Munhumutapa Empire

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The Munhumutapa Empire (also known as the Mwenemutapa , Monomotapa , Mwanamutapa , Mutapa or Karanga Empire ) was an important pre-colonial state in southern Africa. It covered parts of Zimbabwe and central Mozambique . It had its heyday between the 13th and 15th centuries. When the Portuguese were the first Europeans to travel to southern Africa, it had already broken up into several parts. Since this state knew no script, the knowledge about it is based on archaeological finds, especially stone monumental buildings, of which Greater Zimbabwe is the best known. There are also numerous oral traditions about its rulers.

The Empire

As early as the 10th century, Arab sources reported that there was a gold-rich state in the interior of southern Africa. The walls of Greater Zimbabwe were built in the 13th to 15th centuries. The place began as a local center for livestock and agriculture and from a certain time on led to the development of a complex society with a rich upper class and productive farmers and nomads among them. The city itself is said to have had 10,000 to 18,000 inhabitants in its heyday. From this period there are other places with large stone buildings and a large number of smaller finds from the same culture. Despite the traditions of a powerful empire, it is not even certain whether all of these sites belonged to the empire whose capital was Greater Zimbabwe.

Trade relations in the Arab region as well as India and China are proven. Gold and ivory in particular were exported, while porcelain and cotton fabrics were imported. This trade is likely to have contributed significantly to prosperity. Much of this trade took place through illiterate middlemen, Swahili and Malays. Greater Zimbabwe was abandoned as a center around 1450. The most likely cause is an overload of natural resources due to population concentration.

Upon arrival of the Portuguese in the region in 1500, there were two centers of power, the Mutapastaat of Shonastammes Karanga in the north, to the Portuguese visited regularly, even temporarily brought under their control, and the Torwa State (probably Shona) with the center Khami in Southeast, where the influence of Islamic traders predominated for a long time. Around 1600 a civil war broke out in the Torwa state, during which one of the rulers drove out or even killed the Islamic traders. Around 1650 the Torwa state was taken over by the Shona tribe Rozwi around the Changamire clan . The center of the state was about 80 km east of Khami in Danangombe , today called Dhlodhlo. Khami and Danangombe are also large stone walls. The trading center of Massapa was of particular importance in the Mutapa state . In addition, several smaller fortifications, mostly made of stone, were built in this state by the middle of the 18th century. During the period of intense Portuguese influence, the state disintegrated into partial realms. The political situation lasted until around 1830.

Around 1820, the ruler Shaka introduced a strict military organization among the Zulu, who belonged to the Nguni, and began with the bloody subjugation of neighboring tribes. The resulting wave of migration by the Mfecane also hit the Shona states. In 1831 the death of a ruler made the Changamir state incapable of acting. In 1834 he was conquered by the Ndebele , who belonged to the Nguni, under Mzilikazi , who established the Matabele kingdom there. Around 1860 he also subjugated the states of the Mutapa Empire.

Culture and state

Africae tabula nova 1570:
port city of Cefala = Sofala ,
Manich = Manica ,
Simbaoe = Greater Zimbabwe ,
Zuama = Zambezi; almost all of Africa's major rivers flow from the same central lake in this map.

How Munhumutapa was organized is beyond any reliable knowledge. Oral tradition tells of an extreme king-centricity, which is said to have extended to the fact that when the king laughed in Great Zimbabwe , everyone in the city had to laugh. Traditions of this kind seem to point to a radical absolutism that sees in the king's subjects only an extension of the king himself, and therefore no independent individuals, and thus requires unrestricted obedience to the point of self-denial. It is more likely, however, that we are dealing here with a form of sacred kingship ( god kingship ) that is typical of early traditional religions and was particularly widespread in Central Africa. It is reported from mining that the people working in the tunnels were never allowed to leave them and were often prisoners of war. The preserved stone buildings indicate on the one hand a high degree of organization of this society. On the other hand, it is dry masonry without corner connections that did not carry any roofs, but only formed fences around huts. This clearly distinguishes it from the buildings that were built in the Islamic coastal cities at the same time only a few hundred kilometers away. With their columns and vaults, these are technically very similar to European stone buildings of the time.

