The Best Country In all of Africa

Religion was very important in the Zimbabwe civilization.

Religion was seen as a way of life and it held together the

society. Zimbabwe was a religious center where the

Shona religion was very prominent.

The religion had a large affect on the people’s lives

because it was involved in the politics and government,

and the community. Since politics and government hold

together the society, and religious practices were used in

politics, religion helped hold together the Zimbabwe

civilization.

In the Shona religion, the people believe strongly in the

roles of their deceased ancestors. They believed that if

they kept the deceased in their thoughts, then their

ancestors would have a good afterlife and in turn the

ancestors would help their descendants. Medicine was

also affected by the Shona religion. They used different

charms and herbs to cure and keep away illnesses.

Animals played a big part as cultural and religious symbols in Zimbabwe.

The people in Great Zimbabwe had many different crafts. They produced gold, copper, bronze, and iron products through metal working.

Their iron working was most developed and they made hoes, axes, arrow and spear points, knives and gongs.

Copper, bronze and gold were used more making items for decoration or jewelry such as wire bracelets and beads. The people also made pottery from clay and carved soapstone to make bowls, molds, and figurines. They had spindle whorls, which means that they could have been spinning and weaving cotton to make clothing and blankets.

This is a picture of a statue

portraying a falcon and a

crocodile.

Trade was a very essential part of Zimbabwe that was important to its growth and development. The first remnants of trade we found were the remains of Ironworking people that have been dated back to 300AD. Their early groups were driven out of power when Bantu speaking people from the North came into Zimbabwe as part of the Bantu Migration.

It was these Bantu speaking people that developed trade to a higher level. Zimbabwe’s chief resources at the time were ivory, their skills in iron melting and especially their monopoly.

These resources on gold contributed to the mass amount of wealth which certain places in Zimbabwe had. Those well off in Zimbabwe traded their resources with Merchants from the Swahili Coast kingdoms and the Indian Ocean Trade.

There were no outstanding obstacles to trading besides for normal ones. This all happened from the 11th through about the 15th century. During this time, the kingdom was known as Munhumutapa and it’s was the city of “Zimbabwe”.

This was the time of Zimbabwe’s greatest power.

African Ivory

Art

Zimbabwe is surrounded by the countries of Zambia (north), Botswana (west), South Africa (south) and Mozambique (east). Most of the country is between 1,000 and 4,000 feet above sea level. There is not much rain fall coming in Zimbabwe and this causes droughts that hits the people and the land hard. The forests that cover around 1/3 of Zimbabwe are begging to start to disappear. Savannas cover most of the country besides the forests. Victoria Falls and Kariba are in the northwest.

Ancient Zimbabwe

Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe's first prime minister, has been the country's only ruler. He has been the president since 1987 and he has ruled the country's political system since the country's independence. The country's population is 13,349,000 people taken from a 2008 census. The low population growth is due in part to a high mortality rate resulting from HIV/AIDS. Today, Zimbabwe has a parliamentary democracy. Robert Mugabe has been the country's only ruler and has ruled since 1987. The economy in Zimbabwe isn't very stable. The government of Zimbabwe faces a wide variety of difficult economic problems.

Zimbabwe’s

President Robert

Mugabe

In 1998-2002, Zimbabwe was involved in the war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo which lost Zimbabwe hundreds of millions of dollars from the economy. Service industries play a significant role in the economy. Many of them were created by government programs. Violence in rural areas has damaged both tourism and agriculture. Many experts say that Zimbabwe's economy will continue to decrease. Zimbabwe's currency is the Zimbabwe dollar. Zimbabwe's current environmental issues include; deforestation, soil erosion, land degradation, air and water pollution, and the black rhinoceros herd which was once the largest concentration of the species in the world. Today, the population of the rhinoceros has significantly decreased due to poaching. Today, the people of Zimbabwe aren't very technologically advanced and still today they rely on older methods of work to do jobs. Zimbabwe has the most impressive set of stone ruins in South Africa.

Picture of current Zimbabwe refugees

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