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Randlords were the entrepreneurs who controlled the diamond and gold mining industries in South Africa in its pioneer phase from the 1870s up to World War I.
A small number of European adventurers and financiers, largely of the same generation, gained control of the diamond mining industry at Kimberley, Northern Cape. They set up an infrastructure of financing and industrial consolidation which they then applied to exploit the discoveries of gold from 1886 in Transvaal at Witwatersrand — the "Rand".
Once based in the Transvaal many set up residence in the mansions of Parktown.
Many of the Randlords received baronetcies in recognition of their contributions.
Notable Randlords
- Sir George Albu, 1st Bt (1857–1935)
- Leopold Albu (1861–1938)
- Sir Abe Bailey (1864–1940)
- Barney Barnato (1852–1897)
- Alfred Beit (1853–1906)
- Sir Otto Beit, 1st Bt (1865–1930)
- Hermann Ludwig Eckstein (1847–1893)
- Friedrich Gustav Jonathan Eckstein (1857–1930)
- Sir George Herbert Farrar (1859–1915)
- Adolf Goerz (1857–1900)
- John Hays Hammond (1855–1936)
- Sir David Harris (1852–1942)
- Gustav Imroth (1862–1946)
- Solomon Joel (1865–1931)
- Woolf Joel (1863–1898)
- John Dale Lace (1859–1937)
- Isaac Lewis (1849–1927)
- Samuel Marks (1843–1920)
- Sir Carl Meyer (1851–1922)
- Maximilian Michaelis (1852–1932)
- Sigmund Neumann (1857–1916)
- Sir Lionel Phillips, 1st Bt (1855–1936)
- Jules Porgès (1838–1921)
- Cecil John Rhodes (1853–1902)
- Sir Joseph Benjamin Robinson, 1st Bt (1840–1929)
- Charles Ernest Rube (1852–1914)
- Charles Dunell Rudd (1844–1916)
- Harry Struben (1840-1915)
- Jim B Taylor (1860-1944)
- Sir Julius Wernher, 1st Bt (1850–1912)
- Sir Thomas Cullinan (1862–1936)