Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika - Enoch Sontonga (Lyrics + English Translation)

Details

Description

"Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika" ("Lord Bless Africa") is a hymn originally composed in 1897 by Enoch Sontonga, a Xhosa clergyman and a teacher at a Methodist mission school near Johannesburg. He based the melody on the hymn tune 'Aberystwyth' by Joseph Parry.

The hymn became popular in South African churches and was taken up by the choir of Ohlange High School, whose co-founder served as the first president of the South African Native National Congress. It was sung to close the Congress meeting in 1912, and by 1925 it had become the official closing anthem of the organisation, now known as the African National Congress.

Solomon Plaatje, one of South Africa's greatest writers and a founding member of the ANC, was the first to have the song recorded in London, 1923. The song was the official anthem for the African National Congress during the apartheid era and was a symbol of the anti-apartheid movement.

For decades during the apartheid regime it was considered by many to be the unofficial national anthem of South Africa, representing the suffering of the oppressed. Because of its connection to the ANC, the song was banned by the regime during the apartheid era. The song became a pan-African liberation anthem. The song is currently the national anthem of Tanzania and, since 1994, a portion of the national anthem of South Africa.