Xivongo · Xitsonga
Cawuke
- PeopleVatsonga
- Grouping Hlengwe group, Hlengwe proper (Junod); VaHlengwe cluster with Sono, Hlungwani and Mavasa (Wikipedia, uncited)
- Surnames recorded Chauke / Cawuke, Xitlhangu, Mbenzane, Mavube, Magwinyane
- Places recorded East, Baloyi, Maluleke, Save, Mozambique, Hlengwe, Inhambane, Gaza, Limpopo, Zimbabwe, Mathebula, Malamulele
The Swiphato swa swivongo
Shikobela sha Matsheme, Tshauke wa Matsheme Also Spelled
Cawuke is also written Tshauke, Chauke, Chauca, Xioki-xa-humba / Shioki-sha-humba and Hlengwe.
Spellings differ between families, between records and between countries. Wozekhaya keeps the name as each source wrote it rather than settling on one form.
Written down by families and by the people who recorded them.
About This Record
What Was Written Down
Junod names Tshauke as the first king of the Hlengwe and their main clans as Tshauke, Mbenzane, Mavube and Magwinyane. He records the Hlengwe legend that Tshauke married a daughter of the Sono, who knew fire while the Hlengwe ate raw porridge; Tshauke's son stole a glowing cinder in a shell, the Hlengwe grew strong on cooked food and won the ensuing war, and the son was named Shioki-sha-humba, bringer of fire in a shell. Mathebula and Mokgoatsana (2020) give the ruling line from Jaques 1938 and Portuguese sources: Xinyori, likely the revered Cawuke whose name they derive from Xioki-xa-humba, at the end of the seventeenth century; his son Bangwana early in the eighteenth; Bangwana's sons Madzivi and Mantsena, the latter reigning under the Cawuke name; a Chauca recorded as an important chief in 1729 and 1734; the Hlengwe among the Sono at Xikundwini by about 1751; Mantsena's death about 17. Recorded from the sources named on this entry; the wording here is Sibaya's own.
Families Tell This Differently
Families who carry this name tell parts of it differently. Each way it has been told is below.
Where This Comes From
- Written down by
-
- Henri-Alexandre Junod, The Life of a South African Tribe, Vol. I: The Social Life, Imprimerie Attinger Freres, Neuchatel — https://archive.org/details/lifeofsouthafric01junouoft
- Mandla D. Mathebula and Sekgothe Mokgoatsana, The 'polyonymous identity' of the Hlengwe people of Zimbabwe and their struggle for a 'collective proper name', 2020, HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies 76(4), a6192 — https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/6192/16812
- VIV Lifestyle Magazine (Shitshembiso Mabasa Pty Ltd), Xana a wu swi tiva? [Swivongo Edition] (and reader comments, 2019-2020), 2017, vivmag.co.za — https://www.vivmag.co.za/xana-a-wu-swi-tiva-swivongo-edition/
- Wikipedia contributors, Tsonga people, read 2026-09-05, Wikipedia — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsonga_people
Are You Cawuke?
Put your name on the launch list.
Tell Me When It Opens Send This To Your Family
We write to you about Wozekhaya, and nothing else.
If Your Family Holds More Of This
A family saying its own swiphato swa swivongo knows them better than any directory does. If yours has more than what is on this page, it belongs here.