Name
The Griqua are a racially and culturally mixed people who originated in the intermarriages or sexual relations between European colonists in the Cape and the Khoikhoi already living there in the 17th and 18th centuries.
The different mixed-race groups which developed in the early Cape Colony had a variety of different names for themselves. "Bastaards", "Basters", "Korana", "Oorlam" and "Griqua" were just a few of them, with each group often having a different preference. Like the Afrikaners, these groups frequently migrated inland to escape colonial rule.
According to Isaac Tirion, the Khoi name "Griqua" (or "Grigriqua") is first recorded in 1730 as referring to a people living in the northeastern section of the Cape Colony. In 1813 Rev. John Campbell of the London Missionary Society (LMS) used the term for a mixed group of Chariguriqua (a Cape Khoikhoi group), 'bastaards', Koranna, and Tswana living at the site of present-day Griekwastad (formerly "Klaarwater"). The British found their "proud name", Bastaards, offensive, so the LMS called them Griqua.
Because of a common ancestor named Griqua, and shared links to the Chariguriqua (Grigriqua), the people officially changed their name to the Griqua.
Read more about this topic: Griqua People
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