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Present-day Swaziland has been inhabited since the Stone Age. Rock paintings, possibly by the San people, have been found throughout Swaziland.
During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, an African people of Nguni descent migrated southward from Central Africa. Eventually, during the mid-eighteenth century, a group of them settled in the area which is now Swaziland. These people, the Nkosi Dlamini, became known as the Swazis, and today both names live on. Nkosi means ‘king’ and Dlamini is the surname of the royal family. The country derives its actual name from a later king, Mswati I but another name, Ngwane, is an alternative word for Swaziland.
By the middle of the nineteenth century Boers had started to farm land in Swaziland.Following wars between the Boer Republics and the British, Swaziland became a British Protectorate (1902).
Swaziland became an independent country in 1968, led by King Sobhuza the second. His Majesty was a very wise man, who led well. He brought the nation together again, ready to face the next phase in our history.
In 1986 Mswati III became the ruler of the Kingdom of Swaziland, taking on the mantle of his father.
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