Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1902-11-27
ANCIENT RUINS OF RHoDEslA.
A Most Interesting Report of South
Africa Traveller.


Mr. Frederic Philip Mennel, F. G. s.,
the curator of the Rhodesia Museum,
Bulawayo, read most interesting pa
per recently to the members. Of the An
thropological Section of the British AS
ISOLATION at their meeting at Belfast on
the subject of '"The Khami Ruins near
Bulawayo." He said that all over the
territory between the Zambesi and the
Limpopo, now known as Southern Rho
desia, were numerous structures testi-
flying to a former occupation of the
country by race far more advanced in
the arts than the Bantu tribes. who
were shown by Arab records to have
inhabited the country for fully 1000
years. The Khami ruins, situated II
miles Bulawayo, might be taken as
typical. They consisted Of about
dozen separate structures showing the
usual mortarless walls faced with care
fully squared granite blocks about
twice as large as an orrinary brick.
These walls were about three feet thick
and rose perpendicularly, without any
batter as a rule, to heights Of ten feet
to twenty feet or more. The exterior
walls roughly conformed to the shape
of the ground available, or were more
or less circular, but the interior ones
ramified about in a most intricate man
ner. The principal ruin had three sets
OF walls at different levels. The main
entrance had square ends to the walls
on either side and recent excavations
had revealed the fact that a series of
stone-built steps led up to it from the
foot of the slope. In other cases the
walls were rounded off at the entrances,
at times. Other devices in the way of
decoration were the "chessboard" and
clearinghouse" patterns, formed by
varying positions Of the facing blocks
and the introduction of dark-colored
dolerite blocks to contrast with the
granite. It had been stated that these
structures could not have been rooted
in, and in only one instance out of
many hundreds was a covered entrance
known.
At Ohio Dhloruins, however, there
were the remains of wooden posts let
into the masonry, and these had now
been found at Khami also. 1t was pos
sible that they were intended, in some
cases at least, as supports for a roof.
That the buildings were intended pri-
marily as forts could be inferred from
their inaccessible situations, their mar
row and well-commanded entrances,
and the fact that the sides of some OF
the hills on which they were built had
evidently been artificially steepened.
Many objects of interest had been dis
covered at Klami, most of which were
now in the Rhodesia Museum, Bula-
wayo The pottery and the articles
IL - 4AoI HI
in nearly all cases the work of later
occupants Of the ruins than the build
ers. Discrimination was rendered diff
6cult by the obvious fact that the ma
tives had copied the designs of the
earlier workers. This might indicate
either that they were the degenerate
descendants Of the builders Of these re-
naarkable structures, or that their an
ceetors were forced to work for the lat
ter as slaves, probably the correct ex-
PLANTATION. Peculiar fat, oval-shaped
stones, sometimes pierced with hole
near one end, were among the ancient
articles; and SO. were the numerous
gold ornaments, which included chain
and wire work, tacks for fastening
beaten gold on to wood, and gold beads
OF all shapes and sizes and in every
stage OF manufacture. There were no
inscriptions OF any kind in any Of the
ruins, nor Of iron tools such as must
have been used in dressing the stone
for building. The tools might well
have rusted away during the thousands
or years that had almost certainly
elapsed since they were laid aside, but
the absence of inscriptions was not so
easy to explain il these structures were
the WORK, as had been contended. OF
the Sabeaneans of Arabia.