Novela in the sources
Novela is a name on our own planning list of Tsonga clans. We searched the sources we have and did not find a clan history under it.
What the sources say
What we searched. Under Novela and the variants Nwela, Novella. We searched, in full text, Junod’s Life of a South African Tribe (both volumes, 1912 and 1913), Jackson’s The Ndebele of Langa, Stayt’s The Bavenda, Wessmann’s The Bawenda of the Spelonken, Hofmeyr’s Twintig jaren in Zoutpansberg, Nemudzivhadi’s thesis on Makhado, Kirkaldy’s and Mulaudzi’s theses, two articles on Valoyi and Tembe history, and the Wikipedia article on the Tsonga people, and ran general web searches. Absence from these says nothing about whether the family is old or important, only that these sources are silent. We have not seen Jaques’s Swivongo swa Machangana (1938) or Mathebula’s 800 Years of Tsonga History, which are the likely places to look.
The nearest we found. Our planning list and some of our other pages (such as Mabunda and Xilaveko) place Novela in a “Nhlave cluster” with the Nkuna, Mabunda, Maswanganyi and Nkwinika; we could not find that grouping in Junod or any other source we have read, and have marked it unconfirmed on the Nkuna page.
Cautions
This page is still a listing rather than a clan history. We would rather say so than fill it with material we cannot source. We do not know where our planning list took the name from.
Izithakazelo and totem
If you belong to the Novela and can tell us where the family came from, its praises (xivongo) and its totem, we will record it, credited to you.
Sources and further reading
- Henri A. Junod, The Life of a South African Tribe, vol. I, The Social Life (Neuchâtel: Attinger, 1912); Internet Archive scan, read in its machine-read text
- Henri A. Junod, The Life of a South African Tribe, vol. II, Mental Life (1913), searched in the same way
- A. O. Jackson, The Ndebele of Langa, Ethnological Publications No. 54 (Pretoria: Department of Co-operation and Development); typed transcription by Joyce Lee Kunz Peck, 2024, read by machine OCR
- Wikipedia: Tsonga people (its clan and notable-people lists have no inline citations)
Do you belong to the Novela? Tell us your izithakazelo and what elders say about the family’s history, and we will add it, credited to you. Share what you know or WhatsApp 065 138 8213.