'The abandoned mother': Ageing, old age and missionaries in early and mid nineteenth-century south-east Africa

This essay examines issues of ageing and old age in Xhosa-speaking communit ies to c. 1860. Drawing primarily on records of the Wesleyan Methodist and London Missionary societies, the article examines the construction of Xhosa ageing, old age and death in missionary writings. The primary medium of mi ssionary reflection was the figure of the 'Abandoned Mother', modelled on c ontemporary British metaphors, that represented yet another atrocity story for legitimating the mission enterprise and the emerging colonial regime. I t also argues that there were fundamental contrasts in the images of ageing and dying between those of the Xhosa and those of the missionaries. Though older persons found certain themes in the Christian message attractive, th ey preferred the local cultural model of ageing, old age and death.