutch name Schans Vlakte: ''fortified valley'') is an uninhabited village with a ruined fortress in south-eastern Namibia, east of the Great Karas Mountains. It ...

. This settlement was built as a hidden retreat and a fortress to fend off possible pursuits by the Cape authorities, indicating that by then he had lost whatever mandate he might have had to execute military actions in South-West Africa. At around 1800 he handed over the

chieftain A tribal chief or chieftain is the leader of a tribal society or chiefdom. Tribe The concept of tribe is a broadly applied concept, based on tribal concepts of societies of western Afroeurasia. Tribal societies are sometimes categorized a ...

ship to his son

Jager Afrikaner Jager Afrikaner ( Nama name: ǀHomǀaramab, baptised Christian Afrikaner (?) at ''Roode Zand'' near Tulbagh Tulbagh, named after Dutch Cape Colony Governor Ryk Tulbagh, is a town located in the "Land van Waveren" mountain basin (also known ...

References

18th-century births 19th-century deaths People from the Western Cape Nama people Namibian politicians Cape Colony politicians {{Africa-hist-stub