I've a question for the Afrikaners which I'm wondering of: how common is the Huguenot ancestry in Afrikaners and is there any attempts to try to preserve it? Does the typical (classic) Afrikaner have such ancestry or so you view such peoples as mixed peoples?
I've read somewhere that the classic Afrikaner person has definitely some Huguenot ancestry, hence my question.
Correct, at an estimated 10-13% of our ancestry. It's safe to assume this much for the classical Afrikaner, because they arrived (and assimilated) at the Cape early enough during Dutch colonization. In fact, their large-scale organized migration was one of the reasons why the Dutch East India company sent as many Dutch to settle here as they did - the Lords XVII were afraid of the French becoming a majority, or at least a large enough group to become a problem.Originally Posted by Siebenbürgerin
From what I know of our history, I'd say they assimilated fairly quickly into the larger Dutch-German population and there were never any noteworthy attempt to preserve themselves as a distinct ethnic group. This deduction is simply from not finding them featured strongly anywhere on our timeline after arriving and planting vineyards. Today they're only a historical footnote.
Their largest surviving visible influence on the Afrikaner ethnicity is in our surnames, many of which are derived from French surnames.
Last edited by Stormraaf; Thursday, June 25th, 2009 at 08:34 PM. Reason: removed redundant bit
In my ancestry as far as I did my own genealogy about 30% of my ancestry is of Huguenot origination. They are highly revered by Afrikaners and I think there is few Afrikaners that can claim to be without Huguenot blood. If you look at genealogy records you will find some names repeating. In a sense we are all really family. Few are pure Huguenot and most are like me...I have 30% Huguenot, 30% Dutch and 30% German in my ancestry. What make our line a bit unique is that I am 10% Danish as my paternal line goes straight back to Denmark.
TBH, I regard 30% Huguenot ancestry as somewhat atypical. I've come across one or two essays claiming the average Afrikaner have 30/30/30/10 Dutch/German/French/English ancestry, but these numbers were provided without substantiation, and saying we have 10% English ancestry is ludicrous at any measure. It's why I suspect a claim of 30% Huguenot ancestry on behalf of all Afrikaners are the result of someone pushing pan-white sentiments.
On another note, I've met someone with French ancestry much more recent than that of the Huguenots, with a claim of 50%+ French blood. Based on sub-racial compatibility and her family's assimilation into our culture, I still judged her to be Afrikaner, though.
(Edit: I subscribe to the belief that our Dutch and German ancestry are both slightly above 40%.)
Ek stem saam met jou Stormraaf (I agree),
"I subscribe to the belief that our Dutch and German ancestry are both slightly above 40%". I think this can be most accurately be witnessed in Afrikaans as a language seeing as it is considered a low German language like Dutch, Flemish, Frisian etc. Other influences are present but Afrikaans remains a mix predominantly between Nederlands and Hoch Deutsch.
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