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
The manufactures of the Makalanga are fast declining. In very rare
instances may be found villages where bark and cotton are still woven.
Limbo from the stores is so cheap and attractive looking that it has
practically driven out the local article, and the clay whorls used in
spinning cotton are now discarded. Their once famous iron and copper
smelting industries almost disappeared on the advent of cheap and
substantial tools. At one time every village had its blacksmith and
its furnaces and forges, but during the last few years iron-working
has become far less general. Derembghe, near Mr. Nolan’s farm, in the
Victoria district, is the only representative of the old industry.
Pottery is still made, but at Chikwanda, near Arowi and east of
Zimbabwe, the people make pottery of a superior quality. This is also
the case at Mazuwa’s, in Nini district.
The people are essentially a race of agriculturists and cattle
breeders, and dislike working in mines. Though they are most
industrious in their own plantations, yet they will not work for a
white man for more than a month or two in a year, preferring to spend
the rest of the year in absolute idleness. Many are adepts in brass or
copper wire-work, with which they adorn their sticks and weapons. They
are also very skilful in wood-carving, basket-making, and in tanning
and preparing skins.
The Makalanga of this district are certainly above the average
type of natives in the possession of both intellectual and physical
qualifications. Light skins, Semitic noses, fine features, with an
absence of high cheek-bones, small, well-shaped hands—are frequent
features met with among them. The men, who wear but insignificant
aprons, are well proportioned, are as straight as an arrow, and have
athletic figures. Large turquoise-blue beads of glass form the neck
ornament of men, women, and children in this district, and these
contrast effectively with the colour and polish of their skins. Both
men and women frequently wear a narrow band of pink and white beads
round their heads. Brass bangles are worn on wrists, arms, legs, and
ankles, the women and girls wearing these in great profusion.
Women are bare to the low hips, and wear a short skin skirt reaching
almost to the knees. This is most generally adorned with chevron
pattern of pink and white beads. Their stomachs are covered with two
sets of lines worked into the flesh, one set under each breast. This
pattern is very general here, and is identical with the “breast and
furrow” pattern found not only on the fronts of the clay furnaces,
pillows, drums, and granaries, but on the ancient relics and sacred
emblems (phalli) discovered in the ruins. Bent and other writers
believe that these flesh-markings are a survival of the occult idea
of Fertility. There are generally about thirty rows of these lines or
cicatrices, and their regularity is most surprising.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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