Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics
sporting event delegation
Botswana competed at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, United Kingdom, from 27 July to 12 August 2012. This was the nation's ninth appearance at the Olympics.
Botswana National Olympic Committee sent the nation's smallest delegation in its Olympic history. Four athletes from Botswana were selected to the team, competing only in athletics and boxing. Track star and sole female athlete Amantle Montsho, reigning World champion who was considered a pre-Olympic favourite, became a strong contender to win Botswana's first Olympic medal; however, she missed out of the medal standings in the women's 400 metres, finishing only in fourth place. Montsho was also appointed by the committee to be Botswana's flag bearer at the opening ceremony.
Despite being the nation's smallest delegation, Botswana left London with its first ever Olympic medal, when track runner Nijel Amos finished second in the men's 800 metres.
Medalists
Athletics
Three track and field athletes from Botswana participated at the London games after having achieved qualifying standards in their respective events (up to a maximum of 3 athletes in each event at the 'A' Standard, and 1 at the 'B' Standard). Track runner Isaac Makwala, competing in the men's 400 metres, did not advance into the semi-finals after finishing fourth in the heats. Amantle Montsho, Botswana's only female athlete and 2011 world champion, was favored to win Botswana's first ever medal in the women's 400 metres, but finished in a disappointing fourth place.
“Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics” enters the record as sporting event delegation. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Botswana, Summer and Olympics can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Botswana, Summer and Olympics provides the most credible route into that argument.
Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 23, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q140142. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2012 and 2011.
Later summaries often reconcile disputed chronology or motive more neatly than the contemporary record permits. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics primary sources, Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics archive and Botswana research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics”?
- What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
- Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Botswana at the 2012 Summer Olympics” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.