They were largely replaced by the kashian hunter tribe during Bantu migrations who hailed from the Great Lakes regions of eastern and central Africa.

Continuing conflict with the Ndwandwe people pushed them further north, with Ngwane III establishing his capital at Shiselweni at the foot of the Mhlosheni hills.

Somhlolo who became king in 1815 consolidated the order of the Ngwane state by incorporating the Emakhandzambili clans into his kingdom adding to the Bemdzabuko or true Swazi.

Mswati inherited an area which extended as far as present-day Barberton in the north and included the Nomahasha district in the Portuguese territory of Mozambique.

[6] However threats existed from prince Mbilini who had married one of Ntengu Mbokane's daughters, and Mbandzeni's half brother and one of the sons of Mswati who was a pretender to the throne and allied with the Zulu King Cetshwayo.

Indeed, in Mbandzeni's coronation Rudolf, the Resident Magistrate of Ladysmith and former landdrost of Utrecht in the company of about 350 burghers and 70 wagons, attended the ceremony.

In 1879, the same year as the Zulu war, Mbandzeni aided the British who were now controlling the Transvaal to defeat Sekhukhune and to dismantle his kingdom.

[8] Britain refused intervention on the grounds that there was presence of European residents not of British extraction and concessions held at the time by the South African Republic in areas such as tax collection, postal services which should be in the control of a State government.

[7] On 18 December 1889 after Mbandzeni's death, the Swazi Government, represented by the Queen Regent Tibati Nkambule and the Swazi Council made a proclamation appointing Sir Theophilus Shepstone, Chief Ntengu Mbokane and two other officers representing the South African Republic and Britain and a provisional council to oversee administration of the country especially concession and affairs of European residents of the country.

However, for the administrative affairs of Swaziland it would be a protected state of the Transvaal republic with guarantees on the rights of Swazi people in their country and their system of governance.

On 4 October 1899, Special Commissioner Krogh issued an official notice of evacuation for "all White inhabitants" with the exception of burghers eligible for active service.

News of the violent deaths of diplomat Mnkonkoni Kunene and several others in time reached the Boer forces involved in the Siege of Ladysmith.

The South African authorities were worried that the violence could expand towards the south-western border of Swaziland, where Boer farms were cultivated by women and children.

In January 1900, Francis William Reitz, the State Secretary of the South African Republic, started issuing orders discouraging any sheep-herders from entering Swaziland.

His representatives were to persuade the queen-regent of three things: first, the need to prevent the Boers from occupying the mountains of the area; secondly, the necessity of formally appealing for British protection; and third, to make clear that the indiscriminate murders in Swaziland would have to end.

By September, Smuts had gained some support from civil authorities but not from military ones, since Roberts did not want to devote any of his forces to an invasion or occupation of the area.

To maintain their communications with diplomatic and trade contacts in Lourenço Marques, Mozambique, the Boers had to send messengers through Swaziland.

He attempted to convince Kitchener it was time to establish a permanent military presence in Swaziland and put Smuts in charge of the area.

A certain column under Horace Smith-Dorrien proceeded all the way to the Swaziland border, managing to capture several Boer wagons and large numbers of cattle and sheep on 9 February 1901.

On 8 March 1901, remnants of the Piet Retief Commandos, accompanied by women and children, were attacked by forces supposedly under Chief Ntshingila Simelano.

[10] On 11 April 1901, Louis Botha corresponded with Kitchener, complaining that British officers were inducing the Swazis to fight against the Boers.

Sobhuza II, the king at independence, had become Ingwenyama in 1899 after the death of his father Ngwane V. His official coronation had taken place in December 1921 following the regency of Labotsibeni, after which he had led an unsuccessful deputation to the Privy council in London in 1922 regarding the issue of land.

Such decrees were formulated in close consultation with the resident commissioners, who in turn took informal and formal advice from White settler interests and the Swazi king.

Under pressure from royal non-cooperation, this proclamation was revised in 1952 to grant the Swazi paramount chief a degree of autonomy unprecedented in British indirect rule in Africa.

After the Second World War, however, South Africa's intensification of racial discrimination, especially through the election of the National Party, induced the United Kingdom to prepare Swaziland for complete independence.

The Ngwane National Liberatory Congress (NNLC) received slightly more than 20% of the vote which gained the party three seats in parliament.

Real power at this time was concentrated in the Liqoqo, a supreme traditional advisory body that claimed to give binding advice to the Queen Regent.

[16][17] In 1988 and 1989, an underground political party, the People's United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), criticized the king and his government, calling for 'democratic reforms'.

This debate produced a handful of political reforms, approved by the king, including direct and indirect voting, in the 1993 national elections.

In 2018, during the 50th independence day celebration, the king announced the official renaming of the country from the Anglicized Swaziland to its Siswati form Eswatini.