How Nelson Mandela transcended race barriers to become a symbol of resistance and exemplar of human generosity of spirit

Symbol: Nelson Mandela, pictured at his South African home in 2010, 'triumphed as a symbol of national reconciliation between South Africa's races'

Nelson Mandela was the most famous black man in history.
He transcended race barriers to become an exemplar of human generosity of spirit. His towering personality made possible the peaceful transfer of power in South Africa from white minority to black majority rule.  
If he was less effective as president of his country than he had been as the symbol of resistance to apartheid, he demonstrated statesmanship unmatched in Africa.
He inspired love as much as respect, and became regarded by hundreds of millions of people as a secular saint.
More was asked of him, and sometimes claimed for him, than any mortal man could deliver. But the world has been a fractionally better place, because Nelson Mandela lived in it.
He was born into African aristocracy, a descendant of kings of the Thembu people, in Transkeiin 1918. 
His father had four wives, among whom his mother ranked third.
He was the first of his family to attend school, and it was his teacher who gave him the English name Nelson in place of his given name, Rolihlahla.
At 19, he attended Fort Hare University, where he soon became involved in student politics - or rather, in organising a boycott of them.
Rejecting a marriage arranged for him by his tribal elders, he became briefly a mine guard, then was articled to a Johannesburg law firm.
He began living in the Alexandra black township, and started law studies at Witwatersrand University, where he met fellow students and future political activists Ruth First, Joe Slovo and Harry Schwarz.
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Party time: Nelson Mandela celebrates his 94th birthday in July last year surrounded by his family

Dignified: The former South African president is pictured with his wife Graca Macel at their house in Qunu, on the Eastern Cape, during his birthday celebrations

The Afrikaner-dominated National Party attained power in South Africa's 1948 election.
Thereafter, its government set about transforming the country’s longstanding policy of racial segregation into an ironclad, legally-based system of repression.
In the early 1950s, Mandela became deeply involved in radical resistance to apartheid, while he and fellow-activist Oliver Tambo ran a law firm, offering cheap advice to township residents.

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