At least as important as the imposing ruins are the irrigation systems in the Mazowe Valley , which irrigate the area from Inyanga to the Zambezi . Such irrigation systems can also be found in the south of the ruins. They consist of a huge system of open trenches along the mountain slopes, the gradient of which is subtly calculated. They are evidently an entirely separate achievement, and their establishment requires an enormous social organization capable of coordinating so many workers.

State of research

Zimbabwe culture (Monomotapa empire, Torwa and Changamire empire) and environment

Research into material culture is based primarily on archaeological finds. Ethnic classifications are often obtained on the basis of linguistic comparisons. Oral traditions can be a supplement, but have some problems: They can exaggerate the meaning and actions of the respective group, they can be imprecise in terms of terminology, and they do not go back to the actual heyday.

  • According to the current state of research, there were only hunters and gatherers in southern Africa until the birth of Christ . Agriculture, cattle breeding and iron processing do not occur until the birth of Christ. Britt Bousman's work on the spread of cattle breeding in southern Africa, listed as a reference, distinguishes between Neolithic Khoisan finds and early Iron Age non-Khoisan finds. He counters the older theory of an independent development of cattle breeding by the Khoisan as follows: In areas further north, the evidence of cattle breeding is older and always associated with Iron Age culture. In the centuries around the turn of the times, evidence of early Iron Age animal husbandry can be found in the south of today's Zambia and in today's Zimbabwe. With a slight delay, but geographical and temporal overlap, evidence of cattle breeding of the Neolithic Khoisan can also be found here.
  • The introduction of iron and agriculture is mostly associated with the immigration of the Bantu or at least small Bantu speaking groups. Certain finds at the beginning of the Iron Age on the Okavango allow alternatives to equating the Iron Age and Bantu immigration without refuting them. The fact that Khoisan have been displaced by Bantu ("modern Bantu tribes") on the Okavango since the 18th century does not mean that Bantu did not live there before or did not move through there (cf. settlement history of the Teutons and Slavs in Europe).
  • This is followed by an area of ​​Iron Age farmers from Botswana 190, Nkope culture 300, Kalomo 900. For a long time, Stone Age and Iron Age groups apparently lived side by side. The area around Nkope , Quelimane , Inhambane , Musina , Ingombe Ilede , Zumbo , Nsanje , was the one with the greatest density of settlements until 1500 and was located from Greater Zimbabwe to the east. It remains uncertain whether it formed a uniform cultural area. Neither the Longwe culture nor the Nkope culture have so far been assigned with certainty, nor are the finds at Kalomo (Kalundu culture, Dambwa culture, graves). But the early Iron Age Gokomere / Ziwa tradition was found in Matola , Zambezi Delta (Lumbi, Nyamula Kinglet Region), Chinde , Sena and Masvingo .
  • The early Iron Age agriculture was followed by the advanced Iron Age with the first town-like settlements such as Mapungubwe near Musina , whose ceramics south of the Zambezi are of very high quality. Ingombe Ilede is considered inhabited from 700, Zumbo cannot be dated with certainty, so there is a presence through settlements on the Zambezi crossings with fertile floodplains. It is believed that the influence of these border towns extended to Kansanshi . In any case, the trade reached via Ingombe Ilede to West Africa, as archaeological finds show. The role of the navigable sections of the Mazowe, Zambezi and Shire rivers in the narrower settlement area is unclear for this early period and before.
  • This is followed by connections with the coast of the Indian Ocean with Sofala, Inhambane and consolidation of trading places on the Zambezi and other routes.
  • Glass beads of Chinese origin, cowrie shells , Indian fabrics exist from 900 at the latest with a zenith around 1300, which is before the Swahili, dated at least 1100, and later apparently overlaps with them. Munhumutapa mainly supplies gold, copper, iron and ivory. The gold is believed to have been found in the Mutare River, which it swept from the veins of Massi Kessi . It was also won in Zumbo. The gold extraction, in turn, used methods that were also common in southern India (Harald von Sicard), but very different from the African ones.
  • Sofala, the nearest coastal town, was described as a flourishing trading center as early as the 10th century by the Arab geographer Al Masudi, who himself stayed on the east coast of Africa for a long time, although at that time it was still with a pagan ruler (see web links).
  • A little later, the Swahili culture developed here from African and oriental-Islamic elements. From around 1000 AD it was firmly established on the coast with rulership structures extending deep into the interior, e.g. B. Petauke , as proven by reliable Portuguese sources.
  • When the Portuguese arrived in the 16th century, the Karanga inhabited the Mazowetal . Their language, now called Chishona, is independent among the southern central Bantu languages, but has a relatively high degree of resemblance to the languages ​​of the Sotho Tswana group (South Africa, Botswana, also Zambia) and, in contrast to the Nguni languages, does not use click sounds.

