THE MOLTENOS OF THE CAPE

252pp., illus., paperback, Routledge & UNISA, London & Pretoria, 2025

ISBN: 9781776152223

Includes contributions from Hugh Corder and Catherine Corder (nèe Molteno).

A history of the Moltenos, an Anglo-Italian family located at the Cape. Well-known family members include Sir John Charles Molteno, the first prime minister of the Cape Colony; Percy, a director of the Union Castle Line and a politician in the UK; Charlie, who opposed Cecil John Rhodes and was instrumental in keeping Bechuanaland out of his hands; Barkly, who joined the British navy, fought slavers near Zanzibar and commanded a warship at the battle of Jutland, and Donald  who earned the Xhosa name Dilizintaba (‘Remover of mountains’) for his opposition to segregationist policies.

"The Molteno family history tracks all the fault lines of nineteenth-century history. From the rise of the Cape wool economy to self-governance, to the fate of Cape liberalism, the Molteno family was central to every major development worth remembering. Selina Molteno's fair-minded, lucidly written account of the Moltenos is a most valuable resource and will be for a long while to come." Jonny Steinberg, Professor at Yale University and author of Winnie and Nelson

"This engagingly luminous and many-sided portrait of a notable Anglo-Italian family of South Africa's Cape is a refreshing antidote to humdrum histories which categorise people as this or that group, class or race. Showing the richness that can be captured by a first-rate family history, the accomplished authors of this fascinating story of the influential Moltenos have brought them all to life as flesh-and-blood beings." Bill Nasson, Professor Emeritus, University of Stellenbosch 

Selina Molteno was born in Cape Town and moved to Europe in 1959, at the age of 18, to pursue a career as a ballet dancer. After her marriage she spent two years in Nigeria (1967-1969) and extended periods in Trinidad and South Africa. She is the author of Letters from an Intrepid Ballet Dancer, An Expatriate Family in the Nigerian Civil War and The Secret Son of Wallis Simpson. She lives in Oxford and has worked in academic publishing for over 30 years.

The late Robert Molteno (1943-2022) was born in Cape Town. After teaching at the University of Zambia, he returned to London, worked as a senior editor at Zed Books until 2005, and then for the International African Institute until his retirement in 2008.