Ixopo, also known as Stuartstown, is a town situated on a tributary of the uMkhomazi River along the R56 highway in the midlands of

KwaZulu-Natal KwaZulu-Natal (, also referred to as KZN) is a Provinces of South Africa, province of South Africa that was created in 1994 when the government merged the Zulu people, Zulu bantustan of KwaZulu ("Place of the Zulu" in Zulu language, Zulu) and ...

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 ...

Background

The town was laid out in 1878 and named after M Stuart, Resident Magistrate of the surrounding district, who was killed at the Battle of Ingogo in 1881. Its name is derived from the Zulu

onomatopoeic Onomatopoeia (or rarely echoism) is a type of word, or the process of creating a word, that phonetically imitates, resembles, or suggests the sound that it describes. Common onomatopoeias in English include animal noises such as ''oink'', '' ...

word, ''eXobo'', describing the sound made as

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, bovid ungulates widely kept as livestock. They are prominent modern members of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Mature female cattle are calle ...

squelch through mud. The 'x', in Zulu, is pronounced as a

lateral click The lateral clicks are a family of click consonants found only in African languages. The clicking sound used by equestrians to urge on their horses is a lateral click, although it is not a speech sound in that context. Lateral clicks are fou ...

. The town is most famously described by

Alan Paton Alan Stewart Paton (11 January 1903 – 12 April 1988) was a South African writer and anti-apartheid activist. His works include the novels '' Cry, the Beloved Country'' (1948), '' Too Late the Phalarope'' (1953), and the short story ''The Wa ...

in the opening lines of

Cry, The Beloved Country ''Cry, the Beloved Country'' is a 1948 novel by South African writer Alan Paton. Set in the prelude to apartheid in South Africa, it follows a black village priest and a white farmer who must deal with news of a murder. American publisher B ...

: "There is a lovely road which runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass covered and rolling, and they are lovely beyond any singing of it." Until the mid-1980s, Ixopo was served by a railway station on the narrow gauge Umzinto - Donnybrook narrow gauge railway.

Notable people

Thabo Nodada Thabo Nodada (born 2 May 1995) is a South African soccer player who plays as a midfielder for Cape Town City. He has been capped for the South Africa national team. Club career He joined Cape Town City in 2016 when they purchased the PSL li ...

(Footballer) *

Purity Nomthandazo Malinga Purity Nomthandazo Malinga (born 1958) is a South African Methodist bishop and the 100th Presiding Bishop of the Methodist Church of Southern Africa (MCSA). Malinga was ordained to the Christian ministry in 1988, the fourth woman to be ordain ...

(Bishop) *

Ray Zondo Raymond Mnyamezeli Mlungisi "Ray" Zondo (born 4 May 1960) is a South African jurist who served as the Chief Justice of South Africa from 1 April 2022 until his retirement on 31 August 2024. President Cyril Ramaphosa appointed Zondo as South Af ...

(Chief Justice,

Constitutional Court of South Africa The Constitutional Court of South Africa is the supreme constitutional court established by the Constitution of South Africa, and is the apex court in the South African judicial system, with general jurisdiction. The Court was first establ ...

)

References

3
R56 information
Route 56 - Ixopo Populated places in the Ubuhlebezwe Local Municipality {{KwaZuluNatal-geo-stub