Mapungubwe National Park

History of the Park

Kings & Riches

The heydays of the Mapungubwe area started around 900 AD when Zhizo people moved down from present day Zimbabwe and settled in the basin of the Limpopo and Shashe rivers.

They established their capital on a slope overlooking the Limpopo on the present Schroda farm. These 300 to 500 people herded cattle, farmed grains and hunted elephants for their ivory. Excavations at Schroda also uncovered exotic glass beads. They prove that the Indian Ocean ivory trade had reached Southern Africa by that time.

Arab dhows (small boats) traveled with the yearly monsoon up and down the African eastern coast looking for ivory, gold, rhino horn, leopard skin and iron from the interior of Africa. They exchanged these goods for items like glass beads, cotton and silk cloths and glazed ceramics. For a century Zhizo people were in control of this trade in the Limpopo valley.

Around 1020 AD the so called Leopard’s Kopje people moved north in the basin and replaced the Zhizo chiefdom, which moved west into present-day Botswana. According to experts the pottery of the Leopard’s Kopje people suggests they spoke Kalanga, an early form of Western Shona. The capital was on a site now called K2, which was home to approximately 1500 people.

Excavations at K2 yielded graves, evidence of copper and iron working, a lot of ivory and many glass beads. The mostly blue or green beads were imported but some of them were melted down and made into larger beads, called ‘garden rollers’. Those were made by K2-craftsmen but are found hundreds of kilometers away – attaining to a well-developed network in the interior.

During the K2-period the area was wetter than before and than nowadays. The Limpopo was flowing the whole year around and the people were able to cultivate sorghum, millet, ground beans and cowpeas.

The wealth that the K2 people accumulated through farming and especially trade lead to a social division. In these days the commoners moved a few hundred meters to settle in the valley around Mapungubwe Hill. The king and some other elite people moved up and inhabited the hill itself. Royalty lived directly around the hill. This is the first time south of the Sahara that a sacred leader physically separated him from its followers.

Between 5000 and 9000 people inhabited the Mapungubwe area, which makes it the largest known settlement in Southern Africa during those days.

After 1270 it was suddenly all over. No signs of forced removal have been found and scientists suspect that a ‘little ice age’ made the area to dry for farming. Overgrazing could also have contributed to the degradation of the soil. The people of Mapungubwe were scattered but whereto is unknown. Certain is that the powerbase and the control over the Indian Ocean trade shifted north to Great Zimbabwe.

The once powerful kingdom fell into oblivion for centuries. The lost city of Mapungubwe was only rediscovered in 1932. Excavations in the 1930s unearthed 23 graves on top of Mapungubwe Hill. Three were different and probably belong to high royalty. The first, probably a woman, was buried in sitting position facing west. She wore over 100 gold bangles around her ankles and there were over 12.000 gold beads and 26.000 glass beads in the grave. The second grave was a tall middle-aged man, also sitting up and facing west. He wore a necklace of gold beads and cowrie shells and some objects covered in gold foil, one resembling a crocodile. In the third grave, probably also from a man, a golden bowl, scepter and a golden rhino were found. Nowadays this rhino is the symbol for Mapungubwe.

The spectacular findings on Mapungubwe Hill and related sites were the most important reason for the Mapungubwe Cultural Landscape to be proclaimed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site on 5 July 2003. Its rich history earns Mapungubwe an important role in the current African Renaissance.