Earth Views

This complex of ruins from which the modern nation of Zimbabwe took its name is one of the country's greatest historical and cultural attractions. As Paul Tingay's helpful guide explains, Great Zimbabwe, the largest ruins in Africa, cover almost 1,800 acres.

Sited on an open wooded plain surrounded by hills, the ruins comprise the vast Great Enclosure complex, and on a nearby kopje the Hill Complex, a veritable castle of interlocking walls and granite boulders, while all around in the valley lie a myriad other walls. The ruins feature an array of chevron, herringbone and many other intricate patterns in its walls, and the astonishing fact is that despite the dry-stone technique used in Great Zimbabwe's construction (no mortar binds the stone blocks), the complex has endured for seven centuries. [Zimbabwe, Globetrotters Travel Guide, London: New Holland Publishers, 1994, 97.]