Judaic or Semitic Legends and Customs Amongst South African Natives

From 1913-1914 Jewish author Sidney Mendelssohn (18??-1917) published a two-part article in the journal African Affairs titled "Judaic or Semitic Legends and Customs Amongst South African Natives." In these articles, republished together here, the author relates the various similarities in Jewish society and those of South African tribes. Regarding these similarities, the author concludes:

"I do not think that these examples of Semitic or Judaic physiognomy, and these resemblances of customs, traditions, and language, should be brushed aside as accidental similarities, or mere coincidences. The number and variety of these traces should justify a deeper inquiry into the origin and history of these races than has hitherto been achieved by those interested in the subject."
Students and readers of books connected with South Africa, travellers and adventurers who have penetrated the interior in search of sport and treasure, and residents of the Sub-Continent, especially those of an earlier period, can hardly have failed to have been impressed from time to time with the evidences of Semitic or Judaic influence amongst the natives, which the rapid march of civilisation is fast obliterating, the last traces disappearing only in recent years.

These evidences are not, or were not, existent merely in one locality, or amongst one tribe or race; the record of them, as related in various works by many authors, is intermittent and fragmentary; they are often accompanied by other legends and customs entirely unconnected with races of the Semitic type, and yet enough remains unaccounted for to cause one to reflect profoundly on the origin of these traces, if, indeed, it is impossible to come to a definite theory on the subject.

About the author:

When he was still little more than a boy his father went to South Africa, leaving his wife, two daughters, and two younger sons to the care of the subject of this memoir. Sidney Mendelssohn thereupon undertook as much of the work of his father as he could perform. He used to spend hours when other boys of his age were asleep or engaged in recreation in preparing the subjects he had to teach to his pupils on the following day. In due course the boy and the other members of the family followed the father to South Africa. Kimberley was then the El Dorado of British Jewry and it was to Kimberley that young Mendelssohn betook himself. In South Africa, as has already been indicated, he secured for himself a successful career which enabled him to return to England in early middle age with a moderate fortune. In illustration of his life in South Africa we may mention that Sidney-on-Vaal was so named in his honour, and that the public library of the town is a standing monument of his munificence and interest in literature.

Careers such as those of Sidney Mendelssohn are on the whole uneventful so far as the interest of the general public is concerned, and the present case is not exceptional. His literary activities after his return to England are practically the only ones that are of general interest. Mention ought, however, also to be made of the zealous work he performed on behalf of the Liberal Jewish movement and of Anglo-Jewish historical research. An ardent Jew, Mendelssohn, immediately upon taking up his residence in London, became a warm supporter of the former movement, then in its first stages in England, and was for some years prior to his death treasurer of the Liberal Synagogue. He was also during the last years of his life an active member of the Council of the Jewish Historical Society of England, to whose Transactions he contributed a valuable sketch of the history of the Jews in South Africa.

Dettagli