- Where
- Near Masvingo
Masvingo Province, Zimbabwe - Coordinates
- 20.2667° S
30.9333° E - Built
- 11th to 15th centuries
(ancestors of the Shona) - Great Enclosure
- Walls up to 11 m high
about 250 m long (Wikipedia) - Conical Tower
- 9 m high, 5.5 m across
solid (PBS NOVA) - UNESCO
- World Heritage Site
1986 - Advisory
- Zimbabwe Level 2
Climbed a narrow path between boulders the size of barns, past aloes holding up red candles, to walls that ran in and out of the rock as if the hill had been consulted. Down in the valley a great curved wall of grey granite went round and round, block on block, with no mortar anywhere. I looked closely for whatever was holding it up. It was holding itself up.
The short answer
Great Zimbabwe is the ruin of a stone city in the hills of south-eastern Zimbabwe, near the town of Masvingo. UNESCO, which inscribed the Great Zimbabwe National Monument as a World Heritage Site in 1986, calls it a unique testimony to the Bantu civilisation of the Shona between the 11th and 15th centuries, and divides it into three groups: the Hill Ruins on a granite spur, the Great Enclosure in the valley to the south, and the Valley Ruins. The Great Enclosure is an ellipse of cut granite blocks laid in regular courses; Wikipedia gives its walls as up to 11 metres high and about 250 metres long, and its builders used no mortar. Inside, between an inner and an outer wall, stands the Conical Tower. By Wikipedia’s account the stone city spans about 7.2 square kilometres; UNESCO describes the property as extending over almost 800 hectares. It was the capital of a state that grew rich on the gold trade to the Swahili coast, and it was abandoned in the 16th or 17th century.
Why it's worth knowing
A country is named after it. The Shona name was first written down in 1531 by Vicente Pegado, captain of the Portuguese garrison at Sofala, who reported a fortress of stones “of marvelous size” with “no mortar joining them”, and recorded that the people called such buildings Symbaoe, which he understood to mean “court”. Wikipedia gives two modern readings of the word: dzimba dza mabwe, “large houses of stone”, or dzimba-hwe, “venerated houses”. In 1980 the newly independent country took the name, and the soapstone birds carved at the site, already used by Rhodesia, stayed on the new flag and coat of arms; a tower of the city is on the arms too.
The name carries an argument. When Europeans began investigating the ruins in 1871, the German geographer Karl Mauch decided at once that Africans could not have built them and suggested the Queen of Sheba instead; others proposed Phoenicians or Arabs. In 1905–06 David Randall-MacIver, excavating for the British Association, concluded that the builders were ancestors of the Shona and the date medieval, and in 1929 Gertrude Caton Thompson confirmed it. The settler government of Rhodesia did not accept the evidence. Wikipedia records that through the 1960s and 1970s its official line was that the city had been built by people other than black Africans, and that archaeologists who disputed it were censored. Paul Sinclair, the archaeologist then stationed at the site, later described daily censorship of guidebooks, museum displays and school textbooks, said he was threatened with the loss of his job if he said publicly who had built it, and called it “the first time since Germany in the thirties that archaeology has been so directly censored.”
Archaeologists have agreed since the 1950s that the city is African, Shona-built, and medieval. The radiocarbon dates, imported Chinese and Persian ceramics, and the pottery and ironwork all point the same way.
The field notes
Walls without mortar
Wikipedia’s chronology puts the Hill Complex first, occupied from the 11th to the 13th century, then the Great Enclosure from the 13th to the 15th, and the Valley Complex from the 14th to the 16th. Archaeologists still disagree about what the three groups were for. One reading is that successive kings moved the seat of power from the hill to the valley; the “structuralist” reading holds that the hill was for ritual, the enclosure for the king and the valley for citizens. Most people lived in houses of earth and timber that have not survived, which is part of why the population is argued over: older estimates put the peak at 18,000 to 20,000, while a 2017 study led by Shadreck Chirikure of the University of Cape Town concluded that it was unlikely ever to have exceeded 10,000.
The tower nobody enters
The Conical Tower stands between the inner and outer walls of the Great Enclosure, reached along a narrow passage. Wikipedia gives it as 9 metres high and 5.5 metres across; PBS’s NOVA reports that archaeologists have established it is completely solid, and that its purpose is unknown. Its base was also damaged by the people trying to answer that question. In 1891 James Theodore Bent, digging with Cecil Rhodes’s patronage, dug into the tower and, by Wikipedia’s account, destroyed the layers that might have dated it. Between the 1890s and the 1920s antiquarians and treasure-hunters looted the site, and some of the ruins were mined for gold.
The birds come home
Eight birds carved from soapstone, each standing on a stone column, were the most important objects found at Great Zimbabwe. They are unique to the site; Wikipedia records that they probably represent the bateleur eagle, held by the Shona to be a messenger of God and the ancestors. In 1889 a hunter named Willi Posselt climbed to the highest point of the ruins, though he had been told it was a sacred site, hacked one bird from its pedestal and sold it to Cecil Rhodes, who kept it in his Cape Town house, Groote Schuur. South Africa returned four of the birds in 1981 and a museum in Berlin returned a pedestal in 2003. On 14 April 2026, according to the South African Heritage Resources Agency, South Africa handed over the last of them, together with the remains of eight ancestors, at a ceremony at the Iziko South African Museum in Cape Town; Africanews reported that Zimbabwe’s president received them in Harare the next day. The birds returned earlier are kept in a small museum at the site.
A place that is still somebody's
Wikipedia’s account of local perspectives records that the clans who claim the site lament both the antiquarians and the professional archaeologists for desecrating a sacred place, and that for many local communities Great Zimbabwe is a living cultural landscape, not an abandoned relic. The same article lists visitors among the continuing causes of damage: people climbing the walls, walking over archaeological deposits and wearing down the paths.
