[3] It was in fact not before 1869 that Canon Henry Beckett, the Superior of the Society of St Augustine, accompanied by four brothers, set up the mission, initially in a cave converted as church and dwelling.

[citation needed] In the cemetery alongside the Priory lie the remains, besides those of missionary brothers and other former residents, of the legendary BaSotho prophet ‘Mantsopa, who died here on 11 November 1906.

[2] Her memory is revered to this day, with Modderpoort becoming a site of pilgrimage in recent years,[3] when offerings are sometimes placed at her grave or in the nearby Cave Church.

[citation needed] Coplan indicates that these rites are but a part of a larger phenomenon of re-occupation, by re-use, of heritage and ritual sites in the Free State-Lesotho frontier.

A century later, in 1970, members of the Zionist Christian Church (ZCC) began using it as an important pilgrimage site where the ancestors are felt to be strongly present.

Offerings are typically placed here – snuff, that the ancestors may ‘breathe’ better; gambling tokens; scratch-and-win cards; crockery; food; money; written appeals and so forth.

The main panel at the site contains remarkable depictions of birds and an unusual winged figure with zigzag legs, believed to represent a shaman or priest who had assumed a bird-like form to undertake the journey to the spirit world.