The Rise of South Africa: A History of the Origin of South African Colonisation and of Its Development Towards the East from the Earliest Times To 1857 - G.E. Cory
The Rise of South Africa: A History of the Origin of South African Colonisation and of Its Development Towards the East from The Earliest Times To 1857 (Complete 6-Volume Set)
The Comprehensive Settler-Era Historiography and Pioneer Oral Record of the Eastern Cape Frontier
The Comprehensive Settler-Era Historiography and Pioneer Oral Record of the Eastern Cape Frontier
Bibliographic Specifications
- Title: The Rise of South Africa: A History of the Origin of South African Colonisation and of Its Development Towards the East from The Earliest Times To 1857
- Author: Sir George Edward Cory (G.E. Cory)
- Publisher: C. Struik Publishers, Cape Town
- Publication Date: 1965
- Edition Details: Highly regarded facsimile reprint edition, compiling the complete textual span originally issued by Longmans, Green & Co. between 1910–1930 and concluded posthumously by the Archives of the Union of South Africa in 1940.
- Binding: Original publisher's dark olive green skivertex boards, finished with bright gilt-stamped lettering along the spines and a blind-stamped device decoration on the front faces. Issued without dustwrappers.
- Physical Format: 6 Volumes, Octavo (8vo). Comprises extensive historical chapters, supplementary archival indices, and multiple fold-out maps.
- Language: English.
Official Condition Report
- Overall Condition: Very Good (VG)
- Bindings & Exterior: A highly attractive, structurally sound set with excellent shelf appearance. The olive skivertex boards show minor shelf-rubbing, faint corner bumping, and light wear along the edges, consistent with age. Spines remain rigid, uniform, and straight with exceptionally bright, untarnished gilt lettering.
- Interior & Text Blocks: Entirely clean and free of contemporary pen inscriptions or annotations. The text blocks display light foxing, concentrated primarily on the top edges and outer margins, while the core pages remain clean. Mild page tanning is visible due to age. Minimal, historic sticky-tape residue marks are present on the introductory endpapers and final blank leaves of the volumes.
- Provenance: Features a small, neat previous owner's name stamp neatly applied to the first pages.
- Inserts: All large historic fold-out maps (including South Africa to 1820, The Eastern Province, and Albany, Victoria & Somerset) are intact, correctly folded, and securely attached.
Synopsis & Historical Value
Sir George Edward Cory’s The Rise of South Africa remains an monumental pillar of early twentieth-century South African historiography. Spanning from the earliest periods of European footprint up to the structural changes of 1857, this complete 6-volume set offers an exhaustive chronicle of the Eastern Province frontier, detailing the Slagter's Nek Rebellion, the British Settlers of 1820, the Sixth Frontier War, the Great Trek, the creation of the Boer Republics, and the establishing of British K@ffraria.
While Cory has been classified alongside George McCall Theal as a "settler historian" by modern academics like Christopher Saunders, his methodology was revolutionary for its time. Rather than relying solely on official colonial dispatches, Cory actively travelled the Eastern Cape by cart and bicycle, gathering oral histories directly from aging 1820 Settlers and Xhosa elders. This Struik facsimile edition is prized by Africana collectors for collecting all six volumes into a uniform, robust binding—including the elusive final sixth volume, which was initially left unfinished at the time of Cory's death in 1935.
Author Profile: Sir George Edward Cory
Sir George Edward Cory (1862–1935) was a versatile English-born scholar, chemist, and historian. Arriving in South Africa in 1891, he became a founding professor at Rhodes University College in Grahamstown, teaching chemistry while dedicating his personal life to archiving the history of the Eastern Cape. His meticulous field research and collection of original documentation culminated in a Doctor of Letters from Cambridge in 1921 and a knighthood in 1922. His extensive personal collection of manuscripts and oral history interviews formed the foundation of the world-renowned Cory Library for Historical Research at Rhodes University.
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