TOWARDS AN UNDERSTANDING OF SPATIO-TEMPORAL DYNAMICS AT GREAT ZIMBABWE: CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE URBAN ORIGINS IN EASTERN AND SOUTHERN AFRICA PROGRAMME
Paul J.J. Sinclair
Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University, 75 126 Uppsala Sweden
Search for more papers by this authorPaul J.J. Sinclair
Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University, 75 126 Uppsala Sweden
Search for more papers by this authorABSTRACT
In 1987 archaeologists from nine African countries and colleagues from Sweden began a co-operation programme to study urbanism in eastern and southern Africa under the auspices of The Urban Origins programme. The programme involved 22 parallel field projects throughout the West Indian Ocean region and the southern Africa interior. The article presents a compilation of diverse material on Great Zimbabwe that has been scattered in different fora. The research was directed by an overall approach that investigations in urban archaeology in Africa must be at the same scale that people lived in the past. The results briefly presented here show the potential of multivariate assessments of the spatial distributions of large-scale urban sites in Africa.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
- J. Andresen, T. Madsen & I. Scollar (eds.). 1993. Computing the past, computer applications and quantitative methods in archaeology. Aarhus (Aarhus University Press).
- Arrhenius, O. 1931. Markanalysen i arkeologins tjänst. Geologiska Föreningens Förhandlingar. Stockholm.
- Caton-Thompson, G. 1931. The Zimbabwe Culture: ruins and reactions. Oxford (Clarendon Press).
- Chipunza, K. 1994. A diachronic analysis of the architecture of the Hill Complex at Great Zimbabwe. Studies in African Archaeology 8. Uppsala (Societatis archaeologica upsaliensis).
- Chirikure, S. & I. Pikirayi. 2008. Inside and Outside the dry stone walls: revisiting the material culture of Great Zimbabwe. Antiquity 82. 976–993.
- Collett, D.P., A.D. Vines & E.G. Hughes. 1992. The chronology of the Valley Enclosures: implications for the interpretation of Great Zimbabwe. African Archaeological Review 10. 139–161.
10.1007/BF01117699 Google Scholar
- D.W. Collinson, K.M. Creer & S.K. Runcorn (eds.). 1967. Methods in palaeomagnetism. Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Study Institute on Palaeomagnetic Methods, held in the Physics Department of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, April 1-10, 1964. Developments in solid earth geophysics 3. Amsterdam (Elsevier).
- Collinson, D.W. & L. Molyneaux. 1967. An instrument for measurements of isotropic initial susceptibility of rock samples. Collinson et al. 1967. 368.
- Garlake, P.S. 1973. Great Zimbabwe. London (Thames and Hudson).
- Gundlach, H. 1961. Tüpfelmethode auf Phosphat, angewandt in prähistorischer Forschung (als Feldmethode). Mikrochimica Acta 5. 735–737.
10.1007/BF01217360 Google Scholar
- Holleman, J.F. 1952. Shona Customary Law. Cape Town (Oxford University Press).
- Huffman, T.N. 1977. Zimbabwe, southern Africa's first town. Rhodesian Prehistory 7, 15. 1–14.
- Huffman, T.N. 1981. Snakes and birds: expressive space at Great Zimbabwe. African Studies 40, 2. 131–150.
- Huffman, T.N. 1996. Snakes and crocodiles: Power and symbolism in ancient Zimbabwe. Johannesburg (Witwatersrand University Press).
- Huffman T.N. & J.C. Vogel. 1991. The chronology of Great Zimbabwe. South African Archaeological Bulletin 46. 61–72.
10.2307/3889086 Google Scholar
- Jacobson-Widding, A. 2000. Chapungu: the bird that never drops a feather. Male and female identities in an African society. Uppsala Studies in Cultural Anthropology 28. Uppsala (Acta Universitatis Upsalienis).
- Jonsson, J. 1998. Early plant Economy in Zimbabwe. Studies in African Archaeology 16. Uppsala.
