Alone with Strangers - The Zimbabwe Bird at the Groote Schuur Estate in Cape Town, South Africa

In July 2014, I joined a guided tour of Groote Schuur, the residence of Cecil John Rhodes, who later bequeathed the property to the nation of South Africa. Our tour guide explained that the house was originally constructed around 1657 by the Dutch East India Company. Rhodes purchased it in 1893 for 10,000 British pounds, finding it in a state of disrepair. He commissioned architect Herbert Baker to restore the house.

While the history, architecture, notable guests, and antique furnishings were captivating, my primary interest that day was seeing the original Zimbabwe soapstone bird. This culturally significant artifact, described by my fellow tour participant Kirsty Cockerill as "nicked" from the Great Zimbabwe ruins, holds great symbolic value. The Great Zimbabwe ruins, located in the city of Masvingo south of Harare, are a UNESCO World Heritage Site known for their impressive, mortarless dry stone walls and are considered one of the most significant archaeological sites in sub-Saharan Africa.

Original Zimbabwe Stone Bird at Groote Schuur Estate, Cape Town, South Africa (photo by Richard Mudariki - July 2014)

As a young student, artist, and citizen of Zimbabwe, I grew up admiring the soapstone sculptures created by local sculptors in the 'open studios along the road' in my hometown of Chitungwiza. I was particularly fascinated by the image of the Zimbabwe Bird, a stylized version of one of the Great Zimbabwe soapstone birds, which I had seen on the Zimbabwean national emblem, currency (dollars and coins), and the national flag. Throughout high school, I learned more about the significance of these artworks and the history of the great Mutapa and Rozvi states.

In 2003, I watched a live broadcast on Zimbabwe national television of a ceremony celebrating the reunification of a portion of the bird that had been returned to the country by a German museum. This event sparked my growing interest and knowledge in Great Zimbabwe and the Zimbabwe stone birds as a student of art, archaeology, and cultural heritage. My university lectures at Midlands State University, including those by Prof. Ashton Sinamai, a practicing archaeologist who had previously worked at the Great Zimbabwe World Heritage site, provided valuable information and deepened my understanding of this significant heritage.

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe holds the lower portion of the ancient stone sculpture the "Zimbabwe Bird" at a ceremony in Zimbabwe Wednesday May 14, 2003. The sculpture was officially handed over by the German Ambassador Peter Schmidt, second left, and Zimbabwean Home Affairs Minister Kembo Mohadi, left. Germany returned the carved base of the "Zimbabwe Bird" that has spent on near 100 years in the hands of European collectors and museums. (source: Associated Press www.ap.acuweather.com)

To return to my story about the Groote Schuur tour, as we concluded, the last stop was the bedroom where Cecil Rhodes slept when he occupied the house. It was here that we found the soapstone bird that had been looted from Great Zimbabwe. Looking at it intently, I felt overwhelmed and frustrated. Seeing this symbolic and important artwork isolated and shown out of context, displayed as just another object on top of a cabinet filled with other artifacts that Rhodes and his associates plundered during their conquest of what is now Zimbabwe in the 1890s, was deeply disheartening.

One of the Great Zimbabwe bird at Groote Schuur House in Cape Town, South Africa
 (Source: Richard Mudariki. Image taken 25 July 2014 copyright)

As the tour guide explained how the bird ended up in the house, I became curious about the exact journey of this significant cultural object to South Africa. My subsequent research revealed that Willie Posselt, a European hunter, had stolen the first soapstone bird from Great Zimbabwe in 1889. At that time, he found four birds on the hill in the Eastern Enclosure. Ignoring the protests of the indigenous Shona custodians living in the area, Posselt physically cut one soapstone bird sculpture, separating it from its long freestanding column. He later "sold" this soapstone bird to Cecil Rhodes, and it has remained part of Rhodes's estate in Cape Town, South Africa, ever since (Dewey, 2003).

Inside Cecil John Rhodes bedroom in Cape Town, the room  the Zimbabwe soapstone bird is displayed, on top of the curiosity cabinet. (Source: Richard Mudariki. Image taken 25 July 2014. copyright)

Below is an extract that gives an account to the events on how this and other birds left the country by Edward Matenga's in 'The Soapstone Birds of Great Zimbabwe: Archaeological Heritage, Religion and Politics in post colonial Zimbabwe and the Return of Cultural Property' :-

 "...the first transaction,supposedly a purchase, involving a stone Bird from Great Zimbabwe took place in August 1889, a year before Rhodesia was founded, and represents the first historic cultural exportation from Zimbabwe. Willi Posselt, a regular hunter and trader operating from South Africa was on an expedition north of the Limpopo. Local people of Chief Mativi in Chivi Communal Lands told him about Great Zimbabwe, and there were reportedly some stone images of a king and queen. In his imagination, such finds would confirm the popularized view of the African possessions of the Queen of Sheba. Expecting to find the emblems of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, Posselt visited the site on 14 August, thus becoming the 4th earliest European known to visit the site. 

