Babanango is the name of a hill, a stream and a settlement situated in Zululand

Zululand District Municipality

Zululand is one of the 11 district municipalities of KwaZulu-Natal province. The seat of Zululand is Ulundi. The majority of its 804,456 people speak IsiZulu . The district code is DC26...

, KwaZulu-Natal

KwaZulu-Natal

KwaZulu-Natal is a province of South Africa. Prior to 1994, the territory now known as KwaZulu-Natal was made up of the province of Natal and the homeland of KwaZulu....

, South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

. There are many versions of where the name Babanango originates from, the common accepted origin comes from the Zulu words 'baba nango'. The popular story goes that many years ago a small Buthelezi child got lost on the slopes of the mist-shrouded hill and when an elder brother found him he shouted, "baba, nango" which means "Father there he is".

History

Emakhosini in the Mkumbane Valley on the banks of a tributary of the White Umfolozi River

White Umfolozi River

The White Umfolozi River originates just south of Vryheid, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa and joins the Black Umfolozi River at to form the Umfolozi River, before it flows east towards the Indian Ocean.- See also :* List of rivers of South Africa...

 near to Babanango is the site of one of King Dingane kaSenzangakhona

Dingane

Dingane kaSenzangakhona Zulu —commonly referred to as Dingane or Dingaan—was a Zulu chief who became king of the Zulu Kingdom in 1828...

's great royal kraal

Kraal

Kraal is an Afrikaans and Dutch word for an enclosure for cattle or other livestock, located within an African settlement or village surrounded by a palisade, mud wall, or other fencing, roughly circular in form.In the Dutch language a kraal is a term derived from the Portuguese word , cognate...

s, UmGungundlovu

UmGungundlovu

uMgungundlovu was the royal capital of the Zulu king Dingane and one of several military complexes which he maintained...

, where Piet Retief

Piet Retief

Pieter Mauritz Retief was a South African Boer leader. Settling in 1814 in the frontier region of the Cape Colony, he assumed command of punitive expeditions in response to raiding parties from the adjacent Xhosa territory...

 and his Voortrekkers were massacred in 1838. The name "Mgungundlovu" is said to mean "the Place of the elephant" and the name eMakhosini means "At the place of the Chiefs". The settlement of Babanango was originally part of a land grant to European farmers in 1885 by King Dinizulu kaCetshwayo.