Quagga was a species (kind) of zebra that lived in South Africa. It became extinct in the wild during the 1860’s. The last quagga died in captivity in a zoo in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, in 1883. Unlike other types of zebras, which have black and white stripes all over their bodies, the quagga was brown, with a white tail and white legs, and had stripes only on its head and neck and the front part of its body.
The quagga, along with the other zebra species, was hunted by people for its meat and hide. It was a shy animal that lived in herds of small family groups, just as other zebra species do today. The name quagga comes from the language of the Khoikhoi in Africa. It was probably an imitation of the animal’s part-barking, part-neighing call.
The extinct quagga is known as the true quagga. But Afrikaans-speaking South Africans also use the name quagga, or bontequagga (painted quagga), for one of the three surviving species of zebras, the common zebra, or Burchell’s zebra.
