A Short History of Namibia
Namibia has been inhabited for tens of thousands of years and independent for a few decades. Between those two facts sit German colonial rule, the first genocide of the twentieth century, South African occupation, apartheid and a liberation war that ran for a quarter of a century. Travellers meet all of it at specific places, which is why it is worth knowing.
Before Anyone Wrote It Down
The oldest human presence here is recorded on rock rather than paper.
The San are the oldest inhabitants of the region and among the oldest continuously resident populations in Africa. Their ancestors left the engravings at Twyfelfontein, dated variously between 2,000 and 10,000 years old, with most attributed to Stone Age hunter-gatherers around 6,000 years ago.
Excavated shelters at Twyfelfontein have produced tools spanning roughly 5,850 to 370 years before present, showing repeated use across an enormous period.
The White Lady at Brandberg and the White Elephant at Phillip’s Cave in the Erongo belong to the same tradition.
Damara pastoralists arrived in the Twyfelfontein area around a thousand years ago, and Khoikhoi herders after them. Bantu speaking peoples including the Ovambo and Herero moved into the north and centre over subsequent centuries.
By the time Europeans arrived, the country held the ethnic complexity it has today.
Visit the Independence Memorial Museum in Windhoek at the end of your trip rather than the start. By then you will have stood at the Waterberg, seen Shark Island at Lüderitz, driven past German colonial architecture in three towns and stayed on communal conservancy land. The museum then assembles things you have already encountered rather than delivering names you have not yet met.
The Coast and the Cross
European contact began at the shoreline and went nowhere for centuries.
The Portuguese navigator Diogo Cão landed at Cape Cross in 1486 and erected a stone cross, which is why the place carries the name. Bartolomeu Dias reached the site of Lüderitz shortly afterwards and erected another at Diaz Point.
Neither found anything to justify staying. The coast offered no harbour, no water and a desert behind it, which is precisely the combination that later gave the Skeleton Coast its reputation.
For close to four centuries the interior remained beyond European reach, protected by the same aridity.
Missionaries arrived in the nineteenth century, and Rhenish mission stations were established at places including Ameib in the Erongo in 1864.
Traders, hunters and prospectors followed, and by the eighteen eighties the territory was drawing serious colonial interest.
German South West Africa
Germany claimed the territory in the eighteen eighties and held it for around three decades.
The colonial administration built the infrastructure whose remains travellers still see: the railway from Swakopmund to Tsumeb between 1903 and 1906, forts at Sesfontein and Namutoni, and the architecture of Swakopmund, Lüderitz and Windhoek.
Christuskirche in Windhoek was built between 1907 and 1910. Tintenpalast, now the parliament, went up in the same period.
Diamonds were found near Lüderitz in 1908, producing Kolmanskop and a boom that lasted decades before the fields moved south.
Duwisib Castle was built around 1908 by a Schutztruppe officer for his American wife, at a cost of some 250,000 gold marks, with materials shipped from Germany and hauled inland by ox wagon.
The Schutztruppe was the colonial army, and its record is the reason this period cannot be treated as picturesque.
The Genocide
This is the central fact of Namibian colonial history and it is frequently reduced to a sentence.
In 1904 the Ovaherero, led by Samuel Maharero, rose against German colonial rule. German forces defeated them at the foot of the Waterberg.
What followed was worse than the battle. Survivors were driven east into the Omaheke sandveld and pursued, with German forces sealing the waterholes behind them. Many died of thirst and starvation in country that could not support them.
The Nama rose subsequently and were subjected to the same campaign.
Concentration camps followed, including at Shark Island near Lüderitz, where conditions killed a large proportion of those held.
Close to two thirds of the Ovaherero population and roughly half the Nama died. It is recognised as the first genocide of the twentieth century.
Germany issued an official apology a century later. Questions of reparations and land remain politically live in Namibia today.
South African Rule
German rule ended during the First World War and what replaced it lasted far longer.
South African forces took the territory in 1915, and in July of that year the retreating Schutztruppe dumped their artillery into Lake Otjikoto near Tsumeb rather than surrender it. Some of those guns were recovered decades later and are in the Tsumeb Museum.
South Africa administered the territory under a League of Nations mandate after the war, and continued to occupy it after the United Nations revoked that mandate.
Apartheid was extended to the territory, with the same racial classification, pass laws and forced removals. Katutura in Windhoek was created by relocating black residents from the area now called the Old Location.
The Caprivi Strip became a military zone, which suppressed both settlement and conservation for decades.
Wildlife populations in communal areas collapsed under extensive poaching during the prolonged military occupation, which is the background to everything that came after independence.
The Liberation War and Independence
The struggle for independence ran for around a quarter of a century.
SWAPO, the South West Africa People’s Organisation, launched an armed struggle in the nineteen sixties which continued until the late eighties, fought largely in the north and across the Angolan border.
Namibia became independent on 21 March 1990, with Sam Nujoma as its first president.
The constitution adopted at independence made Namibia the first African country to write environmental protection into its founding document, committing the state to using living natural resources in a way that lasts, for the benefit of all Namibians present and future.
That clause is the origin of the conservancy model that followed.
Walvis Bay, retained by South Africa at independence, was transferred to Namibia in 1994, completing the territory.
