Sarili ka Hintsa

Sarili ka Hintsa (about 1810 - 1892) was the 5th chief of the Gcaleka sub-group of the Xhosa nation, and paramount chief of all the Xhosa, from 1835 until his death in 1892 at Sholora, Bomvanaland. He was also known as "Kreli", and led the Gcaleka armies in a series of frontier wars.

Sarili was the oldest son of the great Hintsa ka Khawuta and Nomsa kaGambushe Tshezi.

Sarili had nine wives including Nohuthe, Nondwe of the abaThembu and Bayo of the amaGwali. His first heir died in 1853 at the age of 12 and the next in line was his son Sigcawu ka Sarili from his second wife Nohuthe. His daughter Novili Nomkafulo became the great wife of Ngangelizwe Qeya, the 6th paramount chief of the abaThembu. Another daughter Nowisile became the wife of Chief Falo Mgudlwa of the amaJumba Thembu and the adoptive mother of the future Thembu national poet Mbombini Molteno Sihele. Another daughter became the wife of Mhlontlo of the Mpondomise and another became the wife of Chief Gwadiso of the Knonjwao.

Throughout his reign, Sarili struggled against the expanding British Empire. He was a skilled diplomat who was respected and loved, even by those of the prominent whites of the Cape who knew him well.

He typically sought to maintain Gcaleka independence by avoiding direct confrontation with the British. This strategy initially worked, but as a nationalist and paramount chief of all the Xhosa, he was later drawn into conflict with the British by the neighbouring Ngqika Xhosa. His Kingdom's indirect aid to the Ngqika during the Seventh and Eighth Frontier Wars (1846–1853) was discovered and led to a temporary white invasion of Gcalekaland.

Sarili played an important part in the Great Cattle Killing, a millennialist movement which began among the Xhosa in 1856, and led them to destroy their own means of subsistence in the belief that it would bring about salvation by supernatural spirits, who would return and drive the white people into the sea. Genuinely believing the prophecies of Nongqawuse, Sarili destroyed his cattle and crops, causing thousands of his subjects to do likewise. The famine that followed devastated the last Xhosa Kingdom, forcing the Xhosa to turn to the neighbouring Cape Colony for food, blankets and other relief. His fostering of the cattle killing also led to him being hated in white opinion, as the supposed villain of the frontier conflicts. He was briefly exiled from Gcalekaland, to the territory on the far side of the Mbashe, only being allowed to return in 1865. In his absence, the Mfengu people (traditional enemies of the Gcaleka) settled in much of his former land.

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