Typological and technological attributes of metallurgical crucibles from Great Zimbabwe (1000–1700 CE)'s legacy collections

This paper reports on the typological and archaeometallurgical studies of an assemblage of long forgotten but often misidentified metallurgical crucibles and moulds from Great Zimbabwe's century old archive. It exposes that specialised crucibles, non-specialised crucibles (common pottery), as well as an eclectic assortment of moulds, were primarily used to hold the melt and to form ingots during non-ferrous metallurgical operations, throughout the site's occupation history (1000–1700 CE). The moulds appear in different types, some elongated but others more circular as if they were used to produce small gold ‘buttons’. Available records indicate that the various types of metallurgical ceramics were often found in the same stratigraphic contexts as domestic debris. The characterisation of the crucible fabrics and attached slags suggest that while the two types of crucibles were made using local granitic clays, they were also used to process similar metals and alloys, but sometimes representing different stages in the chaîne operatoire. This raises significant questions relating to the techno-cultural choices behind the typological variation, if the intention of their producers and users, was to work the same metals and alloys

A technological and anthropological study of iron production in Venda, Limpopo Province, South Africa

This study investigates the technology and sociology of indigenous iron production in Venda, northern South Africa, within a framework of ethnographies, historical documents and archaeometallurgical analyses. Investigations revealed that indigenous iron production in the study area, like elsewhere in southern Africa, was based on the direct process in which high-grade iron ores were reduced to metallic iron in charcoal fuelled low-shaft furnaces. The technology exploited at the sites under study used high-grade haematite and magnetite ores, which were extracted from open shaft mines within the vicinity of the smelting precincts. Although new furnace types appeared in the mid-second millennium AD, evidence suggests that the technology of iron smelting was relatively stable during the Early (AD 200-900) and Late (AD 1000 to 1900) Iron Ages. Iron smelting in this area was accompanied by rituals and taboos that connected the smelters to the living and the dead. A comparative study of such rituals and taboos with those invested in other categories of practice, such as male initiation, identified notable similarities and differences. This indicates that material culture production and use broadcast ideas and beliefs applicable to both technical and quotidian practices

The Production, Distribution and Consumption of Metals and Alloys at Great Zimbabwe

The legacy of vandalism and almost a century of continuous focus on drystone wall masonry is that little is known about metal craft production and consumption activities at Great Zimbabwe. Within these limitations, this paper attempts to explore the metallurgy of Great Zimbabwe, guided by the framework of archival, chronological and fieldwork- and laboratory-based studies. The paper contends that residents of various components of Great Zimbabwe worked and processed their own metal, pointing to homestead-level production and consumption. Metal from local and regional sources sustained long-distance trade with the Indian Ocean rim

No Big Brother Here: Heterarchy, Shona Political Succession and the Relationship between Great Zimbabwe and Khami, Southern Africa

In southern Africa, there has been a long-standing but unsubstantiated assumption that the site of Khami evolved out of Great Zimbabwe's demise around AD 1450. The study of local ceramics from the two sites indicate that the respective ceramic traditions are clearly different across the entire sequence, pointing towards different cultural affiliations in their origins. Furthermore, there are tangible typological differences between and within their related dry-stone architecture. Finally, absolute and relative chronologies of the two sites suggest that Khami flourished as a major centre from the late fourteenth/early fifteenth century, long before Great Zimbabwe's decline. Great Zimbabwe also continued to be occupied into the late seventeenth and perhaps eighteenth centuries, after the decline of Khami. Consequently, the combined significance of these observations contradicts the parent-offspring relationship implied in traditional frameworks. Instead, as chronologically overlapping entities, the relationship between Khami and Great Zimbabwe, was heterarchical. However, within the individual polities, malleable hierarchies of control and situational heterarchies were a common feature. This is in tune with historically documented political relations in related pre-colonial southern Zambezian states, and motivates for contextual approaches to imagining power relations in pre-colonial African contexts