The country has held peaceful elections since, and there is genuine pride in that.
Since Independence
The post independence period has been defined by a conservation experiment and a struggle with inequality.
In 1996 the Nature Conservation Amendment Act gave rights over wildlife and tourism to communities forming conservancies. Around 86 to 87 communal conservancies now cover roughly a fifth of the country, involving over 300,000 members.
Black rhino in the northwest recovered from a remnant of under fifty animals to around two hundred. Elephant numbers have grown at roughly 5.4 percent a year since the mid nineties.
Between 1990 and 2017, community conservation contributed an estimated N$7.11 billion to national income.
Land reform remains politically live, since a small minority still owns a substantial share of commercial farmland.
An eleven year drought that only recently broke tested the conservancy model, with a national emergency declared in 2024.
Namibia introduced a reciprocal visa regime in 2025, ending visa free entry for nationals of 32 countries.
The Peoples of Namibia
The country’s ethnic complexity is a product of this history and is worth a short summary.
The Ovambo are the largest group by a wide margin, roughly half the population, concentrated in the north where rainfall supports agriculture. The Kavango occupy the northeast along the river sharing their name.
The Herero, including the Himba of Kaokoland who are a Herero speaking group, are pastoralists of the centre and northwest. Herero women’s Victorian style dress with its horn like headdress is a deliberate adaptation of missionary clothing, worn as a marker of identity rather than as costume.
The Damara and Nama speak Khoekhoegowab, a click language, and occupy the centre and south. The San are the oldest inhabitants, with the Ju/’hoansi of Nyae Nyae the most substantial group in Namibia.
The Caprivian or Lozi peoples live in the Zambezi Region, the Baster community centres on Rehoboth with its own distinct history, and Tswana communities live in the east.
White Namibians, mostly of German and Afrikaner descent, form a small percentage concentrated in the towns and on commercial farmland, and coloured Namibians form another distinct community.
English is the sole official language and almost nobody’s first, chosen at independence precisely because it was neutral between the languages of the colonisers and the indigenous languages.
Where to Meet the History
Waterberg. The 1904 battle site, with a German military cemetery and no equivalent memorial to the tens of thousands of Ovaherero who died. The absence is the most eloquent thing there.
Shark Island, Lüderitz. The concentration camp site, now holding a campsite, which is a difficult juxtaposition worth knowing about before arriving.
Windhoek. Independence Memorial Museum, Genocide Memorial, Christuskirche, Tintenpalast, Alte Feste and Katutura, all within a walkable area.
Lake Otjikoto. Where the Schutztruppe dumped their artillery in 1915, with recovered guns displayed at the Tsumeb Museum nearby.
Namibian History Questions
How old is human presence in Namibia?
Tens of thousands of years. The San are the oldest inhabitants and among the oldest continuously resident populations in Africa. Their ancestors left the engravings at Twyfelfontein, dated between 2,000 and 10,000 years old with most attributed to hunter-gatherers around 6,000 years ago, and excavated shelters there have produced tools spanning roughly 5,850 to 370 years before present.
What happened during German colonial rule?
Germany held the territory from the eighteen eighties for around three decades, building the railways, forts and architecture travellers still see. In 1904 the Ovaherero rose and were defeated at the Waterberg, after which survivors were driven into the Omaheke with waterholes sealed behind them, followed by concentration camps including Shark Island. Close to two thirds of the Ovaherero and half the Nama died.
Is the genocide recognised?
Yes. It is recognised as the first genocide of the twentieth century, and Germany issued an official apology a century later. Questions of reparations and land remain politically live in Namibia today. Visitors meet the history at the Waterberg, at Shark Island near Lüderitz and at the Genocide Memorial in Windhoek.
When did Namibia become independent?
On 21 March 1990, with Sam Nujoma as first president, after a liberation war fought by SWAPO from the nineteen sixties to the late eighties. South Africa had occupied the territory since 1915, first under a League of Nations mandate and then in defiance of the United Nations. Walvis Bay, retained at independence, was transferred to Namibia in 1994.
Why is there so much German architecture?
Because Germany ruled the territory for around three decades from the eighteen eighties and built substantially. Christuskirche in Windhoek dates from 1907 to 1910, the railway from Swakopmund to Tsumeb from 1903 to 1906, and the architecture of Swakopmund and Lüderitz from the same period. The Schutztruppe record means this heritage sits inside a difficult history rather than beside it.
What is Kolmanskop’s history?
Diamonds were found near Lüderitz in 1908 and Kolmanskop was built on the proceeds, a mining town with a hospital, ballroom, bowling alley and casino in the middle of the desert. The fields moved south, the town was abandoned in the middle of the last century, and the desert has half filled it with sand since.
What changed after independence?
The constitution made Namibia the first African country to write environmental protection into its founding document, and the 1996 Nature Conservation Amendment Act gave communities rights over wildlife on their own land. Around 86 to 87 conservancies now cover a fifth of the country. Black rhino in the northwest recovered from under fifty animals to around two hundred.
Booking Your Namibia Trip
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When you are ready, arrange your safari, tour or holiday with one of the recognised operators listed here. Tell them your dates and what matters most, and a real person, not a form, will handle the itinerary, park bookings and logistics for you.