The ‘Chief’s Plot’ account was perpetuated by colonial historians, but has since been discredited. Historians now view this movement as a millennialist response both directly to the lung disease spreading among Xhosa cattle, and to the stress to Xhosa society caused by the continuing loss of their territory and autonomy. J. B. Peires, a leading historian on the conflict who wrote the standard account of the events, "The dead will arise: Nongqawuse and the great Xhosa Cattle-Killing movement of 1856-7," summarizes the wider implications of the event as “the dogged resistance to colonial expansion which the Xhosa had sustained for nearly eighty bitter years was abruptly broken.” Peires emphasized the role of Governor Grey, who both encouraged the movement then capitalized on its failure via the confiscation of land, imprisonment of chiefs, and exploitative labor contracts of the newly famished Xhosa. Another scholar summarizes the event as achieving “clear domination for the British over a powerful African kingdom when eight costly frontier wars had been unable to.”