3-011-669 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

'A kaffir witch doctor, 1864'. Engraving from a photograph sent by Mr. S. D. Mandy. 'The Kaffir tribes of British Kaffraria, as well as those in other parts of South Africa, have a large body of native doctors residing amongst them, who exercise great influence over the people, and in whom all the Kaffirs are in the habit of placing implicit confidence for their treatment of the sick. The Kaffirs, indeed, are a doctor-loving people; their doctors and prophets form part of the machinery of them government, which is upheld by their feeling of devout and superstitious obedience...The Kaffir doctors believe and teach that all disease is caused by witchcraft. The consequence is, that they will sometimes inflict cruel torture and even death upon the unhappy victims of this degrading superstition'. The offensive term 'kaffir' was historically used in reference to Black people. British Kaffraria was a British colony/subordinate administrative entity in present-day South Africa, consisting of the districts now known as Qonce and East London. It was also called Queen Adelaide's Province. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.