Mashonaland
Mashonaland (also Maschonaland ) is the main settlement area of the Shona in Zimbabwe . Today it is divided into three provinces and the capital district: Mashonaland West , Mashonaland Central , Mashonaland East and Harare . The provincial capitals are Chinhoyi , Bindura and Marondera .
geography
Mashonaland as a whole encompasses very different areas. In the north, between the Zambezi and a line Karoi - Mount Darwin is little fertile, difficult to access mountainous terrain that is up to date the reserves and wildlife refuges. South of this line is intensively used arable land with rivers that allow irrigation. Tobacco, corn, wheat and cotton are grown here, but also citrus fruits. On the Bindura-Harare- Kadoma line lies the Great Dyke , a geological fracture and watershed with numerous mines in which gold, iron, chromium, copper and other metals are mined, but also diamonds and numerous semi-precious stones.
history
After Mashonaland, unlike the African coastal countries, was initially not in the focus of the colonial powers , this changed at the end of the 19th century when travelers in Europe reported about the country's mineral resources . For example, in 1883 the German colonial supporter Carl Peters became aware of the country about which an American traveler to Africa named Stacy told him. Peters proposed a joint colonial project in which Stacy should initiate the economic exploitation of the natural resources, while Peters wanted to achieve political colonization by the German Empire . But Stacy, primarily interested in business, preferred to stick with Britain . Peters then submitted a Mashonaland plan to the German Foreign Office on his own , but after months of waiting the German government replied in 1884 that the areas south of the Zambezi are considered to be British interests and that no German protectorate is possible in this region. Around the year 1890 Mashonaland also came under the de facto control of the British South Africa Company , which was commissioned by Great Britain with the administration. Subsequently, Mashonaland became part of the British Protectorate of Southern Rhodesia , which was called Rhodesia from 1965 and became independent as Zimbabwe in 1980.
Today Mashonaland is politically dominated by the ZANU-PF of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe , who is Shona.
literature
- Martin Folkerts: Botswana, Rhodesia, Transvaal - geographical analysis of the population and economic structure. Volume 17 of Hamburg contributions to Africa customer, German Institute for Africa Research, Hamburg 1974.
Individual evidence
- ^ Wilfried Westphal: History of the German colonies. Gondrom, Bindlach 1991, ISBN 3-8112-0905-1 , p. 63.
- ^ Arne Perras: Carl Peters and German Imperialism 1856-1918 - A Political Biography. Clarendon Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 978-0-1915-1472-2 , p. 21.
- ↑ Jutta Bückendorf: "Black-white-red over East Africa!": German colonial plans and African reality. LIT Verlag, Münster 1997, ISBN 3-8258-2755-0 , p. 169 f.
- ↑ Hendrik L. Wesseling: Divide and rule - The division of Africa 1880-1914. Volume 76 of contributions to colonial and overseas history, Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart 1999, ISBN 978-3-51507-543-5 , p. 272 ff.