Author: Martin MeredithPublisher: Pocket Books
ISBN: 9781416526377
Category : Diamond industry and trade
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
Social sciences.
Diamonds, Gold, and War
Author: Martin MeredithPublisher: PublicAffairs
ISBN: 1586486772
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 593
Book Description
Southern Africa was once regarded as a worthless jumble of British colonies, Boer republics, and African chiefdoms, a troublesome region of little interest to the outside world. But then prospectors chanced upon the world's richest deposits of diamonds and gold, setting off a titanic struggle between the British and the Boers for control of the land. The result was the costliest, bloodiest, and most humiliating war that Britain had waged in nearly a century, and the devastation of the Boer republics. The New Yorker calls this magisterial account of those years “[an] astute history.… Meredith expertly shows how the exigencies of the diamond (and then gold) rush laid the foundation for apartheid.”
Diamonds, Gold, and War
Author: Martin MeredithPublisher: PublicAffairs
ISBN: 9781586486419
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 570
Book Description
Furnishes a vivid history of the tumultuous period leading up to the 1910 founding of the modern state of South Africa, exploring how the discovery of vast diamond and gold deposits led to a fierce struggle between the British and the Boers for control of the region, as well as the repercussions of the conflict in terms of both sides, as well as for Africa's native peoples.
Diamonds and War
Author: David De VriesPublisher: Berghahn Books
ISBN: 9781845456337
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 372
Book Description
Based on previously unexamined historical documents found in archives in Belgium, England, Israel, the Netherlands, and the United States, this book is the first in English to tell the story of the formation of one of the world's main strongholds of diamond production and trade in Palestine during the 1930s and 1940s. The history of the diamond-cutting industry, characterized by a long-standing Jewish presence, is discussed as a social history embedded in the international political economy of its times; the genesis of the industry in Palestine is placed on a broad continuum within the geographic and economic dislocations of Dutch, Belgian, and German diamond-cutting centers. In providing a micro-historical and interdisciplinary perspective, the story of the diamond industry in Mandate Palestine proposes a more nuanced picture of the uncritical approach to the strict boundaries of ethnic-based occupational communities.
Beyond Gold and Diamonds
Author: Melissa FreePublisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 1438481543
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 290
Book Description
Beyond Gold and Diamonds demonstrates the importance of southern Africa to British literature from the 1880s to the 1920s, from the rise of the systematic exploitation of the region's mineral wealth to the aftermath of World War I. It focuses on fiction by the colonial-born Olive Schreiner, southern Africa's first literary celebrity, as well as by H. Rider Haggard, Gertrude Page, and John Buchan, its most influential authorial informants, British authors who spent significant time in the region and wrote about it as insiders. Tracing the ways in which generic innovation enabled these writers to negotiate cultural and political concerns through a uniquely British South African lens, Melissa Free argues that British South African literature constitutes a distinct field, one that overlaps with but also exists apart from both a national South African literary tradition and a tradition of South African literature in English. The various genres that British South African novelists introduced—the New Woman novel, the female colonial romance, the Rhodesian settler romance, and the modern spy thriller—anticipated metropolitan literary developments while consolidating Britain's sense of its own dominion in a time of increasing opposition.
Author: Russell H. ConwellBlood Diamonds
Author: Greg CampbellPublisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 0465029922
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 337
Book Description
First discovered in 1930, the diamonds of Sierra Leone have funded one of the most savage rebel campaigns in modern history. These "blood diamonds" are smuggled out of West Africa and sold to legitimate diamond merchants in London, Antwerp, and New York, often with the complicity of the international diamond industry. Eventually, these very diamonds find their way into the rings and necklaces of brides and spouses the world over. Blood Diamonds is the gripping tale of how the diamond smuggling works, how the rebel war has effectively destroyed Sierra Leone and its people, and how the policies of the diamond industry - institutionalized in the 1880s by the De Beers cartel - have allowed it to happen. Award-winning journalist Greg Campbell traces the deadly trail of these diamonds, many of which are brought to the world market by fanatical enemies. These repercussions of diamond smuggling are felt far beyond the borders of the poor and war-ridden country of Sierra Leone, and the consequences of overlooking this African tragedy are both shockingly deadly and unquestionably global. Updated with a new epilogue.
The Fortunes of Africa
Author: Martin MeredithPublisher: Public Affairs
ISBN: 1610394593
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 770
Book Description
Africa has been coveted for its riches ever since the era of the Pharaohs. In past centuries, it was the lure of gold, ivory, and slaves that drew fortune-seekers, merchant-adventurers, and conquerors from afar. In modern times, the focus of attention is on oil, diamonds, and other valuable minerals. Land was another prize. The Romans relied on their colonies in northern Africa for vital grain shipments to feed the population of Rome. Arab invaders followed in their wake, eventually colonizing the entire region. More recently, foreign corporations have acquired huge tracts of land to secure food supplies needed abroad, just as the Romans did. In this vast and vivid panorama of history, Martin Meredith follows the fortunes of Africa over a period of 5,000 years. With compelling narrative, he traces the rise and fall of ancient kingdoms and empires; the spread of Christianity and Islam; the enduring quest for gold and other riches; the exploits of explorers and missionaries; and the impact of European colonization. He examines, too, the fate of modern African states and concludes with a glimpse of their future. His cast of characters includes religious leaders, mining magnates, warlords, dictators, and many other legendary figures—among them Mansa Musa, ruler of the medieval Mali empire, said to be the richest man the world has ever known. “I speak of Africa,” Shakespeare wrote, “and of golden joys.” This is history on an epic scale.
Black Diamonds! Black Gold!
Author: Don WoodardPublisher: Texas Tech University Press
ISBN: 9780896723795
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 348
Book Description
The portrayal of the events, people, and company that created a boomtown and a rare glimpse into the wheelings and dealings of cattle barons, oil tycoons, and politicos on a truly Texas scale.
Diamonds, Gold and War
Author: Martin MeredithPublisher:
ISBN: 9780743286145
Category : Afrikaners
Languages : en
Pages : 570
Book Description
Provides the definitive history of one of the most dynamic and contradictory countries in the world - South Africa, which was built on turmoil and revolution, on reputation and greed, and on battles and bloodshed.
