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Great Zimbabwe National Monument

Great Zimbabwe is Zimbabwe’s ancient capital, a medieval trading hub protected by towering stone walls. Though relatively little-known, the site holds immense historic and cultural significance for Zimbabwean people, who commune with their ancestors here. We explore one of the most notable attractions in Africa, without no safari jeeps in sight.

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Great Zimbabwe National Monument

“Great Zimbabwe is where my ancestors lived. Our country was named after it – Zimbabwe means ‘house of stone’. It was built by the Bantu people who make up almost our entire population, so all Zimbabweans are linked to this place, there is a spiritual connection.” Prosper Manyanda is an overland tour manager for our partner Encounters Travel. He grew up in the Masvingo Province, a 30-minute drive from Great Zimbabwe National Monument, the ancient capital of Zimbabwe, and when he speaks it betrays a deep and passionate knowledge about one of the country’s most notable historical sites.

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What is Great Zimbabwe?

This sprawling medieval city in the hills was once a major east African trading hub, home to between 10,000 and 20,000 people. Work to build it began around the 9th century, and the settlement was abandoned in the mid-15th century, likely because the agricultural land in the area was poor and resources were growing thin.

All Zimbabweans are linked to Great Zimbabwe, there is a spiritual connection… People still believe that these ruins have power, and they want to protect them.

Today Great Zimbabwe is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Our tours of Great Zimbabwe employ guides such as Prosper who are well aware of their role as the custodians of the past.

“People here believe that through their ancestors they can speak to the Creator,” says Prosper. “If someone has not been good to the world, to the environment, their life will be punished. So, if they have broken a taboo and want forgiveness, or they want to ask for the rains, they come to Great Zimbabwe to appease the Creator through their ancestors, with ceremonies that involve brewing beer and percussive drumming ceremonies. People still believe that these ruins have power, and they want to protect them. That’s why there is no mining in the area, no big tourism developments. They won’t stand for it.”

“It stays with you.”

Despite its importance to the history and people of Zimbabwe, Great Zimbabwe remains frustratingly little-known. Most visitors to the country will be there to admire the thundering Victoria Falls, perhaps to see the ancient rock paintings in the Matobo Hills, or to take a safari in Hwange National Park, but won’t go much further.

“A lot of people don’t even realise they’re in Zimbabwe when they go to Victoria Falls, it’s such a tourism bubble,” says Chris Wrede, an overland tour director for Encounters Travel. “Very few actually leave its confines which is a shame because Zimbabwe is very safe for visitors.” Chris has visited Great Zimbabwe on several occasions since his own experiences as a tour leader began in 1993. “It’s a place that has always fascinated me. Far more actually than game parks. Africa doesn’t have much written history, compared with Europe for example, but because Great Zimbabwe is there it can tell us a great deal about the country’s past. Yet despite it being evidence of a highly developed civilisation, it’s very little known. Our travellers are quite surprised by it.”

You just can’t help but wonder: how did they do it?

That sense of awe is familiar to Madri Bowmont, Travel Specialist at our partner Odyssey World, who has explored Africa extensively herself. “Great Zimbabwe stays with you. It has such an impact. Pictures and aerial views don’t do justice to the scale of the place. And the stonework is so intricate. There was no mortar involved, and the walls are so tall, you just can’t help but wonder: how did they do it? All these little stones that just fit. But compared to other sites like Angkor Wat in Cambodia, Great Zimbabwe gets so few other visitors, you can connect with the site in the peace and stillness.”

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Visiting Great Zimbabwe

Great Zimbabwe is very accessible, being just outside the city of Masvingo, which is itself a four-hour drive south from Harare. There are hotels, and government-run lodges, but overland tour groups such as those organised by Encounters Travel will camp, shopping for supplies at markets alongside local people. Tours of Great Zimbabwe normally take around a day, which is plenty of time to explore it fully.

The site itself is in the hills – sunsets are beautiful – and there are villages in the area whose residents come to Great Zimbabwe to commune with their ancestors, as Madri Bowmont explains: “You’ve got the key sections where tourists go, but obviously the local people have different ideas of what’s important and how they want to use the site. Their ceremonies are usually private for the families, taking place in smaller, remote areas of the site. Some people do earn money from inviting tourists to witness that kind of thing but it’s certainly not common.”

