Myth of Iron - 9780821418482

Myth of IronShaka in History\nAuthor(s): Dan Wylie\nFormat: Paperback\nPublisher: Ohio University Press, United States\nImprint: Ohio University Press\nISBN-13: 9780821418482, 978-0821418482\nSynopsis\nOver the decades we have heard a great deal about Shaka, the most famousor infamousof Zulu leaders. It may come as a surprise, therefore, that we do not know when he was born, nor what he looked like, nor precisely when or why he was assassinated. In Shaka's case, even these most basic facts of any person's biography remain locked in obscurity.\n Meanwhile the public image, sometimes monstrous, sometimes heroic, juggernauts ontruly a \""myth of iron\"" that is so intriguing, so dramatic, so archetypal, and sometimes so politically useful, that few have subjected it to proper scrutiny.\n Myth of Iron: Shaka in History is the first book-length scholarly study of Shaka to be published. It lays out, as far as possible, all the available evidencemainly hitherto underutilized Zulu oral testimo.