Permission to enter the ruins was granted by Chief Mugabe.......Posselt saw four soapstone Birds planted in what is now called the Eastern Enclosure during a second visit to the site. He decided to remove one of the Birds, one that in his opinion was the finest specimen, but he was stopped by the site custodian, Haruzivishe, brother and close adviser of Chief Mugabe....... He (Haruzivishe) and his men brandished their weapons in protest and were ready to stop Posselt with force, if necessary. Posselt was also armed, but sensing the danger of continuation with the operation, called off the plan and retreated. The next day he changed tactics and paid a “price” in blankets and got the prized Bird.........Posselt took the stone Bird to South Africa, where he initially had intended to sell it to the President of South African Republic, Paul Kruger, for inclusion into the collection of the Transvaal Museum in Pretoria......Although Kruger expressed interest, he procrastinated until Posselt approached his political arch-rival, Cecil John Rhodes, who bought it for a personal collection at his Groote Schuur residence in Cape Town. From its place in a shrine, because of the antiquarian tastes of an English gentleman (Belk 1995), the Bird was now put into a household collection."

According to Matenga, the following year (1890) Rhodes occupied Zimbabwe in the European 'Scramble for Africa'. He sent a team of archaeologists to Great Zimbabwe, notably Theodore Bent and Richard Hall, who carried out unsystematic and destructive archaeological excavations at the site focusing on their efforts to prove that Great Zimbabwe was inhabited by people with a Semitic background. According to scholars, Europeans had a great deal of romance and idealism at that time which had been created by those who believed of the existence of a great castle ruins, whose origin was credited to everybody other than the indigenous Shona custodians, but rather to the Sabaeans, Phoenicians and Hebrews. (Matenga, 2011). Bent took the remaining soapstone birds from the site  and took them to a museum in Cape Town (now Iziko Museum) where they began the journey of travelling throughout Europe.

Display of replicas of the Zimbabwe Birds at Iziko Museum of South Africa, Cape Town
(Source: Richard Mudariki: Image taken July 2014)

 Some of the Zimbabwe Soapstone Birds at Great Zimbabwe Museum
(source: Great Zimbabwe site Museum. Image taken 2014)

As a Zimbabwean artist, I am at awe of the creative and technical skills of these old masters who created these magnificent sculptural pieces of art. Winter-Irving noted in 1991 that the earliest manifestations of a visual culture in Zimbabwe are seen in the architecture, rock painting and the Great Zimbabwe birds. The Zimbabwe birds are the most precious works of art in Zimbabwe today and highly valued religiously, culturally and politically. Made out of soapstone, Matenga (1998) believes that there are eight birds in total, though the exact number of how many where there is unknown.  Dewey (2003) notes the birds alone are all about 33 cm in height and with the columns stand about 1.6 meters high. He further notes that they were divided into two groups on the basis of the style with the first stone birds  consisting 'of those that squat with bent legs on rectangular plinths and have horizontal beaks, and the other group, with legs hanging down onto the ring they perch on, all have round columns and point their beaks vertically'.

In my practice as an visual artist have referenced the image of soapstone bird(s) in my artworks as a symbol of the artistic heritage and Zimbabwean identity. The painting titled 'The Surgeon' (2012) include a reference of the image of the bird and a series of drawings titled 'Shiri/Hungwe' (2013) depicts a stylized version of the Zimbabwe Bird, with the one housed in Cape Town drawn in red marks, the red symbolizing the blood of it having been cut off as well as being in isolation. I must say as an artist am privilege to have seen all the remaining 'real soapstone Zimbabwe birds' (there are replicas at the Iziko museum in Cape Town), at the site museum at Great Zimbabwe and now at Groote Schuur. It is a vision to someday have the opportunity to drawing these sculptural birds  in real life, all being displayed at the museum one day (Great Zimbabwe ie) with the approval of the museum officials of course.  

Richard Mudariki, Shiri /Hungwe, 2014, Charcoal on book paper                      Click on image to enlarge

     A series of drawings of the Zimbabwe stone birds on display in my apartment in Cape Town                     Click on image to enlarge

In my mind, one big question remainds,  when will this significant cultural object/artwork return to its deserving home in Masvingo, Zimbabwe. It may seem that it may not be that of a complex repatriation as both Zimbabwe and South Africa are now 'democratic' states and we are neighbours. Or maybe it may be, needing legal and bureaucratic processes etc to happen. It is my desire that  Zimbabwean and South African citizens should find a way to allow for the safe return of this iconic artwork to Great Zimbabwe and be housed at the site museum.

We can all start with the  hashtag 'Return Our Bird Campaign' [#retunoutbird] or an online petition for the 'Return of the Soapstone Bird and Reunification at Great Zimbabwe'

For more detailed information regarding the history and events, please read my sources:

Sources

1.  Edward Matenga, 2011: The Soapstone Birds of Great Zimbabwe: Archaeological Heritage, Religion and Politics in post colonial Zimbabwe and the Return of Cultural Property, Institutionen
för arkeologioch antik historia. Studies in Global Archaeology 16. 258 pp. Uppsala. ISBN 978-91-506-­2240-­9. (Download PDF at uu.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:451503/FULLTEXT02.pd)

2.  William J. Dewey, 2003: Repatriation of a Great Zimbabwe Stone Bird, The University of Tennessee (Download PDF at  safa.rice.edu/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=2147484153)

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Me with the bird at Groote Schuur, Cape Town, South Africa (25 July 2014)