Great Zimbabwe, Mashonaland, Rhodesia: An account of two years' examination work in 1902-4 on behalf of the government of RhodesiaHall, R. N. (Richard Nicklin)
History
Great Zimbabwe, Mashonaland, Rhodesia: An account of two years' examination work in 1902-4 on behalf of the government of Rhodesia
Hall, R. N. (Richard Nicklin)
Great Zimbabwe (Extinct city); Zimbabwe -- Antiquities
My statements regarding the long-standing relations of the Northern
Semites with the peoples of Madagascar and South Africa as far as
Sofala are thus fully supported by the greatest authority on the
subject. But there are some minds so constituted that they seem
incapable of accepting a new revelation. They can do nothing but _stare
super vias antiquas_, and will strain every nerve to minimise the force
of facts and arguments pointing at conclusions which run counter to
their deep-rooted prejudices. I here reproduce the famous “Zimbabwe
Zodiac” (Fig. 2.), which was found near Great Zimbabwe, and shows the
twelve signs of the Zodiac carved round the rim, as described by the
late Dr. Schlichter in the _Geographical Journal_ for April, 1890. This
specialist tells us that “the signs coincide in every respect with
other finds which Bent and others have made in Zimbabwe. One of the
pictures is an image of the sun analogous to the sun-pictures which
Mauch and Bent found on the monoliths of Zimbabwe, and _analogous also
to finds in Asia Minor which belong to the Assyro-Babylonian period_.”
But a writer in the _Guardian_ attempts to destroy the significance of
this document by asserting that the Zodiac or its nomenclature is of
Greek origin and consequently of no great age. Now the Hon. Emmeline M.
Plunket has recently (1903) published a work on _Ancient Calendars and
Constellations_, in which she maintains that the Babylonian Calendar,
with its Zodiacal signs, dates from 6000 B.C., that is, about 8,000
years ago. It is true that this estimate is not clearly made out. But
on the other hand, the reader may be assured that Miss Plunket does
not hold by the “Greek” theory. Nor does F. Delitzsch, who reminds us
that “when we distinguish twelve signs of the Zodiac and call them
Ram, Bull, Twins, etc., in all this the Sumero-Babylonian culture is
still a living influence down to the present day.”[7] Nor does Sayce,
who points out that the Babylonian account of the Flood occurs in the
eleventh book of the epic of Gisdhubar corresponding approximately
with the eleventh sign of the Zodiac, at that time _Aquarius_, just
as the fifth book records the death of a monstrous lion by Gisdhubar,
answering to the Zodiacal _Leo_ and so on. He further observes that
“the Zodiacal signs had been marked out and named at that remote period
(certainly before 2000 B.C.), when the sun was still in Taurus at the
beginning of spring,”[8] and, let me add, when the Greeks had not
yet been heard of, but when the great Gnomon, or Conical Tower, had
possibly already been erected by the Semitic builders of Great Zimbabwe.
[Illustration: CYLINDER WITH ROSETTES FOUND IN PHŒNICIAN TEMPLE OF
PAPHOS, IN CYPRUS
(FIG. 3)]
[Illustration: SOAPSTONE CYLINDER, WITH ROSETTES FOUND NEAR ZIMBABWE
(FIG. 4)]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account