Museum & Heritage

Cape Cultural Heritage - History of the Solms-Delta Museum van de Caab

Whether through our wine, our music, our cuisine, our environment, or simply through our museum, Solms-Delta's heartfelt mission is to embrace and celebrate all that it means to be South African. In the second decade of our democracy, what "South African-ness" stands for has started to change. Hidden or ignored narratives have revealed themselves, and our appreciation of our heritage has become far more inclusive. We have discovered that our history, however difficult, painful and complex - as well as inspiring - is the shared basis for our future. In everything we do at Solms-Delta we try to honour what it means to be South African, to be Hiervandaan, in an honest and open way that unites all of our people, cultures, languages, musical styles, culinary traditions, flora and fauna, historic landscapes and buildings.

The social history of the 320-year-old estate is displayed in a museum in the original wine cellar, dating back to 1740. This is a few yards from a recently excavated Later Stone Age settlement site, and the exposed foundations of a 1680s hunting lodge, one of the oldest buildings in the Cape. Amazingly, the first colonists to settle on the farm (Hans Silverbach and his freed slave wife Ansela van der Caab) chose exactly the same spot to build their home as the Stone Age hunter-gatherers had chosen thousands of years before.

From its name, which honours the farm's slave heritage, to the fascinating display, the emphasis of the Museum van de Caab is on the individual people who lived and worked on the farm, from pre-colonial times to the present. One of the walls is covered by 200 stone plaques, each memorializing an individual life given to the farm through slavery.

Admission and a guided tour of the museum are free of charge.

Farm Tours
To celebrate the history and achievements in recent years, the estate offers various special interest farm tours to explore the history, the music, the food and the people of a bygone era.

Call the Museum on +27.218743937 ext 134/135

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