Copper wire objects from Jahunda and Little Mapela: technology, value systems and networks in Iron Age southern Africa

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe present study explores the archaeometallurgy of flexible cuprous wound wires recovered from two precolonial Shona centres of power, Jahunda and Little Mapela, separated by 60 kilometres in Gwanda, southwestern Zimbabwe. Widely believed to have been fashion accessories, archaeologists have traditionally consigned such objects to appendices in site reports and other publications. Chronological and technological information gathered from this category of objects indicates that Jahunda exploited more tin bronzes than pure, unalloyed copper. The converse holds for Little Mapela. However, the presence of copper and its alloys brass (with zinc) and bronze (with tin), in a region with no known sources of any of the raw materials, poses important questions about the role and value of these objects in both their immediate societies and networked regional places. This study shows that as metal objects, flexible wound wires were an important component of the political economy and conjoined diverse worlds — healing, spiritual, decorative, technological and much more — that made their production, circulation and use a microcosm of resilient networks and changing societal values.