Tuli is a village in the province of Matabeleland South, in southwestern

Zimbabwe file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...

. It is located about 90 km west of Beitbridge on the eastern bank of the

Shashe River The Shashe River (or Shashi River) is a major left-bank tributary of the Limpopo River in Zimbabwe. It rises northwest of Francistown, Botswana and flows into the Limpopo River where Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa meet.Pioneer Column The Pioneer Column was a force raised by Cecil Rhodes and his British South Africa Company in 1890 and used in his efforts to annex the territory of Mashonaland, later part of Zimbabwe (once Southern Rhodesia). Background Rhodes was anxious to ...

in July

1890 Events January * January 1 – The Kingdom of Italy establishes Eritrea as its colony in the Horn of Africa. * January 2 – Alice Sanger becomes the first female staffer in the White House. * January 11 – 1890 British Ultimatum: The Uni ...

at the place known as Selous Camp and used by

Frederick Selous Frederick Courteney Selous, Distinguished Service Order, DSO (; 31 December 1851 – 4 January 1917) was a British people, British explorer, army British Army, officer, professional hunter, and conservation movement, conservationist, famous for ...

as a base for his hunting expeditions. The village is mainly a police post and associated housing. The village can be accessed from Gwanda town via Guyu and Hwali, or from Beitbridge via Nottingham and Shashi Irrigation Scheme, although the latter road is in very poor condition.

History

Tuli was the first point at which the pioneer column, and many subsequent expeditions entered into

Matabeleland Matabeleland is a region located in southwestern Zimbabwe that is divided into three provinces: Matabeleland North, Bulawayo, and Matabeleland South. These provinces are in the west and south-west of Zimbabwe, between the Limpopo and Zambezi ...

and onward north to

Salisbury Salisbury ( , ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and civil parish in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers River Avon, Hampshire, Avon, River Nadder, Nadder and River Bourne, Wi ...

(now Harare), the capital of

Rhodesia Rhodesia ( , ; ), officially the Republic of Rhodesia from 1970, was an unrecognised state, unrecognised state in Southern Africa that existed from 1965 to 1979. Rhodesia served as the ''de facto'' Succession of states, successor state to the ...

as the country was then known. Tuli was the first location north of the

Limpopo Limpopo () is the northernmost Provinces of South Africa, province of South Africa. It is named after the Limpopo River, which forms the province's western and northern borders. The term Limpopo is derived from Rivombo (Livombo/Lebombo), a ...

/Shashe rivers where a 'European' style building was erected - the BSA Police Station was a wooden modular style Victorian building, brought from the UK and erected to house members of the BSA Police who monitored the river crossing just south of the building's location. Until this time a large Fort (Fort Tuli) had existed on the southern bank of the Shashe where oxen and

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 mi ...

s were rested prior to undertaking the river crossing. In the 1970s this building was re-located from its original site and erected at the site of the old, and now obliterated, Fort Tuli. It was used to house artifacts and items of historic interest which were found by persons in the area of the old Fort. Fort Tuli was also the launching point of the

Jameson Raid The Jameson Raid (Afrikaans: ''Jameson-inval'', , 29 December 1895 – 2 January 1896) was a botched raid against the South African Republic (commonly known as the Transvaal) carried out by British colonial administrator Leander Starr Jameson ...

into the

South African Republic The South African Republic (, abbreviated ZAR; ), also known as the Transvaal Republic, was an independent Boer republics, Boer republic in Southern Africa which existed from 1852 to 1902, when it was annexed into the British Empire as a result ...

which contributed significantly to the start of the

Second Boer War The Second Boer War (, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, Transvaal War, Anglo–Boer War, or South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer republics (the South African Republic and ...

in the late 19th century.

Tuli Circle

Tuli also forms the centre of a 'circle', the southern half of which stretches south of the Shashe River. This circle was established by the early pioneers with the agreement of local tribesmen as a no-go area for the

grazing In agriculture, grazing is a method of animal husbandry whereby domestic livestock are allowed outdoors to free range (roam around) and consume wild vegetations in order to feed conversion ratio, convert the otherwise indigestible (by human diges ...

of local

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, bovid ungulates widely kept as livestock. They are prominent modern members of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Mature female cattle are calle ...

. This preserved the grazing and helped to prevent the spread of

rinderpest Rinderpest (also cattle plague or steppe murrain) was an infectious viral disease of cattle, domestic water buffalo, and many other species of even-toed ungulates, including gaurs, African Buffalo, buffaloes, large antelope, deer, giraffes, wilde ...

from the local cattle to the all-important oxen needed for the trek north. The historic legacy of this is the shape of the international boundary separating Zimbabwe from

Botswana Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory part of the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the sou ...

, which ceases to be the Shashe River for the section where it flows through this area and instead follows the outer rim of this circle, known as the "Tuli Circle". This is a protected area, now the Thuli Parks and Wildlife Land.

References

{{Coord, 21, 55, S, 029, 12, E, display=title, region:ZW_type:city Populated places in Matabeleland South Province 1890 establishments in Southern Rhodesia Shashe River