where did afrikaneers originate from?

Answer 1

In 1652 a small company of employees of the Dutch East India Company were settled on the southern tip of Africa in order to establish a refreshment station for the Company’s ships en route to the Far East. From this group of Dutchmen the Afrikaners were to develop. From 1688 to 1700, they were joined by about 200 French Huguenots, Protestant refugees from Catholic France.


Despite language and cultural differences, a shared commitment to the Reformed faith enabled these two groups to merge into one, and to this day many Afrikaans-speaking people in South Africa have surnames which can be traced back to the Huguenots. German refugees farther swelled their numbers. For more than a hundred years after the first settlement, the Dutch Reformed Church was the only legally permitted and established church on South African soil.

In time, groups of settlers moved away from the Cape settlement into the hinterland to develop farms there. The indigenous people of the Cape at that time were the Khoikhoi people, many of whom worked as laborers on the farms of the Dutch-speaking settlers. The Dutch government forbade enslaving indigenous people of southern Africa.

Answer 2

The Afrikaans language is descended from the Dutch spoken by Dutch settlers in the Cape Colony (Cape of Good Hope).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afrikaans

Answer 3

Dutch settlers in the Cape area of what is now South Africa.