There are three main areas in Great Zimbabwe. The Hill Complex is the steepest part of the site, and is likely where the earlier rulers lived, as well as where rituals like rain-making ceremonies would have taken place. Below the Hill Complex is the Great Enclosure, a circular area protected by walls almost ten metres high in places and built entirely without mortar. Here you can see one of the most distinctive features of Great Zimbabwe, a tall conical tower that may have been used to store grain. “The conical tower was symbolic,” says Prosper. “When they started farming in the province surrounding Great Zimbabwe, the tower would have served as a granary, but it also represents the community’s great wealth.”

Then, close to the Great Enclosure, are the Valley Ruins, a collection of mud brick houses where pottery and ironmongery has been unearthed, giving hints as to how the Bantu population would have lived. While agriculture went on here, ultimately Great Zimbabwe was a place of trade – and lots of it. According to Prosper, this included: “Animal skins, ivory, ceramics, salt, glass, and gold. People then didn’t appreciate the value of their precious stones. And as wealth was amassed, this became the heart of the country.” Artefacts that have been unearthed indicate that the trading was international, and that the traders came from as far as Arabia and China. But not all of Great Zimbabwe’s treasures were traded away…

Racism, ruins, and robbery

Boxed up and neatly labelled, somewhere in a deep, dark storage area in the British Museum, on Russell Square in London, England, there is a thin, beaded necklace made of gold. But while it has been in the museum’s collection since 1923, it is not a British necklace. Rather it originated between the 11th and 15th centuries, in Great Zimbabwe. And although this simple piece of jewellery is a priceless link back to an ancient civilisation, it was not an official gift from one government to another. The necklace arrived at the British Museum by way of one Franklin White, a South African gold miner and archaeologist.

Ever since European colonists began to arrive, Africa has lost countless cultural treasures to private and public collections. Sadly, the ruins of Great Zimbabwe were picked clean by European explorers throughout the 20th century, and it’s impossible to know how many antiquities have been plundered over the centuries. Alongside the theft came insulting speculation among European colonists such as Cecil Rhodes that the construction was too sophisticated to have been the work of African people, a debate that is hopefully settled today.

As yet, however, there is no concerted effort among Zimbabweans to restore their cultural heritage. “I wouldn’t say there’s a lot of people agitating for it,” says Prosper Manyanda. “The reality is that much of the time it was trade rather than theft. At least that is how people then would have seen it.”

Madri Bowmont agrees that a campaign similar to that which aims to restore the Benin Bronzes to Nigeria is still some way off. “You have to remember that many Zimbabweans are just trying to make ends meet. This kind of thing isn’t really on the radar. It’s a mentality you get in many parts of Africa, especially among older people, of just ‘fill the pot tonight, and don’t worry about tomorrow’. But the younger generation are more aware of the value of places like Great Zimbabwe and more aware of the importance of tourism. So perhaps yes it will come, but I think it will take a while.”

Prosper takes a similar view that things are gradually changing in this respect. “We teach sustainable tourism in schools now. People are learning how to preserve these sacred places, their nature and culture. It’s something I’ve seen growing recently, more of an understanding of the need for long term sustainability.”

Khami Ruins National Monument

Four-and-a-half hours’ drive to the west of Great Zimbabwe is another of Zimbabwe’s five UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the Khami Ruins. It’s believed that after Great Zimbabwe fell into decline, many of its inhabitants made their way here where they continued to trade and further developed their dry stone wall architecture. Indeed, at Khami they built their houses on top of terraces, possibly to keep them cooler, which demonstrates innovation in their construction techniques.

Khami, Great Zimbabwe, and many other sites of immense historic significance in Africa continue to be overlooked in favour of those of Europe and North America. And when they are visited, typically it is on the way to, or from, a safari. But awareness is growing, thanks in no small part to the efforts of Prosper and his fellow guides, who will continue to safeguard these sacred places and honour their ancestors. “When you come to Great Zimbabwe, you won’t find guides walking around in traditional clothing or doing things to entertain people,” says Prosper. “Places like this speak for themselves.”