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Peninsula, the Tygerberg, the foothills of the Hottentots Holland, and districts much farther
afield. Buiteposte were manned, decentralised, support centres that served as collection points for

meat, vegetables, fruit, wood, fish, and so on, and also as military / signals stations and ship
service points. This brought the colonists into contact with the Khoi-San herders and hunter-

gatherers with whom there was soon competition for resources. The buiteposte therefore became

instruments of colonial expansion and the associated displacement of local peoples and the
destruction of their culture.

During the first ninety years of DEIC occupation the south Peninsula remained largely

unexplored because of its mountainous terrain and general inaccessibility. Its False Bay coastline
was sometimes called “Norway” because of its resemblance to the Norwegian coast. At Kalk Bay

large shell deposits had been noted and the first consignment of lime to Cape Town took place by

pack-ox in 1673, and later in 1676 by sea, but it never attained the status of a buitepos. Three
short-lived buiteposte existed elsewhere: at Aghter de Steenbergh in the Noordhoek Valley

(precise location unclear) there was a cattle and signal post between 1672 – 1691; at Aan de

Steenbergh (present-day Tokai-Westlake) a cattle post operated between 1672 – 1683, when the
land was sold to freeburgher Tijs Michielsz (Matthys Michiels) who three years previously had

married Catharina Ras of Zwaanswijk; and, in the Silvermine Valley a silver mining post
operated between 1685 – 1688. (All of this was discussed to earlier.)

Of the three permanent buiteposte that were established in the south the first was at Fish Hoek in

1717, near the present traffic circle where a spring provided a source of water. It eventually

comprised six to seven officials, eight to ten slaves, and a couple of buildings. Its purpose was to
provide fish and oysters (mussels?) for the Governor’s table, and these were carried bi-weekly to

Cape Town in baskets slung on donkeys. The fish were salted with salt extracted from the
Noordhoek salt-pan. The post also served as a look-out station and in 1725 reported the presence

of the Great Alexander to the authorities in Cape Town. In 1745 its role was expanded to provide
fresh vegetables to the ships using Simon’s Bay, and this continued until a new garden was laid

out in Simon’s Town in 1767. Because the road to Simon’s Town was virtually impassable and

dangerous the vegetables were fetched by boat sent from Simon’s Bay.