Domboshava (also Domboshawa) is a peri-urban residential area in the province of

Mashonaland East Mashonaland East, informally Mash East, is a province of Zimbabwe. It has an area of 32,230 km2 and a population of approximately 1.73 million (2022). Marondera is the capital of the province. Demographics The province has a history ...

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 in an area of

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

hills about north of

Harare Harare ( ), formerly Salisbury, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Zimbabwe. The city proper has an area of , a population of 1,849,600 as of the 2022 Zimbabwe census, 2022 census and an estimated 2,487,209 people in its metrop ...

and is named after the large granite hills. The name is derived from ''Dombo'' meaning rock and S''hava'' translating to light brown. The clan name ''Shava'' is a reference to the light brown colour of the Eland or ''Mhofu'' in

Shona Shona often refers to: * Shona people, a Southern African people ** Shona language, a Bantu language spoken by Shona people today ** Shona languages, a wider group of languages defined in the early 20th century ** Kingdom of Zimbabwe, a Shona stat ...

. The most prominent and famous granite hill in Domboshava is called ''Ngoma'' ''Kurira'' which directly translates to the drum sounds/drumming. This site attracts hundreds of both local and international travellers each year. The granite hill is a National Monument of Zimbabwe and has some examples of cave paintings which date back almost 6000 years. The majority of these paintings can be found in a cave which is some walk from the rock formations at the top of the hill. File:Domboshava_cave_painting_1.jpg, Cave paintings at Domboshava File:P1120938 (Modified).JPG, Domboshawa Interpretive Centre The three largest shopping centres (commonly known as grocery points in Zimbabwe) are Mverechena, Mungate and Showground. These centres have become areas of large economic activity and growth for Domboshava. For many years, primarily in the later 20th-century, Domboshawa was a major location of

market gardening A market garden is the relatively small-scale production of fruits, vegetables and flowers as cash crops, frequently sold directly to consumers and restaurants. The diversity of crops grown on a small area of land, typically from under to s ...

for the markets of Harare. Since the start of the 21st-century Domboshava's economy has seen a rise in pottery production and horticulture.

References

Populated places in Mashonaland Central Province {{Zimbabwe-geo-stub