This ground-breaking book evaluates a topic central to the past century of South African history — the 1913 Natives Land Act and its consequences. Applying rigorous scholarly standards, Harvey Feinberg analyses, reassesses and then challenges previously accepted ideas about the impact of the Land Act. The book, a product of meticulous research in major South African archives, is notable for its reference to a wide array of documents scholars have until now neglected. A plethora of evidence provides the data to challenge major theories about the impact of the Natives Land Act, and to illuminate changes in government land policy. Objectively presenting this new evidence, Feinberg convincingly demonstrates that through African agency, black South Africans continued to buy land after 1913 thereby challenging the territorial segregation goals of the rural white population. His study also includes important contrasts between the 1910—1948 period and the apartheid era.