What happened to Great Zimbabwe?
SHORT ANSWER The historic African city is honoured in the name and flag of a country. Take that, Europeans
LONG ANSWER A once-magniflcent city, the sprawling ruins of Great Zimbabwe serve as an important monument to the people of Zimbabwe today. Not only did the site give the modern country its name, but Zimbabwe's national flag bears a bird based on the historic soapstone carvings found there. It is also a testament to the architectural skills of the culture who built it – something that the Europeans tried to take away.
It is thought that Great Zimbabwe was constructed around the 11th century by one of the Bantu peoples, possibly the Shona; spread over 700 hectares, it was large enough for 18,000 people and a palace for the local monarch. The city prospered as a trading post for several hundred years, primarily with gold, but eventually fell into decline around 1450. This may have been the result of a drop in trade overcrowding, crop failures or famine.
When European explorers found Great Zimbabwe, they could not accept that black Africans were capable of such an architectural feat, and theories abounded that it must have been a lost city linked to King Solomon of Israel or the Queen of Sheba, or that the Phoenicians, Greeks, Persians or Chinese had actually built it. So keen were they to promote this theory, that archaeological evidence was even suppressed to back up the delusion.
Who were the Smoking Snakes?
SHORT ANSWER ‘Snakes might smoke’ is a much
