A research project submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for B.A. Honours degree in the Department of History at the University of Zululand, South Africa, 1995. / AbaKwaMthethwa form a very important component of the Zulu nation as we know it today. They were in fact the vanguards in the implementation of the idea of a confederation of smaller states (clans) under one supreme ruler or a king who become their overlord. The history of abaKwaMthethwa is so wide that one would need volumes to do justice to it. This project is only going to deal with their movement from around uBombo mountains round about AD 1500 to 1818 when king Dingiswyo was assassinated by Zwide, inkosi of the Ndwandwe people. This project will furthermore concentrate on the life of Dingiswayo from the time he escaped death from his father. The project also seeks to examine the controversy surrounding Dingiswayo's formative journey. It is intended that Dingiswayo's influence and his contribution socially, politically, military and economically to the upliftment of the Mthethwa confederacy will be examined. Finally mention will be made of the royal imizi, some principal imizi not necessarily royal ones, as well as religious imizi that are to be found at KwaMthethwa.