One of the mountain peaks between Stellenbosch and Paarl was christened Clapmuts in 1657 by the fiscal A. Gabbema. The post was originally established for making hay. The indigenous Koina peoples were given from 1676 to 1680 to move their settlements and livestock elsewhere because the VOC had commandeered the grasslands in order to make hay for its horses. The region surrounding the outpost was rich in meadowlands and numbered many farms. According to an illustration by Thibault the engineer, executed in 1787, there was also a post house. For some considerable time, however, the Clapmuts region remained sparsely populated.
