The K2 kingdom of the middle Limpopo (Mapungubwe)

Who rules

Name

Not known. Later Venda oral tradition names Shiriyadenga about 1220 and Tshidziwelele about 1300, but these are late traditions and tell us nothing about 1 January 1200

Title

Sacred ruler of the middle Limpopo, living at the capital K2 (Bambandyanalo) beneath the rain-making hill of Mapungubwe

Since

Not pinned

Born

Not known

Family

Not known; the people are Leopard's Kopje farmers, regarded as cultural ancestors of the Kalanga, Shona and Venda

Confidence

low

Archaeology only. Huffman reads K2 as a capital with a court and a ruler from about 1000; Huffman and Woodborne (2021) date the K2 phase about 1000-1150, the Transitional K2 phase about 1150-1270 and the Mapungubwe phase about 1270-1320.

What the realm holds

• The capital K2 (Bambandyanalo) and the rain hill of Mapungubwe
• The settlements of the Shashe-Limpopo basin of the Transitional K2 phase (Den Staat, Little Muck, VK2 and the Liz sites, dated about 1110-1240 by AMS)
• The Leokwe people, descendants of the Zhizo, living in the valley as a distinct group (Leokwe ceramic facies about 1000-1200), probably subordinate to K2 and specialising in ritual
• Perhaps the hill town of Mapela, 90 km to the north-west (see its own record: its subordination is disputed)
• The ivory of the valley's elephants; copper from the Messina (Musina) deposits is likely but its working in this period is not pinned

How it was acquired

The K2 people (Leopard's Kopje) took over the Shashe-Limpopo basin from the Zhizo about 1000; the Zhizo moved west towards Toutswe or stayed as the Leokwe people.

Allies and rivals

Mapela, the largest known Leopard's Kopje hill town, 90 km north-west: Huffman treats it as a provincial centre, Chirikure and colleagues (2014) as a coeval and perhaps senior rival polity, stone-walled since the eleventh century. The Toutswe chiefdoms of eastern Botswana to the west share the cattle economy and later (after about 1200-1300) show Mapungubwe influence at Bosutswe. The Gumanye community at Great Zimbabwe to the north-east is still a small chiefdom.

San hunter-gatherers live in the rock shelters of the valley, trading with the farmers and serving as rain-makers in some readings; Hall and Smith argue the farmers took over shelters for rain rituals.

The realm that morning

The ruler at K2 controls the confluence basin and its trade. His reach beyond the valley, into the Soutpansberg to the south, the Tuli country to the north-west and the Mapela district, is not pinned. The move to the hill has not happened. South of the Limpopo valley's edge (the Waterberg and the Polokwane plateau) lie farmers of the Eiland tradition outside this sheet's scope.

Wealth

Ivory (worked into bracelets at the capital and exported), hides, cattle, sorghum and millet grown on the floodplain in the wetter centuries before about 1200, cotton cloth, iron; gold is known from the hill graves of the thirteenth century, so its trade at 1200 is likely but its scale is not pinned. Imports: glass beads of the 'K2 series' of Indian Ocean trade beads, cloth.

Military

No walls at K2; no evidence of warfare. Power rested on cattle, trade and the ruler's ritual control of rain.

Threats

• Drought: the baobab record studied by Woodborne shows dry episodes about 1185 (plus or minus 10 years) and in 1200-1250 (baobab dates 1208, 1226, 1256)
• Competition from Mapela for the plateau's gold and the coast's trade
• A shift of coastal trade from the old Limpopo and Chibuene route to the Sofala route

Court and kin

Not known by name. Archaeology shows a ruler's court at the centre of K2, an elite that will later live apart on the hill, and a five-tier settlement hierarchy in the later Mapungubwe phase (Huffman). Wives, heirs and kin cannot be named.

Coinage

None. Glass beads, re-melted locally into large 'garden roller' beads, served as prestige wealth and a measure of value (Wikipedia, after Huffman); cattle were bridewealth.

Religion

Rain-making centred on the hill and the ruler's ancestors; San ritual specialists hired as rain-makers in some readings.

Wars and treaties

None attested. Relations with Mapela (partner, vassal or rival) and with the Toutswe chiefs are not pinned.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

1. Rainy season, November 1199 to March 1200The ruler's rain-making on the hill decides whether the floodplain harvest of 1200 succeeds; the drought episodes the baobabs record for 1200-1250 begin in these years.Depends on: Rainfall: the wetter period of about 1000-1200 is ending. Stopped by: Good rains.

Later, on the likely course

1. About 1220 (older chronology) or about 1270 (Huffman and Woodborne 2021)The ruler and the elite move onto the summit of Mapungubwe hill, the commoners live below, and the kingdom enters its Mapungubwe phase with gold-rich elite graves.Depends on: Continued growth of trade wealth and of the ruler's sacred standing. Stopped by: A collapse of trade or a severe drought.
2. About 1300-1320The valley is abandoned and power passes to the plateau (Great Zimbabwe).Depends on: Drought (baobab dates 1285 and 1310) and the shift of trade. Stopped by: Not relevant to 1200.

Places of note

• K2 (Bambandyanalo), the capital: Capital on 1 January 1200.
• Mapungubwe hill: The rain-making hill; the later royal residence.
• Schroda: The old Zhizo capital (about 900-1000), with a K2-phase occupation dated about 1057-1075; abandoned by 1200.
• Mapela hill: Stone-terraced hill town of the Leopard's Kopje people, 90 km to the north-west.

Where the sources disagree

• The brief's 'K2 from about 1000 to about 1220, then the hill from about 1220 to about 1290' is the older chronology (Vogel, Huffman 2000s). Huffman and Woodborne (2021), with fifteen new AMS dates, give K2 1000-1150, Transitional K2 1150-1270 and Mapungubwe 1270-1320, with abandonment about 1320. Either way the capital is at K2 on 1 January 1200.
• A popular history page (South African History Online) dates the move to the hill to 'about 1045' on old radiocarbon; this is superseded.
• Chirikure et al. (2014) argue that Mapela had stone-walled elite terraces in the eleventh century, nearly two centuries before Mapungubwe hill, so that K2 and Mapungubwe were not the sole cradle of the Zimbabwe culture.
• The extent of the kingdom (often given as about 30,000 square kilometres) is an estimate; we draw the valley and the confluence only.

Evidence: Archaeology only, but dense: over 500 Middle Iron Age sites in the valley, a radiocarbon and AMS chronology, excavated capitals. No written source mentions the kingdom.

On the map: The valley polygon is drawn from the distribution of K2 and Transitional K2 sites as described in the literature; the kingdom's reach into the Soutpansberg and the Tuli hills is not pinned.

Primary sources for this realm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Mapungubwe, the Zimbabwe plateau, Toutswe and the Comoros: the archaeological record (no text; radiocarbon-dated sites). There is no written word from the interior south of the Zambezi or from the Comoros in 1200; all that is known is from excavation. Read online