There are enough important historical figures in Group Portrait South Africa to contradict the claim — in the foreword by Nelson Mandela — that it is about “ordinary people”.Sure, there are ordinary people in the nine family histories summarised by researchers and organisers linked to Amsterdam’s Tropenmuseum. But these are found in the lineages of recognisable names like Sol T Plaatje, Dolly Rathebe and one-time president of the old Republic of the Orange Free State, Martinus Theunis Steyn.The book, edited by the Africa curator of the museum, Paul Farber, with Annari van der Merwe, is the result of an exhibition held last year that would “explore a territory normally inaccessible to outsiders”. Local researchers teamed up with their Dutch counterparts to explore families that displayed “diversity in terms of cultural, economic, social and geographical backgrounds”. So we have a glossy tribute — full of mementoes, commissioned artworks and images by the county’s top photographers — to more than a century of the South African family. And what twisted tales they are! The album begins with Robert Papini and Sibongiseni’s story of the Mthtethwa family led by a staunch polygamist (“14 wives, half no longer here”) and rural elder Zizwezonke “Khekhekhe” Mthtethwa. Here the pace is set for the prehistory of the living: rich historical narratives that read like fireside tales full of historical wars, religious visions, significant burials and personal traumas. Then come the tribulations of the apartheid era — forced removals, hidden romances and colour classifications. Finally we meet the new generation of South African teenagers preoccupied with university studies and wondering whether it wouldn’t be better to settle in Australia.Such is the case of Audrey le Fleur, inheritor of the legacy of the Griqua leadership told in the chapter The Dead Bones of Adam Kok by Henry Bredekamp. Audrey’s lineage is traced back five generations to Andrew Abraham Stockenström le Fleur whose grave has become a sacred site because of major events he predicted (he prophesied World War II and a British royal tour).Le Fleur didn’t prophesy the apartheid era tricameral Parliament where his grandson Eric would become a leader, or the release of Mandela that would lead to his great-grandson Andrew’s promotion to state prosecutor in 1990. But what strikes one about families that contain examples of leadership is that the environment invariably spawns leadership.In Group Portrait South Africa we have stories of achievers who’ve become chips off the old block, such as advocate Colin Steyn who still lives in the former presidential home of Onze Rust in Bloemfontein. And those who went in search of their pedigrees, such as Ebrahim Manuel whose father appeared to him in a dream, encouraging him to travel to Indonesia where he found long-lost relatives of one Imam Ismail banished to Cape Town in the 1700s.Like soap operas, or epic movies, each story sweeps across generations and provides just enough family dirt to be classified as healthy voyeurism. There are ample examples of British traders who procreated with African locals in Elsabé Brink’s look at the Nunn family in Beyond the Borders. And here, this reviewer found himself confronting a disturbing South African syndrome.In this multi-ethnic story of men and women, with English surnames, who assimilated into an out of the Zulu nation, I found myself continually trying to fathom the skin colour of the dramatis personae. Eventually, in what could be considered a therapeutic turnaround I gave up and read the story as a narrative of people and not colour.Ultimately, there is Steve Lebelo’s Completing the Circle, the story of the Plaatje family that culminates in what is apparently the fulfilled marriage between North West Premier Popo Molefe and Tumi Plaatje. However, subsequent to the book’s publication this marriage, very much in the public eye, has broken down amid accusations that Molefe sexually molested a pre-teen relative. This tragic turn of events is testimony to the fact that, while the rainbow nation often glorifies family values, the institution may not always be as sacred as the work would have us believe.