Mzilikazi was born in 1796 to Mashobane, head of a small Khumalo chiefdom on the Black Mfolozi River. Mashobane paid tribute to Zwide, and Zwide had him killed in 1818 on suspicion of betrayal. Because Mzilikazi was the son of Mashobane’s senior wife, herself a daughter of Zwide, he was installed as head of the Khumalo chiefdom.

Following Shaka’s victory over Zwide at the White Mfolozi, Mzilikazi transferred his allegiance to Shaka. In 1822, Shaka sent him to campaign against a neighboring Sotho group. Mzilikazi refused to surrender the captured cattle, defeated a Zulu regiment sent against him, and gathered his people on Ntumbane hill before a second attack forced him to flee.

Mzilikazi crossed the Drakensberg with a following of about two hundred men, women, and children. He evaded pursuing Zulu regiments among small Sotho groups on the highveld, crossed the Vaal, and captured cattle and people. Other Nguni communities that had previously crossed the mountains joined him, while the resulting population became known as Ndebele in the Transvaal highveld.

In 1824, Mzilikazi settled at Ekupumleni on the Olifants River in Pedi country. His campaigns against Pedi and other Sotho groups increased his herds and expanded his following through conquest, capture, and the accommodation of refugees from Shaka. By 1825, Ndebele regiments were fighting Sotho-Tswana communities across the highveld as far west as eastern Botswana.

Threats from raiders and rival forces prompted Mzilikazi to move his capital in 1827 to Mhlahlandlela, near the source of the Odi or Crocodile River and close to present-day Pretoria. He later moved west to Mosega on the Madikwe River in 1832, where his forces attacked Tswana groups in the western Transvaal and present-day Botswana. A joint Boer, Tswana, and Griqua force expelled him from Mosega in 1837, after which he established his headquarters at Bulawayo.

Mzilikazi led the Ndebele through successive settlements during a period of warfare and political upheaval in southern Africa. After moving westwards to Mosega in 1832, he expanded Ndebele power across parts of the western Transvaal and present-day Botswana. A coalition of Boers, Tswana, and Griqua defeated him at Mosega in 1837, prompting the establishment of a new headquarters at Bulawayo.

At Bulawayo, Mzilikazi presided over the incorporation of Kalanga and Shona chieftaincies. His regiments raided for cattle and collected tribute in cattle, grain, tools, weapons, ornaments, leather goods, labour, and services. Some communities became tribute-paying vassals, while others remained outside effective Ndebele authority, especially east of the Sabi and Hunyani rivers.

Mzilikazi stood at the apex of the Ndebele military hierarchy, above four divisional indunas and the commanders of individual regiments. He appointed village headmen and indunas, received detailed reports, travelled among regimental towns, and conducted surprise inspections. The army, numbering about 20,000 in the later years of his reign, overlapped extensively with the political and administrative structure of the kingdom.

His authority also extended into the economic and reproductive organization of society. As the theoretical owner of all cattle, Mzilikazi controlled access to the kingdom’s principal wealth and influenced the ability of subjects to contract marriages. The annual incwala, or first-fruits ceremony, dramatized the king’s central role and gathered his subjects at the capital.

Mzilikazi combined warfare with selective diplomacy. He sent expeditions against Sebetwane’s Kololo in 1845 and 1850, resisted a Boer commando in 1847, and later signed a treaty with Boers in 1852 permitting them to hunt in his country. Robert Moffat’s visits in 1854, 1857, and 1860 led to permission for missionaries to operate in the kingdom, increasing European presence before Mzilikazi’s death in 1868.