328 ORIGIN OF ZIMBABWE-CULTURE. 



scattered all over the country in parts where there are no other 

 ruins, but cheek by jowl to the oldest structures which display 

 the most perfected style of workmanship, the material of the 

 older buildings having, in many instances, been specified by 

 Bent, Willoughby, Schlechter, Neal, Hall, Franklin White, 

 Francis Masey. and many other examiners, as material for the 

 later and decadent form of building. 



There is not the slightest doubt that " ascertained facts " 

 revealed in construction overwhelmingly prove that the builders 

 of the original structures in Matebeleland were contemporaries, 

 if not the very identical people, wdio were among the early 

 " subsequent squatters " at Zimbabwe, and the older type of 

 structures in Alashonaland — that is. after the oldest ruins had 

 become abandoned by their original builders and occupiers, and 

 after the structures had fallen more or less into dilapidation and 

 their floors became buried under wall debris. 



Every ruin in Matebeleland is but a much later and poorer 

 copy of the oldest Zimbabwe type of building. The Matebele- 

 land culture in stone building was impc^rted from Mashonalaiid. 

 The remarkable similarity of all decadent " glorified Kafir kraal " 

 ruins in Matebeleland and Mashonaland to each other, and the 

 identical relics they yield, have l)een noticed bv all archaeologists 

 who have visited this country. 1^-ofessor Henry Balfour, but a 

 few weeks ago, informed me that he agreed with my explanation 

 given some twelve years ago, namely, that the builders of such 

 decadent structures, being left entirely to their own resources, 

 would, as they actually did, copy along identical lines common to 

 all of them. Thus, as the culture in building gradually suffered 

 decadence it resulted in a type of structure common in all parts 

 of Southern Rhodesia, but varying considerably in essential fea- 

 tures from the Zimbabwe Temple's excellent plan and method of 

 construction. This the walls of the latest ruins most clearly 

 demonstrate. 



There is no evidence in any of our ruins, older or later, of 

 any evolution in culture, but overwhelming evidences of pro- 

 longed processes of devolution, decadence, and dissolution. Not 

 a single rudimentary structure leading up to the more perfected 

 structure has ever been discovered, nor. if it be not scientifically 

 wrong to say so, will it ever be discovered. To prove an evolu- 

 tion, the rudimentary stages of such evolution must first be 

 established. This is a conclusion to which a hundred close 

 observers of our ruins testify, a fact stated ten years ago in my 

 first volume on our monuments, which statement remains im- 

 shaken, notwithstanding the fierce controversy that up to recently 

 has been waged round this very question. 



But I have said that the ruins in ^Jatebeleland, such as 

 Khami, Regina, Dhlo-dhlo, N'Natali, etc.. are very much later 

 than the finer structures of the original Zimbabwe tvpe. This I 

 have always maintained, and have claimed an interval of any- 

 thing from 500 to 900 years between the erection of the present 



