Great Zimbabwe
The stone capital of a powerful Shona trading kingdom, Great Zimbabwe's massive dry-stone walls — built without mortar — stand today as one of Sub-Saharan Africa's most significant archaeological sites.
Great Zimbabwe was the capital of a kingdom that controlled trade in gold and ivory between the African interior and Indian Ocean port cities, at its height home to an estimated 10,000-18,000 people.
Its most famous structures, including the Great Enclosure, were built from stone blocks fitted together without mortar — a construction technique so impressive that 19th and early 20th century colonial writers wrongly refused to credit it to African builders, a myth long since disproven by archaeology.
The kingdom's name lives on in the modern nation of Zimbabwe, and Great Zimbabwe's soapstone bird carvings appear on the country's flag and coat of arms today.