Early hypotheses

The exploration of Munhumutapa began at the end of the 19th century after the German Africa explorer Karl Mauch discovered the ruins of Greater Zimbabwe in 1871. Soon during excavations one came across not only an iron gong, but also goods from Asia and thus old trade relations. There has long been speculation as to whether this trade even reached back to antiquity, especially whether it is the land of Ophir mentioned in the Bible , with which King Solomon traded in the 10th century BC. Today's physical dating of stone buildings and their predecessor cultures excludes the Ophir hypothesis. There is also no sandalwood there .

reviews

colonization

Archaeological evidence suggests that the highlands of Zimbabwe have been colonized by Bantu tribes since the 2nd / 3rd centuries. Century AD The ancestors of today's Shona are considered to be the carriers of the Gokomere culture. However, it is not yet possible to say with certainty which tribal affiliation the inhabitants of Greater Zimbabwe had, especially since the city was largely abandoned in the middle of the 15th century.

Stone buildings and landscaping

Radiocarbon dates show that Greater Zimbabwe was built and used in the 13th to 15th centuries. All other buildings that are strictly part of the Zimbabwean culture are younger. Earlier dates appear in individual treatises, but could have been taken from a time when physico-chemical dating was not yet possible and the ruins were believed to be older due to their archaic construction.

Round construction and the lack of corner connections in places where walls meet, speak against a builder from other areas on the Indian Ocean. At that time, angular stone buildings had long been common not only on the Asian coasts, but also on more northern areas of the African coast (e.g. Kilwa , 900 km south of the equator). The whole floor plan has a lot of an African kraal , albeit much larger : The impressively high stone walls of Greater Zimbabwe never supported roofs, but were enclosures in which huts and houses made of clay and wood stood. In 1895 a missionary described the residence of an Ovambo chief from the west side of southern Africa. Made of wooden palisades and much smaller than Greater Zimbabwe, their layout nevertheless follows similar principles. The stone construction did not end with the heyday of culture: In the Mutapa empire, smaller fortifications (hill forts) were built from the 16th to the 18th century. An Danangombe ( Dhlodhlo ), the residence of the Torwa - and later Changamire - state continued to be built into the 18th century, although the last of the measures served more for military security than for representation and were accordingly more crude. It is questionable how long the irrigation system on Mazowe was in use, but the Manica Shona tribe in the border area between Mozambique and Zimbabwe continued to expand their terraced fields well into the 19th century. The cultural break postulated by some people, not without political interest, between Zimbabwe culture and today's Shona in particular, or today's Bantu in general, melts away on closer inspection.

trade

Chinese porcelain and Indian cotton fabrics are easy to identify in African sites using isotopes and trace amounts. Reconstructing the paths of the metal trade is more difficult.

The gold mines of Johannesburg had not yet been discovered and might not have been exploited with the methods of the time, but the Arab traveler Al-Masudi reported one of them around 916, centuries before the erection of the first walls of Greater Zimbabwe that are preserved today gold-rich state in the hinterland of Sofala.

