Chivhu (called Enkeldoorn until 1982) is a small town in

Zimbabwe Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and ...

, with an estimated population of 10,000 in 2007. It is located south of

Harare Harare (; formerly Salisbury ) is the capital and most populous city of Zimbabwe. The city proper has an area of 940 km2 (371 mi2) and a population of 2.12 million in the 2012 census and an estimated 3.12 million in its metropolitan ...

on the main road south to

Masvingo Masvingo is a city in south-eastern Zimbabwe and the capital of Masvingo Province. The city is situated close to Great Zimbabwe, the national monument from which the country takes its name and close to Lake Mutirikwi, its recreational park, ...

and South Africa.

Name

Chivhu's original name, Enkeldoorn, is a

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

and

Afrikaans Afrikaans (, ) is a West Germanic language that evolved in the Dutch Cape Colony from the Dutch vernacular of Holland proper (i.e., the Hollandic dialect) used by Dutch, French, and German settlers and their enslaved people. Afrikaans gr ...

word meaning "lone thorn". It refers to the tree '' acacia robusta'' and implies that a single specimen once grew there. The name was adopted in 1891 but was changed to Chivhu in 1982, on the second anniversary of Zimbabwe's independence. The current name comes from the

Shona language Shona (; sn, chiShona) is a Bantu language of the Shona people of Zimbabwe. It was codified by the colonial government in the 1950s. According to ''Ethnologue'', Shona, comprising the Zezuru, Korekore and Karanga dialects, is spoken by about ...

and means "anthill".

History

Enkeldoorn was founded by Afrikaans-speaking Boer farmers and settlers in around 1850, and was the first

white White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White ...

settlement in

. It became an

Afrikaner Afrikaners () are a South African ethnic group descended from predominantly Dutch settlers first arriving at the Cape of Good Hope in the 17th and 18th centuries.Entry: Cape Colony. ''Encyclopædia Britannica Volume 4 Part 2: Brain to Cast ...

stronghold in a predominantly English-speaking white

Rhodesia Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of So ...

, giving it the nickname of 'the Republic of Enkeldoorn'.''The Reluctant President: The Memoirs of the Hon. Clifford DuPont'', GCLM., ID.
Books of Rhodesia, 1978, pages 73–75

Economy

Chivhu has an agricultural economy, based in poultry farming and

dairy cattle Dairy cattle (also called dairy cows) are cattle bred for the ability to produce large quantities of milk, from which dairy products are made. Dairy cattle generally are of the species '' Bos taurus''. Historically, little distinction was ...

. Beef, pork, maize and

millet Millets () are a highly varied group of small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for fodder and human food. Most species generally referred to as millets belong to the tribe Paniceae, but some millets a ...

are also important produce. As more white farmers were expelled from Zimbabwe by the

Mugabe Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...

government, this once lively agricultural economy has become more endangered.

References

Populated places in Mashonaland East Province Populated places founded by Afrikaners {{Zimbabwe-geo-stub