Editing Zulu people (section)

=== Kingdom ===
{{Main|Zulu Kingdom}}
[[File:KingShaka.jpg|thumb|King Shaka]]
The Zulu formed a powerful state in 1816<ref>{{cite book|last=Bulliet|title=The Earth and Its Peoples|year=2008|publisher=[[Houghton Mifflin Company]]|location=US|isbn=978-0-618-77148-6|page=708}}</ref> under the leader [[Shaka]]. Shaka, as the Zulu commander of the [[Mthethwa Empire]] and successor to [[Dingiswayo]], united what was once a confederation of lordships into an imposing empire under Zulu [[hegemony]]. Shaka built a militarized system known as [[Impi]] featuring conscription, a standing army, new weaponry, regimentation, and encirclement battle tactics. Zulu expansion was a major factor of the [[Mfecane]] ("Crushing") that depopulated large areas of southern Africa.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/537814/Shaka/537814rellinks/Related-Links |title=Shaka (Zulu chief) |website=Encyclopædia Britannica |access-date=30 October 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=W. D. Rubinstein|title=Genocide: A History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nMMAk4VwLLwC&pg=PA22|access-date=26 June 2013|year=2004|publisher=Pearson Longman|isbn=978-0-582-50601-5|page=22}}</ref> It was during this period when Shaka deployed an army regiment for raiding nations in the North. The regiment which was under Mzilikazi disobeyed Shaka and crafted a plan to continue raiding up-North forming another dialect of Zulu language referred to as [[Northern Ndebele language|Northern Ndebele]] (now in Zimbabwe). Another group under [[Zwangendaba]] who was Shakas relative from the Gumbi Clan from [[Pongola, KwaZulu-Natal|Pongola]] and military commander trekked northwards crossing the Zambezi River at Chirundu in 1835 into Zambia setting up the [[Ngoni people|Ngoni]] nation that extended to Malawi, Mozambique and Southern Tanzania.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Zulu |first=Edwin |date=2012-08-14 |title=Interpreting the Exodus Among the Ngoni People |journal=Scriptura |volume=108 |issue=1 |doi=10.7833/108-1-9 |issn=2305-445X|doi-access=free }}</ref>

==== Conflict with the British ====
{{Main|Anglo-Zulu War}}
In mid-December 1878, envoys of the British crown delivered an ultimatum to 11 chiefs representing the then-current king of the Zulu empire, [[Cetshwayo]]. Under the British terms delivered to the Zulu, Cetshwayo would have been required to disband his army and accept British sovereignty. Cetshwayo refused, and war between the Zulus and African contingents of the British crown began on January 12, 1879. Despite an early victory for the Zulus at the [[Battle of Isandlwana]] on 22 January, the British fought back and won the [[Battle at Rorke's Drift]], and decisively defeated the Zulu army by July at the [[Battle of Ulundi]].{{citation needed|date=November 2023}}

==== Absorption into Natal ====
[[File:ZuluWarriors adj.jpg|thumb|right|Zulu [[warrior]]s in the late nineteenth century, with Europeans in the background]]
After Cetshwayo's capture a month following his defeat, the British divided the Zulu Empire into 13 "kinglets". The sub-kingdoms fought amongst each other until 1883 when Cetshwayo was reinstated as [[King of the Zulu Nation|king]] over [[Zulu Kingdom|Zululand]].{{citation needed|date=November 2023}} This still did not stop the fighting and the Zulu monarch was forced to flee his realm by [[Usibepu|Zibhebhu]], one of the 13 kinglets, supported by Boer mercenaries. Cetshwayo died of a heart attack in February 1884, leaving his son, the 15-year-old [[Dinuzulu]], to inherit the throne. In-fighting between the Zulu continued for years until in 1897 Zululand was absorbed fully into the British [[colony of Natal]].{{citation needed|date=November 2023}}