- Jonsson, J. 2002. The plant economy of Early and late Farming Communities (c. 200 BC-AD1800) in Zimbabwe. Evidence from Matopos, Great Zimbabwe, Nyanga, Mwenezi Ranch and Malumba. Viklund 2002.
- MacIntosh, R. J., P.J.J. Sinclair, T. Togola & S. McIntosh. 1996. Microstratigraphical investigation at the Jenne-jeno urban complex and at Jenne Town Inland Niger Delta, Mali. Final Report on NGS Grant 5159–93.
- Matenga, E. 2011. The Soapstone Birds of Great Zimbabwe Archaeological Heritage, Religion and Politics in Post-colonial Zimbabwe and the Return of Cultural Property. Studies in Global Archaeology 16. Uppsala (Institutionen för arkeologi och antik historia).
- Mullins, C.E. 1974. The Magnetic properties of the soil and their application to archaeological prospection. Archaeo-Physica 5. 143–347.
- Ndoro, W. 2001. Your Monument Our Shrine. Studies in African Archaeology 19. Uppsala (Uppsala University).
- Persson, K. 1996. Phosphate test strips. A new equipment for direct soil-phosphate field analysis. Journal of Nordic Archaeological Science 9. 57–60.
- Petrén, M. 1996. Analysis and evaluation of phosphate in cored samples from Jenne and Jenne-jeno. Appendix 5 in R. J. MacIntosh et al. 1996.
- Pikirayi, I. 2001. The Zimbabwe Culture: Origins and Decline of Southern Zambezian States.Walnut Creek (Alta Mira Press).
- Randall-MacIver, D. 1906. Medieval Rhodesia. London (MacMillan).
- S. Rahtz & P. Reilly (eds.). 2003. Archaeology and the Information Age - a global perspective. One World Archaeology 21. London (Routledge).
10.4324/9780203168349 Google Scholar
- Reilly, P. & N. Thompson. 1993. Experiments with user-friendly volume visualisation and iconographic display methods to explore core data. Andresen et al. 1993. 429–439.
- Robinson, K.R., R. Summers & A. Whitty. 1961. Zimbabwe excavations 1958. Occasional Papers of the National Museums of Southern Rhodesia 3, 23a.
- T. Shaw, P.J.J. Sinclair, B. Andah & A. Okpoko (eds.). 1993. The Archaeology of Africa, Food, Metals and Towns. London & New York (Routledge).
- Sinclair, P.J.J. 1987. Space, time, and social formation: a territorial approach to the archaeology and anthropology of Zimbabwe and Mozambique c 0-1700 AD. Aun 9. Uppsala (Societas Archaeologica Upsaliensis).
- Sinclair, P.J.J. 1989. Urban Origins in Eastern Africa: A Regional Cooperation Project. World Archaeological Bulletin 3. 33–51.
- Sinclair, P.J.J., I. Pikirayi, G. Pwiti & R. Soper. 1993. Urban trajectories on the Zimbabwe plateau. Shaw et al. 1993. 705–731.
- Sinclair, P.J.J., M. Kokonya, M. Meneses & J-A. Rakotoarisoa. 2003. The impact of information technology in the archaeology of southern and eastern Africa, the first decades. Rahtz & Reilly 2003.
- Summers, R. 1971. Ancient Ruins and Vanished Civilizations of Southern Africa. Cape Town (Gothic Printing).
- Viklund, K. 2002. Issues in Swedish archaeobotany - a guide through twenty years of archaeobotanical research at the University of Umeå. Archaeology and Environment 15. Nordic Archaeobotany - NAG 2000.
- Österholm, S. & I. Österholm. 1982. Spot test som metod för fosfatanalys i fält: praktiska erfarenheter. Arkeologiska skrifter 6. Visby (Riksantikvarieämbetets Gotlandsundersökningar (RAGU)).