Kingdom of Mapungubwe

The Kingdom of Mapungubwe (pronounced mah-POON-goob-weh) was an ancient state located at the confluence of the Shashe and Limpopo rivers in present day South Africa, south of Great Zimbabwe. The capital's population was 5,000 by 1250, and the state likely covered 30,000 km2 (12,000 sq mi). Around 1000 CE, some Leopard's Kopje people moved across the Limpopo to Bambandyanalo where they practiced agropastoralism, moving large cattle herds to other communities' grazing land which fostered socio-political relations, while also engaging in the Indian Ocean trade via Swahili city-states on the East African coast.

Over the centuries, increased wealth among the growing population produced inequalities for which Bambandyanalo's spatial arrangement was unsuited. Around 1220, amid a dry period, the Mapungubwe elite moved to settle the top of Mapungubwe Hill, followed by the population who settled the surrounding land below. Hills often served as rainmaking sites, and Mapungubwe Hill became the sole such site; its habitation by the leader was substantial in the development of sacred kingship.

A large amount of wealth was accumulated via tributes, facilitated by the Limpopo-Shashe confluence being...