Relocation and division

For the Zimbabwe or Monomotapa empire two periods have to be distinguished, that in which Greater Zimbabwe was built and that in which there were two centers. One was in the north around the Mazowetal , where the Portuguese found the Monomotapa empire Mokaranga. The other was in the southeast, first as a Torwa, then as a Changamire state. The traditions tell of struggles between the two centers of power. There are various theories about the reasons for giving up Greater Zimbabwe around 1450. The most plausible assumes the depletion of regional resources due to population concentration. Whether a long drought in the 14th or 15th century contributed to the fall of the original Munhumupata Empire has not yet been answered by climate research. An epidemic or civil war are also discussed.

Europeans and Mfecane

The first Portuguese sources date from the 16th century. In 1560, the Jesuit priest Gonçalo da Silveira, who evangelized the Shona king Nogomo Mupunzagato (Chisamharu Negomo Mupuzangutu), came across a notable settlement and social organization in the Mazowetal. Greater Zimbabwe near today's Masvingo (under British rule Fort Victoria, today's name means "ruins") had been abandoned about 100 years earlier and there was a second successor state around Khami . Between 1569 and 1572, a Portuguese army of 1,000 soldiers under Francisco Barreto was enough to conquer the entire settlement area. However, the general and most of his troops died of an epidemic in Sena on the Zambezi, so that only a few survivors reached the coast and the conquest became obsolete. Subsequently, in 1574 a force of 400 soldiers under Vasco Fernandes Homen failed due to the resistance of the inhabitants and the geography in the Nyanga highlands. It was not until 1628 that the Portuguese gained control over the tribal feuds in Munhumutapa, i.e. in the Mazowetal, which split the Mutapa empire into insignificant tribal dominions by the end of the 17th century. They did not seek more than one area of ​​influence during this time. They were first forced to real state control by British colonialism, which in 1890 ultimately demanded the withdrawal from the gold fields of Manica, i.e. from Massi Kessi , and which drew borders in 1891. Around 1816, the Mfecane began , a migration movement of the Nguni tribes from the east of what is now the South African Republic , triggered by the strict military organization and bloody conquests of the Zulu under their King Shaka . Nguni massacred the people of Chinhoyi in 1830 . In the following year, the Changamire state of the Shona tribe Rozwi of the Mfecane fell victim and in the same decade was easy prey for the Matabele, who immigrated from what is now the Republic of South Africa. The Karanga in the northeast were not conquered by the Matabele until the 1860s.

Mutapa ruler

Orally transmitted genealogies are always afflicted with the problem of serving to confirm current claims to rule, even to today's states:

  • Nyatsimba Mutota (c. 1430 to c. 1450) - According to other sources, he and his son Matope are assigned to the 12th and 13th centuries.
  • Matope Nyanhehwe Nebedza (ca.1450 to ca.1480)
  • Mavura Maobwe (1480)
  • Mukombero Nyahuma (1480 to approx. 1490)
  • Changamire (1490-1494)
  • Kakuyo Komunyaka (1494 to approx. 1530)
  • Neshangwe Munembire (ca.1530 to ca.1550)
  • Chivere Nyasoro (c. 1550 to 1560)
  • Chisamharu Negomo Mupuzangutu (1560–1589) (first documented Karanga chief in the Mazowetal)
  • Gatsi Rusere (1589-1623)
  • Nyambo Kapararidze (1623-1629)

The Torwa dynasty , whose ethnic allocation is unclear at this time, first had Khami as its center, later Danangombe. In the 17th century it got caught up in a civil war, the victors of which drove out or even killed the Swahili traders who had previously had a strong presence. Weakened by this civil war, it was conquered in 1650 by the Changamire at the head of the Rozwi. The culture remained unchanged with this change of power and the stone walls of Danangombe were expanded. But in 1831 this state, whose inhabitants may well have mixed up with Karangas, fell apart under the onslaught of the Mfecane. In 1837 his area was subjugated by the Ndebele. The Mutapa state lasted until the 1860s. Then he came under the rule of the Ndebele, so that maps from the late 19th century show all of today's Zimbabwe as Matabeleland, during which King Lobengula referred to himself as King of the Matabele and the Shona.