The Great Enclosure and the ruins of the valley below the hill, seen from above.
Photograph: Janice Bell · CC BY-SA 4.0 · cropped
The Conical Tower inside the Great Enclosure, a solid tower of dry-stone granite with no door.
Photograph: Andrew Moore · Conical Tower - Great Enclosure V (33736897638) · CC BY-SA 2.0 · cropped
Granite blocks laid without mortar at the top of a Great Enclosure wall, crusted with lichen.
Photograph: Fanny Schertzer · Great inclosure - Great Zimbabwe (14) · CC BY 3.0
The walls of the Hill Complex built onto a granite hill, in evening light.
Photograph: Andrew Moore · The Great Zimbabwe Hill Complex · CC BY-SA 2.0 · cropped
- Be up on the hill while the morning is still cool, and go quietly. For many of the people who live round it, it is a holy place first and a ruin a long way second.
- Keep off the tops of the walls, however good the view looks from up there. They have managed without anybody's help for a very long time.
- Hire a guide at the gate and walk the narrow passage inside the great wall at their pace, not yours.
- Visit the carved birds in the little museum before you leave, and give each one a moment to itself.
- Stay until the shadows lift out of the valley in the evening and the granite goes the colour of a bread crust.
Ticked the list as I walked round the great wall, and came back to where I had started with every item still to do. The wall was entirely unsurprised.
The Conical Tower. A tower of granite blocks, about 9 metres high and 5.5 metres across, standing in the narrow space between the inner and outer walls of the Great Enclosure. It has no door, no stair and no room inside: archaeologists have found it to be solid all the way through. Nobody knows what it was for, and the dig into it in 1891 that might have told us destroyed the evidence instead. It was laid without mortar, and it is still standing.
Tally, in the marginRound it once and round it again, looking for the door, before the plain fact of it landed: there is no inside to get into. It has been very gracious, over the centuries, about visitors who keep on checking.
Getting there
How to get there. The gateway is Masvingo, which Wikipedia gives as 292 km south of Harare by road. Tracks4Africa, the southern African mapping service, puts the monument about 27 km south-east of Masvingo along a tarred road to the entrance gate. Pay at the entrance, where you can also hire a guide; the site is large, and the Hill Complex is reached on foot up the hill.
When to go. Wikipedia describes the Masvingo area as hot and dry through the year except in summer, when the rains come; outside the rains is easiest for walking. Start early in the day in any season.
What to arrange ahead. A car or driver from Masvingo, a bed in Masvingo or near the monument, and cash for the entry fee and the guide. Allow most of a day for the three groups of ruins and the site museum.
Safety. The State Department has Zimbabwe at Level 2, exercise increased caution, because of crime and official harassment of U.S. citizens; it advises staying away from political rallies and demonstrations and carrying a copy of your passport and visa. The advisory names no area of the country as higher risk.
Mark this place
Common questions
What is Great Zimbabwe?
Great Zimbabwe is the ruin of a stone city near Masvingo in south-eastern Zimbabwe, built by ancestors of the Shona between the 11th and 15th centuries. It has three groups of ruins, the Hill Complex, the Great Enclosure and the Valley Ruins, all of granite laid without mortar. UNESCO inscribed it as a World Heritage Site in 1986.
Who built Great Zimbabwe?
Great Zimbabwe was built by ancestors of the Shona people, a conclusion archaeologists have shared since the 1950s. David Randall-MacIver reached it in 1905–06 and Gertrude Caton Thompson confirmed it in 1929, but the Rhodesian government pressed museums and archaeologists to say otherwise into the 1970s, and censored guidebooks and textbooks.
How did Zimbabwe get its name?
Zimbabwe is named after the ruined city of Great Zimbabwe. The independent country took the name in 1980, according to Wikipedia, and kept the soapstone bird carved at the site on its flag. The Shona word is read either as dzimba dza mabwe, large houses of stone, or dzimba-hwe, venerated houses.
What is the Conical Tower at Great Zimbabwe?
The Conical Tower is a dry-stone tower about 9 metres high and 5.5 metres across, standing between the inner and outer walls of the Great Enclosure at Great Zimbabwe. PBS’s NOVA reports that archaeologists have established it is completely solid, and that its purpose is unknown. An excavation into it in 1891 destroyed the layers that might have dated it.
Where are the Zimbabwe Birds now?
Most of the eight soapstone Zimbabwe Birds are back in Zimbabwe. South Africa returned four in 1981, and on 14 April 2026, according to the South African Heritage Resources Agency, it handed over the last one, taken in 1889 and once owned by Cecil Rhodes. The birds returned earlier are displayed in a small museum at the site.
How many people lived at Great Zimbabwe?
Estimates differ. Older figures put Great Zimbabwe’s peak population at 18,000 to 20,000, while a 2017 study led by Shadreck Chirikure of the University of Cape Town concluded that it was unlikely ever to have exceeded 10,000. UNESCO’s description gives more than 10,000 inhabitants in the 14th century.
How do you get to Great Zimbabwe?
Great Zimbabwe is about 27 km south-east of Masvingo by tarred road, according to Tracks4Africa, and Masvingo is 292 km south of Harare. Entry is paid at the gate, where guides can be hired. Allow most of a day for the Hill Complex, the Great Enclosure, the Valley Ruins and the site museum.
Is Zimbabwe safe to visit?
The U.S. State Department has Zimbabwe at Level 2, exercise increased caution, because of crime and official harassment of U.S. citizens (advisory reissued 27 June 2023). It advises avoiding political rallies and demonstrations, and names no area of the country as higher risk.