The Crocodile in his Pool: politics, ritual and lived experience in the Limpopo Valley in the 19th century

  • Author: Nelius Kruger
  • Topic: Younger than 500 BP,Buildings, towns and states,Heritage studies
  • Country: South Africa
  • Related Congress: 13th Congress, Dakar

A series of nineteenth century fortified stone walled sites, broadly associated with Venda-speakers, are located in the Limpopo Valley on the present-day border between South Africa and Zimbabwe. The complex wall structures of these sites display primarily defensive features, a probable response to an arduous, unpredictable and sometimes perilous subsistence on the northern frontier of the old South African Republic (ZAR). It also contains more subtle symbolic features which suggest an equally complex visual display of sacred leadership, power and ritual seclusion. Excavations at the largest walled settlement yielded a range of significant and unusual finds. Not only does the material culture inform on the function and meaning of space, settlement and landscape in 19th century frontier societies in the Limpopo Valley, but it also intersects with local oral and ethnographic narratives where a recurring theme of internal and external ritual politics is amplified and richly animated. The paper ultimately examines the interesting dialogue between unique archaeological assemblages, ethno-historical crossreferences and rich oral narratives that all comment on the lived experiences
of the people of Ha-Tshirundu.


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