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Abstract
Gold was an important commodity at the time of the Zimbabwe and its successor states, both as an export item and as a status symbol. Although numerous gold burials were discovered at zimbabwe ruins at the turn of the century, none were properly excavated, and consequently little is known of funerary practice at these times. A gold burial excavated at Castle Kopje in Mashonaland recently can be linked with the Zimbabwe state and, by reference to more recent Shona customs, this provides us with a preliminary insight into burial modes and symbolism during this period.
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Opening Paragraph
Some years ago one of the very few structuralist anthropologists to contribute to Southern African studies complained that ‘Aucune étude n'a encore été consacrée à l'organisation spatiale et aux relations qu'elle implique chez les Bantu du Sud-Est’ (Roumeguère- Eberhardt 1963: 77). This was not strictly accurate. For example, Holleman (1940) had provided an important analysis of the Zulu homestead, borrowing something of the methods and concerns of the Leiden school's studies in Indonesia; and one cannot ignore Walton's (1956) wide-ranging if unsystematic treatment of the Southern African village. Yet the topic has been largely neglected despite the highly-ordered nature of the Southern Bantu homestead and the legal and symbolic significance of the traditional homestead plan.
A term used to designate metal-using agriculturalists, the Iron Age of eastern and southern Africa extends over the last 2000 years. Based on the great upsurge in research and improved methods of ordering ceramic and settlement data, the author reviews three long-standing problems, namely the Early Iron Age and the spread of Bantu speakers, the postulated transition from an Early to a Late Iron Age, and the origins of the Zimbabwe Culture. -after Author
This paper describes the excavation of a cave used for funerary purposes in the Mtoroshanga district of Rhodesia. The cave was found to contain a large quantity of skeletal material and pottery, together with the personal ornaments of the persons interred there. The physical type represented is similar to that of the modern Bantu-speaking peoples of Southern Africa. Bodies had been placed in the cave surrounded by pottery—although pottery, unlike the skeletal material, which was ubiquitous, was mainly placed towards the entrance of the cave. Quantities of palm-leaf and bark-cloth matting used for wrapping round the bodies of the persons interred were found. Conus shell end-whorls and glass beads indicate trade links with the outside world.
There are two superimposed funerary layers in the cave, both belonging to the same culture, but at different stages of its development. The earlier layer has been dated by radicarbon dating methods to approximately the late 13th or early 14th century A.D. Prior to its use for funerary purposes, the cave had been briefly occupied for other purposes by people of the same culture.
The ceramics of the site indicate that it belongs to a culture newly recognized in Rhodesia with a fairly wide distribution in the north-east of the country. Cultural affinities lie with Zambia and Malawi, rather than with the contemporary Zimbabwe culture, whose expansion, indeed, probably put an end to the occupation of the Mtoroshanga area by the people of the ossuary.
Excavations at the Zimbabwe (enclosure) of Manekweni, in southern coastal Mozambique, have shown that it belongs to the Zimbabwe Culture which was centred on the Rhodesian plateau. Occupation levels have been dated to between the twelfth and eighteenth centuries. The faunal evidence indicates that a section of the population benefited from intensive beef production through transhumant pastoralism on the seasonally-fluctuating fringes of tsetse fly infestation. The settlement pattern of Rhodesian Zimbabwe suggests that their siting was determined by the demands of a similar system of transhumance. This model provides a basis from which to begin to reconstruct some aspects of the economies of early Zimbabwe. It is already clear that Zimbabwe were not simply the products of long-distance trade; rather, their economies integrated farming and cattle-herding as well as gold production and foreign trade.
Thesis--University of Illinois, 1974. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 187-194). Photocopy.
Thesis--Indiana University. Includes bibliographical references (p. 229-248). Photocopy.
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