The Mazoe Valley is frequently alluded to in early Portuguese enterprise, being easily approachable from the Zambesi, and the river is, I am told, navigable about eighty miles below where we struck it.
Couto, the Portuguese writer, thus speaks of the gold mines here in his quaint legendary style: ‘The richest mines of all are those of Massapa, where they show the Abyssinian mine from which the Queen of Sheba took the greater part of the gold which she went to offer to the Temple of Solomon, and it is Ophir, for the Kaffirs called it Fur and the Moors Afur … the veins of gold are so big, that they expand with so much force, that they raise the roots of trees two feet.’ He fixes the spot which he here alludes to farther on when speaking about the three markets held by the Portuguese in these parts: ‘(1) Luanhe, thirty-five leagues from Tete South, between two small rivers, which join and are called Masouvo; (2) Bacoto, forty leagues from Tete; and (3) Massapa, fifty leagues from Tete up the said River Masouvo.’ Now the Mazoe, which, doubtless, in the native tongue, is the [[296]]Maswe, like the Pungwe, Zimbabwe, &c., joins the Zambesi just below Tete.
Further evidences of this Portuguese enterprise will doubtless come to light as the Mazoe Valley is further explored. In the vicinity of a new mine called the Jumbo, fragments of old Delft pottery have been found, a few of which were shown to me when at Fort Salisbury. Nankin china is also reported from the same district, an indubitable proof of Portuguese presence; and no doubt many of the large Venetian beads, centuries old, which we saw and obtained specimens of from the Makalangas in the neighbourhood of Zimbabwe, were barter goods given by the traders of those days to the subjects of the Monomatapa, who brought them gold in quills to the three above-named dépôts, collected from the alluvial beds of the Mazoe and other streams. It is rumoured amongst the inhabitants of the Mazoe and Manica that long ago, in the days of their ancestors, white men worked gold and built themselves houses here. This rumour most probably refers to the Portuguese, who at the three above-mentioned places had churches and forts, faint traces of which are still to be found in the district.
Corvo, in his work ‘As Provincias ultramarinas,’ speaks at considerable length about the early Portuguese enterprise and the jealousy of the Arab merchants at their advent, and how these men excited the suspicion of the Monomatapa and brought about the subsequent martyrdom of the Jesuit missionary [[297]]Silveira and the entire destruction of the Portuguese mission, which had nearly converted the Monomatapa in 1561. He concludes his remarks on this subject as follows:—
THREE VENETIAN BEADS; ONE COPPER BEAD; THREE OLD WHITE VENETIAN BEADS; BONE WHORL, MEDICINE PHIALS, AND BONE ORNAMENTS
[[298]]
‘The early Portuguese did nothing more than substitute themselves for the Moors, as they called them, in the ports that those occupied on the coast; and their influence extended to the interior very little; unless, indeed, through some acts of violence, or through some ephemeral alliance of no value whatever, and through missions without any practical or lasting results. It is easy to see, by looking at the map, where the Portuguese influence extended to, and that they never left a good navigable river as a basis of operation. They went up the Zambesi, and up the Mazoe as far as they could, where they established the three fairs for trading purposes, and up the Pungwe and Buzi Rivers, establishing themselves in the same way at Massi-Kessi and Bandiri; and beyond this their influence did not extend at all during what may be called the most flourishing epoch of their colonial existence.’
From the Yellow Jacket tents we had a long ride before us of thirty miles back to Fort Salisbury. We arose betimes and found it very cold, with a thin coating of ice on the water-cans, almost the only time we saw ice during our ‘winter’ in Mashonaland, although occasionally the wind was cold and the nights very fresh. Winter in these parts is delightful, with brilliant sun by day; but as evening approaches a coat is necessary, and during our two nights at the Yellow Jacket huts we had to remove rugs, which were sorely wanted below, to procure the necessary warmth above. [[299]]
One more breakfast off that excellent eland fortified us for our ride, and the sun was not high in the heavens when we bade farewell to our hospitable entertainers. About three hours’ ride brought us to the Mazoe again just before it enters the Poort on its way to the lower valley. At the extremity of the valley we were riding down, just before the hills are ascended to reach the level plateau, there is another nest of Kaffir villages; one of these had incurred the enmity of the officers of the Chartered Company for refusing to recognise its authority by restoring stolen cattle.