This article explores the construction and changing nature of masculinity amongst Lutheran Norwegian missionaries in Natal and Zululand (present day KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa) between 1870 and 1930. Presupposing masculinity to be a cluster of cultural ideas and social practices that change over time (history) and space (culture), and not a stable entity with a natural, inherent and given meaning, the article argues that ideal missionary masculinity in the Norwegian missionary movement was the result of a complex dialogue between ideas of modern male “self-making” associated with the late nineteenth century, and the Christian ideal of self-denial
