Rozvi Empire

Common card · No. 329408

The Rozvi Empire (c. 1683–1866) was a Shona state established by Changamire Dombo on the Zimbabwean Plateau. The term "Rozvi" refers to their legacy as a warrior nation, taken from the Shona term kurozva, "to plunder". They became the most powerful fighting force in the whole of Zimbabwe. Early in the 17th century, Mutapa was vassalised by the Portuguese, and over the following decades Portuguese settlers regularly raided its Shona subjects on the Plateau, while disease and famine devastated the region. The 1670s and '80s saw the rise of Changamire Dombo (likely a Mutapa governor who used royal cattle herds to gain followers); Dombo defeated the Portuguese and Mutapa in battle before turning south to conquer Butua c. 1683. In the 1690s, he came to the aid of a Mutapa ruler and massacred Portuguese traders, forcing all Portuguese off of the Plateau. He also conquered Manyika before his death c. 1696. The following decades saw several succession conflicts, and some offshoots of its dynasty...

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