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Frank Kelley wrote: When did Spion Kop become "Spioen" Kop? certainly not in 1900!

It is the Afrikaans spelling, used on the current SA topographical maps issued by the SA government.

If you google this site you will find it used in Breytenbach (as expected), Creswicke (contemporary) - albeit one in the eastern Transvaal and not this one; and maybe more references. The Gazetteer lists three Spion Kops: one in the Free State and two in Natal. Which brings the distinct, but I grant remote, possibility that Spion Kops found around the world do not relate to the famous one.

There is a Graspan Lane in Ludgershall, Wiltshire that I drove past three or four times a year on my way to my parents, often wondered why, perhaps the town planner simply liked military history.

Regards
Meurig

Nice to know that elsewhere in the world South African History is commemorated. In South Africa we sandblast it. www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Battle-b...-permission-20150712

David Grant wrote: Nice to know that elsewhere in the world South African History is commemorated. In South Africa we sandblast it. www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Battle-b...-permission-20150712

Admiral Chris Hani - of course!

I am sure he is spinning in his grave having his name attached to building steeped in the SA history that he railed against. Why not create a new memorial building for him?

Frank
Probably since 1838 when the ancestors of the 1899-1902 Boers used its summit to get a panoramic view of what they had hoped would be their 'promised land'.
Brett

PS The Zulu name for Spioen Kop is 'Ntabamnyama' (= 'Black Mountain'), which may well replace 'Spioen Kop' in the New South Africa.

Brett Hendey wrote: PS The Zulu name for Spioen Kop is 'Ntabamnyama' (= 'Black Mountain'), which may well replace 'Spioen Kop' in the New South Africa.

That's going to be confusing, there is already an Ntabamnyama immediately to the west of Spion Kop.

Meurig
I had already thought of that complication, but perhaps the cartographers of that time simply misunderstood what they were told by local Zulus. As far as I have been able to discover there is not another Zulu name applied to Spioen Kop, and it certainly deserves a name, since it is the most prominent topographic feature over a wide area east of the Drakensberg.
Brett.