GREAT ZIMBABWE RUINS

To access the Great Zimbabwe site from Masvingo, if you do not have a car, you can take the shared cabs, which leave in front of the Pick N Pay, in the center of town, and can drop you off on the main road. There are two options to get to the information center. The first is to walk down in front of the Great Zimbabwe Hotel and walk 1.5 km on a footpath, the second is to walk down a little further to the park entrance and walk 1 km on a paved road. Some lodges and hotels may also offer tours of the site.

In general, it takes four to five hours to tour the main sights of the site. There are three major architectural complexes to visit: Hill Complex (the oldest part of the city, built on top of a hill), Great Enclosure (where the famous conical tower that appears on all the brochures and postcards of Zimbabwe is located), Valley Enclosures (which gathers a multitude of enclosures more scattered and less impressive than the previous ones). To complete your knowledge of the place, a small and very instructive museum can be visited at the exit of the site, and a traditional karanga village has been rebuilt between Hill Complex and Valley Enclosures.

It is possible to hire local guides, and even highly recommended if you really want to appreciate the mystery and beauty of the ruins. The guides are usually located at the tourist information center. The tour lasts about three hours. One of the best times to visit the park is in the late afternoon, to enjoy the sunset. Whatever happens, the place is not overrun with tourists and there is a good chance to be alone. If the visit to the ruins has fascinated you and made you want to know more, don't hesitate to get one of the books of the specialist in the field, Peter Garlake: Great Zimbabwe Described and Explained (today the best book on the medieval city) or Life at Great Zimbabwe (a less exhaustive essay, but easier to read). A small museum on the spot explains well the history of the ancient city, even if some doubts and uncertainties remain. It should be added that the site has been recently restored with the support of the French Development Agency.

Hill Complex. This part of the city, the first one undoubtedly to have been invested by the local populations, represents a true architectural tour de force: rather than imposing the shape of their constructions to the environment, the builders of the time balanced their buildings starting from the already existing rocks. The walls and stone enclosures were built according to the configuration of the rocky overhangs and granite blocks. For example, faults were transformed into access corridors, a natural amphitheater became a place for rituals, etc. The complex is located at the top of a hill, 80 m above the valley. It housed the successive rulers of the kingdom as well as their advisors and mediums. In the eastern part of Hill Complex, a few steps lead to a semi-circular square, dominated by a huge rock. It probably served as a court of justice, but especially as a religious center: bronze ceremonial objects were found there, as well as six sculptures of birds in steatite. Three more or less steep paths lead to the Hill Complex, from where one can have beautiful views of the Great Enclosure.

Great Enclosure. Located in the valley at the foot of the hill, this complex consists of an enclosure 100 m in diameter and 243 m in circumference, with walls up to 11 m high and 6 m thick. The largest stone monument in sub-Saharan Africa, Great Enclosure, like Hill Complex, was a royal palace whose function was not protective but ostentatious, it was to display its wealth and power! It was undoubtedly used as residence to the sovereigns of the kingdom, as well as to their children: pearls, bracelets, necklaces and even pairs of gold earrings were found there during the excavations. Built a century and a half after the hill complex, Great Enclosure represents the apogee of Rozvi sculpture: while the walls, as in the other complexes, were built with skillfully piled stones, they appear more often decorated with herringbone patterns and above all house a high conical tower, which is considered the most finished construction of Rozvi masonry. This tower, flanked by a similar but much less imposing conical building, rises to a height of 10 m and can be reached by a narrow corridor 70 m long. Since the discovery of the city, it arouses the interrogations of the researchers who hardly succeeded in agreeing on its origin and its exact use: some see there a phallic representation symbolizing the fertility; others think that it was used as altar at the time of the initiatory or religious ceremonies (in top of the tower, a stone platform covered with carbonized wood and bovine bone was found); others still see there only a gigantic granary... If none of these theories has yet been verified, the conception (oh so romantic!) according to which the tower would have sheltered the royal treasure of the Rozvi dynasties has been categorically denied by some dream-busting archaeologists...

Valley Enclosures. This grouping of enclosures and stone walls is the least impressive of the site. Without doubt it was used to shelter the notables of the kingdom and not their sovereigns anymore. Platforms of daga huts were found there, as well as one of the famous steatite bird sculptures, today the national emblem of the country. These ruins are between the Hill Complex and the Great Enclosure, but it takes a lot more imagination to picture the great era.

Reconstructed Karanga Village. Near Valley Enclosures, a village of traditional huts has been reconstructed to allow tourists to appreciate the interior layout of typical Zimbabwean dwellings (children's rooms, parents' rooms, kitchen, healer's hut, etc.). In the days when Great Zimbabwe was a thriving city, thousands of such huts must have been crammed inside the compounds (for the royal or very rich families) and outside (for the common people). Today, only the few prototypes of the reconstructed village still adorn the site, while a witch doctor (straight out of the tourist industry?) offers to tell fortunes in exchange for a few small dollars.

Museum. Open from 8 am to 4:30 pm. Like most major archaeological sites, the ruins of Great Zimbabwe have been extensively looted and most of the objects found during the excavations are scattered all over the world. The modest collection that has been preserved is now housed in a small museum at the entrance to the site. One can observe tools and weapons, as well as some objects of oriental origin, proof of the commercial links that the powerful of Great Zimbabwe maintained, probably through the intermediary of Swahili merchants, not only with India but also probably with China and Persia. Apart from these few relics, the main interest of the museum lies in the seven (and a half!) soapstone birds that are exhibited there: about forty centimeters high, these strange creatures have become the emblem of Zimbabwe and appear on the national flag, as well as on the country's stamps and official seals. According to informed ornithologists, they are crudely carved fish eagles. Archaeologists, however, see them as mythological creatures that may have served as totems; it is assumed that the carvings of the birds were used by rainmakers or represented the spirits of the ancestors, according to the Rozvis, the deceased transformed into a bird in order to reach the sky. The museum closes at 4:30 pm, a little earlier than the rest of the site.