Great Zimbabwe was the capital of a powerful Shona kingdom that rose between roughly the 11th and 15th centuries and grew rich through cattle, gold, and trade routes linked to the Swahili Coast.

Its rulers built massive dry-stone walls without mortar, creating one of the most impressive urban centers in precolonial Africa and a symbol of political authority, wealth, and sacred power.

Later outsiders tried to deny that Africans had built it, but archaeology made clear that Great Zimbabwe was the work of local African civilization at a very high level of skill and organization.