The Mother City

I arrived yesterday in Cape Town, my final destination before returning home to San Francisco. “The Mother City” is indeed beautiful. I have yet to do the site-seeing, but I’m enjoying the sun and the wicked afternoon breeze.

I met long-time Cape Town penpal Daniel last evening. He brought me to a lovely Indian restaurant where I definitely noticed the horn of plenty here as compared to Zimbabwe where I always felt a bit deprived on the food front. Plenty of excellent vegetarian options available here.

Great Zimbabwe: Largest Sub-Saharian Pre-Colonial Structure

After relaxing for a day at the Ancient City Lodge, I went to visit the Great Zimbabwe Monument site. I had reserved in advance an archaeologist as a guide.

OVERVIEW:

Hill Enclosure
Valley Enclosures
Great Enclosure
Museum
References

HILL ENCLOSURE:

Arriving at the Hill Enclosure, one passes through what was probably an ancient guard station

Climb uphill passing through narrow passages between boulders where defenders could have thrown boulders onto invaders to prevent entry and protect city

At summit, enter past double walls into a clearing where the king’s huts were built (one on top of another over time, possibly demolished as each king died, with new hut built on remains of the old, ending up with the stratified layers several meters deep excavated by archaeologists)

King’s platform short climb above the clearing. Thought to be the chikuva of the Hill Enclosure. A chikuva is traditionally a part of the kitchen far from the entrance where people pray to spirits for protection or good fortune. When a person dies, their relatives lay their body overnight in the chikuva before burial.

One of the famous Great Zimbabwe birds was found in the chikuva, representing what is probably an eagle of as yet unknown species.

Next comes what was probably the homesteads of the king’s closest and most prestigious advisors.

The Recessed Enclosure, named after the recesses in its far wall, is thought to have been the home of the spirit mediums.

A short walk on a downhill path brings you to the Cave where ore was likely stored and where the spiritual leadership likely prepared for rituals. Also, the cave acts as a natural megaphone for communicating messages to the Valley Enclosures and Great Enclosure far below.

Walking uphill along another nearby path, one reaches the Furnace Enclosure used for ore smelting, including iron and possibly gold work.

A bit further uphill is the Ritual Enclosure or Sacred Enclosure. Six birds were found there, then stolen in the late 19th century by a European archaeologist.

Many of the birds have toes that look like human toes.

There were at least two platforms within the Ritual Enclosure, one on each side. Probably two of the birds rested on each platform, facing inwards toward the people sitting around the edge at the rear (downhill side of the enclosure). The king’s advisers and the diviners likely sat on platforms arranged upward on the hill. The king likely presided over the rituals seated on top of a large boulder well above everyone else, a small wall seen on the left side when facing him, probably accompanied by guards.

The ritual likely consisted of drinking beer, chanting, clapping, and dancing until sweaty, which produced states of possession by the spirits.

According to Matenga, three cows were sacrificed: one for the crowd, a second for the spirits, and a third carcass taken to the jungle for the spirit lions. If the carcass was found eaten the next day, it meant the spirits were pleased; otherwise, additional measures might have to be taken to appease the spirits.

Sometimes the purpose of the ritual was to dance for rain.

King’s lineage passed from older to younger brother starting with first wife, then second wife, etc. King usually had over 200 wives living in Valley Enclosures. Continued on to sons if all brothers had served as King.

VALLEY ENCLOSURES:

Thought to be where the king’s wives lived in about 50 households with two to three wives per household.

Judicial court for commoners in one field with appeal only rarely to “supreme court” of King’s council.

Also the location of an enclosure where imported treasures were found, called the Royal Treasury.

GREAT ENCLOSURE:

Theories:

First wife of king may have lived there
Maybe a school of initiation and ethics there
Evidence includes phallic objects found there and a decorated beam with crocodile and other symbols
Children’s play area near front entrance(s)?
OR perhaps the (last?) king shifted residence from the Hill Enclosure to the Great Enclosure

The enclosure has the shape of a womb

The outer and most recent wall of the Great Enclosure curves around like a python biting its tail with the earliest construction at the lower end of the tail and later construction toward the head, including the layer of chevron decoration over the newer part of the outer wall.

MUSEUM:

Power was out at the museum, but luckily I had brought a torch. No pictures allowed. 🙁

Exhibits as far as I remember included:

History of Great Zimbabwe
Models of Enclosures
Crops: sorghum, millet, and one other
Tools: adze, spears, etc.
The Zimbabwe Birds (the piece de resistance!)
The Forge
Cotton and Textiles – Weaving
Trans-Continental Trade
Zoomorphic stool (said to walk around to fetch water on command of magician)

REFERENCES:

Provided by guide:

Hall, Martin. Farming Communities.

Hoffman, Thomas. Snakes and Crocodiles.

Hoffman, Thomas. Symbols of a Nation: Unveiling the Mysteries of Great Zimbabwe.

Matenga, Edward. Bird book (which I purchased there)

Garlake, Peter. Many books.

Mudhenge, Stan. Political History of Munhumutapa.

Pikirai, Innocent. The Archaeology of the Mutapa Empire.

Thanks to Senior Tour Guide Francis Muchemwa, Great Zimbabwe World Heritage Site, P.O. Box 1000, Masvingo, Zimbabwe, tel. +263 039 265084 or 262080, mobile 011 760824, email francismuchemwa@yahoo.com (send copy of book)

Zooming All the Way to Great Zimbabwe and the Ancient City Lodge

I took the bus from Harare to Masvingo.

Then, on January 20, 2008, I made it to the Great Zimbabwe Monument, outside Masvingo, Zimbabwe, by paying off a local gas station owner who was willing to undercut the price offered to me by unscrupulous taxi operators in town.

I stayed at the stunning Ancient City Lodge, which is itself a recreation of the grounds of ancient Great Zimbabwe. The hotel is one of the best hotels where I’ve stayed anywhere in the world and certainly an amazing find in Zimbabwe. Tip: the price in South African rand was much more reasonable than the US dollar price for some unknown reason.

After resting for a day, I made my way to the monument the following day as chronicled in the following blog entry.

Zimbabwe Museum of Human Sciences in Harare

My arrival in Harare came with fears about how 8000% monthly inflation, food shortages, and a repressive dictator who hates gay people would influence my stay and feelings about Zimbabwe and its people.

I was a bit bewildered on arrival at the airport since I didn’t want to change money at the official rate, which was far below the black market rate. Yet I didn’t know who I could trust to change money on the black market without getting arrested or cheated or whatever.

Luckily, I met Sarah, a wonderful person who helped me figure out how to adapt to life in Zimbabwe right there at the airport. She was asking around about the current exchange rate and helped me meet a Zimbabwe local who gave me a free ride along with my bags in the back of a pickup truck to meet my friend Richard in the parking lot of a well-known hotel.

Richard put me up at his place for the day and night and showed me around town a bit. I saw the grocery stores full of food in Harare, although with prices rapidly becoming unaffordable for people whose salaries weren’t pegged to foreign currencies. He took me to an excellent Chinese restaurant with an interesting twist to the menu… each dish had a price code listed by it and the list of prices corresponding to the codes appeared on the last page of the menu, so it could be updated on a regular, even daily, basis. When it came time to pay, Richard pulled out the bag he carries around everywhere and laid a pile of cash about six inches tall on the table.

The government announced the new 10,000,000 dollar note around the time I arrived in the country, to help with the problem of physically carrying around so much cash for even the simplest of transactions. In most places that do any regular business involving large amounts of cash, they have a cash counting machine, like the one pictured below.

As soon as I changed money, I became a multimillionaire!

Richard’s father was arriving that day to stay at his place so he helped me find a hotel room. Luckily, we found one that wasn’t horridly expensive as most of them are for foreigners paying a special hard-currency foreigner price in Harare. I stayed at the lovely Bronte Hotel.

I saw a placard announcing the groups meeting there at the hotel. One of the groups listed was GALZ, which I knew as Gay and Lesbian Zimbabweans. I was shocked to see them listed, since I thought the repression would be so great that they would have to meet in private homes, ever since Mugabe’s “gays are worse than dogs” statement. I had the privilege of popping in one of their meeting sessions to wish them well, letting them know that people all over the world have heard about their struggle and understand the difficult conditions under which they are operating with threats of violence, imprisonment, and death, not to mention public humiliation and loss of employment.

On January 18, 2008, I visited the Zimbabwe Museum of Human Sciences, in Harare, Zimbabwe.

Machanga people

Oral tradition says origins in Hlengwe people who arrived before Soshongana, a Ngoni (Ngohi?) whose real name is Mamukese / Manukosi, son of Chiyangeni. Manukese fled Shaka during Mfecune period. Soshongana found the Hlengwe and established the Gaza state in early 19th century after defeating all tribes…

Machangana men pierced ears using knife, sign of bravery, skin loins, mayadha white cloth, mubodhi head ring, tnbaya(?) urinary chamber

Machangana women wear minceka, salempore (chibhelana / chibhabhela), seashells (mbambamba), leg bangles (madheya(?))

Zvitumbarse drums

Ranzala groundhornbill drum

Thumb piano

Initiation – instructor (mudzhabi)

Girls’ initiation = kombla

Boys’ initiation = mupundu(?)

Food processing: grind (kukanda) food using pestle (musi) and mortar (xthurhi), in chihizo for final processing

Ngula grainbin

Farming–

Crops: mvele (small grains), mashalani (sorghum), mahuva (millet)

Wooden hoes

Conservation of trees as shed for crops (minduti yemerele (or yemevele???))

Singing songs, political or even vulgar, only while pounding grain

Beer pots (mbita)

Head cushion (simbo)

Head rests (mukigeio)

Woven grain storage container

Chieftancy–

Nzalema power in chief’s stomach, vomited at death

Chosen from eldest son of first wife, if chief too young, nephew (tukulu, who is not in line for chieftancy) would hold the post (kuomela)

Chiefs had spear (thlari), elephant’s tusk (lumhondo lwendhlopfu), leopard’s skin, and headring (mubhodhi)

King buried in house seated facing east, elephant tusk buried with him, protruding a bit from grave

Hunting–

Shields from animal hides, arrows (mupatya), spear, and pit traps for big animals like elephants (hardwood poles with sharpened ends vertical in put, animal pierced during fall

Rituals–

Shona– possession by principal ancestors (masvikiro)

Machanga – possession at homestead level (mudzimu)

Traditional healers (N’anga) advise who to lead ritual to ask for rain before people ate produce from the fields

Madhlozi are possessed by spirits from another culture like Ndau (Maronge or Maconge?) or Ndebele

Rituals performed under Marula tree or in Ndumba house dedicated to ancesstors Inside house, white cloth, multi-colored cloth (palu), small multi-coolored clay pot (chikalaulo) and spears/gourd (ndeve)

Old women in menopause (vatsvah) brew the beer for rituals assisted by young pre-menstrual girls who carry water

Inyanga, early iron age from 300 – 1000 CE, pottery known as Ziwa

Late iron age, 1650-1800 CE, Hwisa settlements

GREAT ZIMBABWE:

Soapstones found at Great Zimbabwe, Dhlodio (Midlands), and Mutare Altar site
figural art, bowls with animal images, eight birds on pillars

Stone building tradition from about 1100-1600 CE

Arrows, spears, adze, hoe, plus imported Chinese celadon, glass beads

Iron gongs, gold grinder, grain bins

Millet, sorghum, and r??? (small grain millet?)

Cattle and goat herding: young cattle for the king’s compound, older for rest of population

Not so much hunting

Great Zimbabwe flourished 1250 – 1450 CE with smaller Zimbabwes all over the central plateau (approximately 300 of them extending even into Mozambique, Botswana, and South Africa)

King lived on the Hill Complex – wealth and power from control over subjects

Symbols of authority found: iron gongs, trade items

Zimbabwe Hill – enclosures

Imba Huru: pole and daga (mortar/cement) houses with enclorsure, three entrances

Khami ruins at Bulawayo are second largest after Great Zimbabwe

Others at places like Matendara, Dhlodhlo, and Naletale

All used decorative wall patterns: chevron, check, cord, dentelle, herriingbone, and alternate courses of granite (light) and schist (dark)

Shona concept of mutupo, link to ancestors

Mazimbabwe – plural usage for other zimbabwes around the country

References found at Museum Library:

Garlake, Peter. Life at Great Zimbabwe. Gweru, Zimbabwe: Mambo Press, 1982, reprinted 1991. {Exploring Zimbabwe Series #1}

Garlake, Peter. Early Zimbabwe: From the Matopos to Inyanga. Gweru, Zimbabwe: Mambo Press, 1983. {Exploring Zimbabwe Series #3}

Garlake, Peter S. Great Zimbabwe. London, United Kingdon?: Thames and Hudson, 1973.

Garlake, Peter. Great Zimbabwe: Described and Explained. Harare, Zimbabwe: Zimbabwe Publishing House, Ltd., 1982.

National Museums and Monuments of Rhodesia. Map of the Zimbabwe Ruins. Publication location and date unknown, like pre-independence, i.e. before 1980.

R.N. Hall. Great Zimbabwe. London, United Kingdom: Methuen and Co., first published 1905.

Chauke, Chris. The Great Zimbabwe Monument Traveller’s Guide. Mosvingo, Zimbabwe: The National Museums and Monuments of Zimbabwe(?), publication date unknown.

Mantenga, Edward. The Soapstone Birds of Great Zimbabwe: Symbols of a Nation. Harare, Zimbabwe: African Publishing Group, 1998.

Robinson, K.R. Khami Ruins. Cambridge, United Kingdom: University Press, 1959.

Summers, Roger. Inyanga: Prehistoric Settlements in Southern Rhodesia. Cambridge, United Kingdom: University Press, 1958.

Gathercole, Peter, and Lowenthal, David (eds.). The Politics of the Past. London, United Kingdom: Unwin Hyman Ltd., 1990, updated 1994?, pp. 189-199 (West Africa article), and pp. 291-298 (Nigeria article)

Thanks to Naone Chiruka, Librarian, Zimbabwe Museum of Human Sciences, Box CY 33, Causeway, Harare Zimbabwe (send copy of my book to the library).

I left Harare by bus at the bus station pictured above.

Whirlwind Ride and Flights Across the Continent

I knew going in to the Festival in the Desert that I was doing something crazy. I traveled all the way from Nigeria back to a desert outpost outside Timbuktu in Northern Mali so I could participate in this Tuareg music festival. The whole drama of waiting for a Niger visa in Abuja, Nigeria, put me off a bit and I ended up on this crazy series of flights back to Bamako, then paid a painful chunk of cash for a supposedly comfy and dependable 4×4 ride to Timbuktu and back to Bamako, missing the final day of the music festival so that I could return in time to catch a flight from Bamako. Instead, the 4×4 had engine trouble and I ended up having to rent a vehicle with only a few hours to go before my flight left the airport.

The flight from Bamako, Mali, to Accra, Ghana, was the first in an incredible arc of flights planned across the continent, traveling then on to Johannesburg, South Africa, and finally to Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. After a lot of travel aggravation with South African Airways, I ended up instead skipping the Congo portion of the trip and heading on after a fourteen hour harangue in the Johannesburg airport to Harare in Zimbabwe.

Griot Convergence in Timbuktu

January 12, 2008, Hotel Boctou, Timbuktu, Mali

Boubakar Touré, the owner of the Hotel Boctou, told me that there had been a conference in December 2007 on griots at the hotel here in Timbuktu. He mentioned that a fellow named Paul Raukin has been gathering stories in Timbuktu aided by a guide named Azima. He also mentioned Madame Touré Zalia-Maïga, at the University of Arizona at Tempe. And a fellow named Salem Ould el Hajh (tel. 9407926) has English translations of the transcripts of the griots who spoke in Songhaï (or Songhui or ???) and Tamchek languages at the conference.

Travelers Joshua and Heather Tallis, who I met on the route from Essakane to Timbuktu, recommended reading the books entitled Salt and Cod, as well as a book called Timbuktu by Marq de Villiers and Sheila Hirtle.

Festival in the Desert, Essakane, Mali

The eighth annual Festival in the Desert (Festival au Desert) took place in Essakane, Mali, on January 10-12, 2008. I made it late the first day, stayed the second day, and had to leave really really early the morning of the last day. So, I missed my most anticipated musician playing at the festival: Tiken Jah Fakoly. I got to experience lots of really good music though.

One apparently traditional event at the festival is camel racing. At the same time, with a bunch of jostling in the crowd, a ceremony of women took place, perhaps a form of “dressage” to show off their finery for potential spouses.

A Day in Timbuktu: Ahmed Baba Institute and Another Manuscript Library

The Institut des Hautes Etudes et de Recherches Islamiques – Ahmed Baba (IHERI-AB), formerly the Centre de Documentation et de Recherches Ahmed Baba (CEDRAB), commonly known in English as the Ahmed Baba Institute, houses an excellent collection of historical manuscripts in Timbuktu.

We walked through Timbuktu from one manuscript library to another.

The other library also had amazing historical manuscripts.