← The interactive mapAll civilizations

Dutch Cape Colony

1652 – 1795
ColonyAfrica

VOC (Dutch East India Company) way-station and settler colony at the Cape of Good Hope, founded by Jan van Riebeeck to resupply Asia-bound ships; expanded into a full settler colony with enslaved and indigenous Khoekhoe labor before falling to Britain in 1795.

Occupied by a British expeditionary force in September 1795 (Battle of Muizenberg) during the French Revolutionary Wars, ending VOC rule; briefly restored to the Batavian Republic 1803-1806 before permanent British annexation confirmed at the 1814 Congress of Vienna. The successor 'Cape Colony' (British era, 1795/1806-1910) is already a distinct canonical record (id: cape_colony) under its own Wikidata item (Q370736) and is correctly scoped to that later period.

Borders in 1652 · drawn from 1 sourced border frame
See it on the interactive map →

Further reading

Sources