Great Zimbabwe is the name of the stone ruins of an ancient city near modern day Masvingo, Zimbabwe.

It is estimated that the central ruins and surrounding valley supported a Shona population of 10,000 to 20,000.

With an economy based on cattle husbandry, crop cultivation, and the trade of gold on the coast of the Indian Ocean, Great Zimbabwe was the heart of a thriving trading empire from the 11th to the 15th centuries.

The city was the capital of the Kingdom of Zimbabwe, which was a Shona (Bantu) trading empire. Zimbabwe means “stone houses” in Shona.

Because of its stonework and further evidence of an advanced culture, the site was variously, and erroneously, attributed to ancient civilizations such as the Phoenician, Greek, or Egyptian.

In 1905, archaeologist David Randall-MacIver concluded that the ruins were medieval and of exclusively African origin

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Illustration: AVAC Zimbabwean Art and Sculpture Hub
Photo: National Geographic.

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