Orange Free State

American  

[awr-inj free steyt, or-] / ˈɔr ɪndʒ ˈfri ˌsteɪt, ˈɒr- /

noun

1. a province in central Republic of South Africa: a Boer republic 1854–1900; a British colony Orange River Colony 1900–10. 49,647 sq. mi. (128,586 sq. km). Bloemfontein.

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Orange Free State British  

noun

1. a former province of central South Africa, between the Orange and Vaal rivers: settled by Boers in 1836 after the Great Trek; annexed by Britain in 1848; became a province of South Africa in 1910; replaced in 1994 by the new province of Free State; economy based on agriculture and mineral resources (esp gold and uranium). Capital: Bloemfontein

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Orange Free State

Cronje was appointed Orange Free State captain aged 21 and the batting all-rounder soon became a part of the post-apartheid South Africa team which re-emerged on the international stage.

From BBC ● Jul. 30, 2025

The war ended in 1902, and the Cape Colony annexed the South African Republic and the Orange Free State.

From Textbooks ● Dec. 14, 2022

Robert O’Brien, a relatively junior official appointed to the top White House post on Wednesday, went to the University of the Orange Free State under the South African apartheid system.

From The Guardian ● Sep. 24, 2019

André Phillipus Brink was born May 29, 1935, in Vrede, a small community in the Orange Free State, then an independent state within the borders of South Africa.

From Washington Post ● Feb. 14, 2015

His great-grandfather had been a chief in the Orange Free State, and had greeted the Afrikaner voortrekkers of the nineteenth century with open arms and gifts of land, and then been betrayed.

From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela