Zimbabwe

Rhodesia's Ancient Greatness

A.J. Bruwer

Hugh Keartland publishers, hardcover with dustjacket, illustrated.
dustjacked damaged.

This study of the ancient stone structures and mining activities spread over an area of a quarter-of-a-million square miles, or more, in South-East Africa, proceeds from the stand point that the only people of old, powerful, industrious and knowledgeable enough to undertake such an awe-inspiring task, were the Phoenicians. As such, it is a direct challenge to the fashionable theories held in some circles that some unnamed indigenous African tribe was responsible for this spectacular enterprise ; like the Maltese temples, occupied by Bronze Age man but built by others before him, the Rhodesian temples were built by others before they were occupied by one or other Bantu tribe.

The opening up and development of this South-East African colony is linked with the struggle, firstly, between the Phoeni­cians and the Greeks for the control of the Mediterranean, and, secondly, between the Romans and the Phoenicians after the destruction of Carthage. The reaction to military defeat of an industrious, highly intelligent and intensely religious people is outlined, as well as the effect on the South-East African colony of the eruption of Islamism af ter 632 A.D.