Kaffraria [key], former name for what is now SE Eastern Cape prov., E South Africa. The region was inhabited by the Xhosa, who fought a series of wars with the Boers and then the British to their west. When W Kaffraria became British Kaffraria in 1847, the term was used for the Xhosa lands east of the Great Kei River, which gradually fell to British rule. The region was absorbed into Cape Colony (see Cape Province) during the second half of the 19th cent.
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