New AMS dates for the Middle Iron Age in the Mapungubwe landscape

Research in the Limpopo Valley has documented over 500 Middle Iron Age sites (AD 900–1320) relevant to origins of Mapungubwe – capital first indigenous state southern Africa. Fifteen new accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) dates from 11 these archaeological establish boundaries ceramic facies that form culture-history framework for such diverse topics as land use, ethnic stratification, population dynamics and rainfall fluctuations. was abandoned at about AD 1320.Significance:
 
 Because developed relatively recently (circa 1200), it can clarify older states.
 Environmental factors droughts, along with agriculture trade, played a role abandonment Mapungubwe.