Ethnic groups and etymology

The Portuguese noted "Mokaranga" as the name of the empire and "Monomotapa" as the ruler (cf. Catholic Encyclopedia). Today this word is often interpreted as "Mwenemutapa", "Mwanamutapa" or "Munhumutapa". The meanings of the first half of the word in today's Shona are "Mwene" = owner, "Mwana" = child and "Munhu" = human, plural "Vanhu". In some other Bantu languages is called "man", "Muntu", plural "Bantu", from which the world used term " Bantu " was of central and southern Africa for much of the population. The second half of the name, "Mutapa", means ruler . It is undisputed that the Karanga, a Shona tribe, lived there when the Portuguese arrived. How long the terms they noted were in use at that time is not yet known.

The term "Shona" has only appeared since 1835 as the Matabele term for non-Matabele. The history of the tribes known today as Shona, which for a long time only passed on orally, goes back much further, but only to the 15th century. The Chishona language and its dialects form a separate group of the Bantu languages. Neighboring are the Sotho Tswana group, the Nguni group (Zulu, Ndebele), the Tsonga and the Venda.

The Munhumutapa is mostly associated with the Shona , which include Karanga and Rozwi.

According to the official account of the history of Botswana, Sotho peoples lived there at least around 1200. The Bantu -Einwanderung south of the Zambezi is recognized by archaeologists rather the turning point, linguists rather around 1000. Chr.

See also

literature

  • David N. Beach: The Shona and Zimbabwe , Mambo Press, Gewlo, and Heinemann, London 1980
  • Fernand Braudel : The Perspective of the World vol III of Civilization and Capitalism. 1979
  • Peter Garlake: Africa and his kingdoms , Berlin, Darmstadt, Vienna 1975, pp. 60–79
  • Gertrude Caton-Thompson : The Zimbabwe culture: ruins and reactions , Oxford 1931.
  • Kevin Shillington: History of Africa , New York 2005, pp. 147-53 ISBN 0-333-59957-8
  • PJJ Sinclair, I. Pikirayi, G. Pwilt, R. Soper: Urban trajectories on the Zimbabwean plateau , In: The Archeology of Africa , edited by T. Shaw, P. Sinclair, B. Andah, A. Okpoko, London / New York 1993, pp. 707-731, ISBN 0-415-11585-X (cf. Prof. I. Pikiaryi in the BBC )

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Iron Age cattle breeding in southern Africa and its spread
  2. ^ Shillington: History of Africa , p. 52
  3. ↑ Iron Age Archeology of the Kavango Region, Northern Namibia ( Memento of the original from July 26th, 2009 in the web archive archive.today ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.uni-koeln.de
  4. ↑ Wallace G. Mills Hist. 316 2 Types of Economy
  5. ↑ cf. Thomas N. Huffman: `` Archeology and Ethnohistory of the African Iron Age '', in: Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 11, 1982 (1982), pp. 133-150
  6. ↑ cf. Yusuf M. Juwayeyi: Iron age settlement and substence patterns in southern Malawi, In The Archeology of Africa, edited by T. Shaw, P. Sinclair, B. Andah, A. Okpoko, London / New York 1993, p. 396, ISBN 0-415-11585-X
  7. ^ Harms Erdkunde, Band Afrika, Paul-List-Verlag 1967, plate 3 (after page 64)
  8. ↑ 50 Greatest Africans - Mutapa Matope & Pharaoh Mena , whenweruled.com
  9. ^ Catholic Encyclopedia: Monomotapa
  10. ↑ Garlake: Afrika und seine Kingdoms , p. 75; Shillington: History of Africa , p. 147
  11. ^ Botswana History Pages, by Neil Parsons - 1: A Brief History of Botswana