Where Does The Name Mdantsane Come From ?

What does the name Mdantsane mean ? Where does it come from? 

Nobody knows. It does not mean anything. Really, we don't know. It's just a name.

We have heard that more than once. 

But it was rather hard to believe for us! In Africa every name has a meaning! Every name comes from somewhere. In Africa behind every name there is a story. In Africa every name has significance and stands for an event, a place, a great happening or a story. Like the guy, named ambulance, whom we met and who in works in an upholstery in town. His mother gave birth in an ambulance. That is logic, that is real! That's a great story!

So we asked again and again most of the time receiving the same answers - until we came, across a  document about the history of East London and Mdantsane, that satisfied our curiosity!

MDANTSANE = UMDANZANI

Mdantsane is said to have received its name from the farm Umdanzani on whose ground it was established

By the 1940s, living quarters for black East London workers were hard to find and the existing locations and the already big township Duncan Village were overcrowded. Duncan Village is a township, that existed long before Mdantsane.
More Residential areas for black labor were needed and lengthy discussions took place on the level of the town council concerning the most suitable location for another "Bantu Residential Area". More information can be found in our article The Origin of Mdantsane.

In 1954 the City Engineer was requested to find space for expansion, especially on suitable land adjoining Duncan Village.

But the survey was refused by the national government and the area was declared to be for white people only. 

Areas near Newlands, Macleantown, Kwelegha and a farm with the name “Umdanzani”, were examined. 

The latter was found to be suitable as it lay alongside the national road and railway line, and in 1958 the new site was declared.

The municipality undertook the planning which was based on the "neighbourhood concept" of a garden city, first suggested by E. Howard in 1898. This envisaged a central CBD (Central Business District) with neighbourhoods clustering around it. 

In each neighbourhood there would be low order central areas, which would house shops, churches and educational facilities. 

The nature of the topography, ridges and valleys, dictated much of the layout, which tried to avoid the formal grid pattern and worked around curves, loops and triangles. 

By the end of 1963 the first 300 residents occupied the new houses.
In 1966 it was proclaimed a "Ciskei homeland" town and excised from East London. The advantage at least was that this did allow for freehold title. It was originally only intended to make provision for 120 000, but it grew very rapidly and today it is divided into eighteen zones which are still expanding, with the newest unit known as Unit P.

The original Name Umdanzani transformed over time to Mdantsane.