Spion Kop is one of those SA places that doesn’t translate. Just as Gansbaai can never become Goose Bay, Spy Hill sounds so Enid Blyton. Even thrusting an “e” into it seems an affront to the heroism on that hill 125 years ago.

Thomas Pakenham might agree. He called it “an acre of massacre” and spelt its name the old-fashioned way in The Boer War. Wikipedia still does too. ..

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