The following events happened in South Africa during the 1680s.

Events

1680

  • Land is given to Dutch farmers along the Eerste River in the Cape Colony

1681

  • March - Deported Islamic religious leaders arrive from Batavia, later to become the Cape Malay community

1682

  • 8 June - The Johanna, a British East Indiaman sailing from Kent to Surat, India under the command of Captain Robert Brown is shipwrecked off Cape Agulhas

1683

  • Cape Colonists petition for a school in Stellenbosch for the 30 families that are there.
  • Sybrand Mankadan is appointed as a teacher in Stellenbosch, alongside being a preacher and sick-visitor.
  • Sheikh Yusuf is captured and exiled by the Dutch to Ceylon, eventually arriving at the Cape of Good Hope 11 years later.
  • Olof Bergh leads another expedition to the Nama people. Olof Bergh's expedition attempts to reach the Tropic of Capricorn, but is halted by drought and rough terrain near the Doornbosch River. The travel diaries of Olof Bergh contribute to the evolution of Dutch into Afrikaans
  • The first use of "bosjesmans" (bushmen) for indigenous people and "Afrijkaenders" for Dutch settlers is recorded.
  • The VOC establishes a cattle stock-farm at Klapmuts.
  • Hawthornden House in Wynberg has its original construction.

1684

  • The Dutch East India Company unilaterally establishes price controls over hides, skins, ivory and ostrich eggs in the Cape Colony
  • An English ship arrives off the eastern coast of KwaZulu-Natal to trade for ivory

1685

  • 17 May - The English ketch Good Hope is shipwrecked off Bay of Natal
  • A slave school is established in the Slave Lodge for VOC slave children.
  • Marriages between Dutchmen and female slaves are prohibited, unless the slave has a Dutch father.
  • After decades of exploration, an expedition involving Simon van der Stel and other Dutch settlers discovers copper deposits in Namaqualand.
  • Simon van der Stel makes the oldest visible engravings of the Heerenlogement cave.
  • The Amersfoort anchors at the Cape with a 174-slaves cargo.
  • A Constantia farm is granted by the VOC to Simon van der Stel.
  • The revocation of the Edict of Nantes leads to the persecution of Huguenots in France. The VOC encourages Huguenot immigration to the Cape for agriculture.

1686

  • 16 February - A Dutch East India Company ship Stavemisse is shipwrecked about 112 km south of Port of Natal
  • 25 December - An English ketch Bona Ventura is shipwrecked at St Lucia Bay
  • April - The Honselaarsdijk, a first of nine VOC ships carrying around 200 Huguenots, arrives in Table Bay.
  • Simon van der Stel sets aside land for Huguenot settlements in Franschhoek and Drakenstein.
  • The Huguenot refugees from France begin to mainly settle in Franschhoek.
  • Flemish merchant Jacques De Savoye founds the Vrede en Lust winefarm after fleeing Europe due to religious persecution.

1689

  • 4 January - The Dutch East India Company ship, the Noord became the first ship to sail into the Bay of Natal to search for survivors of the Stavenisse shipwreck of 1686