UNESCO World Heritage Sites in South Africa

UNESCEO world heritage sites are those places and monuments which are of great cultural or natural significance to humanity. Presently, there are approximately 890 such sites around the World. Italy leads this list where 44 sites, exist. Interestingly, the idea came into being after world wide efforts to move Abu Simbel temple from flood paths of Aswan Dam.

Such efforts also became the basis of preservation of other landmarks including Venice lagoons in Italy, ruins of Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan and Borobodur Temple compounds in Indonesia. Further efforts lead to the foundation of UNESCO world heritage sites committee in 1976. Since then eight sites in South Africa have been included in this coveted list. Three of these are natural wonders, four offer cultural values and one is of mixed type.

Cultural Sites

The Taung Skull Fossil Site , located in Gauteng, Limpopo and North West Provinces offer insight into the living of early humans in various cave dwellings. Likewise, in Northern South Africa, the Mapungubwe cultural landscape is known to provide intact remains of a lost kingdom that suddenly vanished but left important clues to a model civilization, unseen anywhere in Southern African continent.

Similarly, Richtersveld Cultural and Botanical Landscape offer intact Nama lifestyle where Nama people still hold to their fascinating traditions. The portable rush mat houses and seasonal migration routes are sights worth beholding. Near Cape Town, the prison at Robben Island was also admitted to this list in 1999. It is regarded as a place where democracy and freedom triumphed over oppression.

Natural Sites

The iSimangaliso Wetland on eastern coast is full of eye-catching landscape due to constantly shifting patterns of land, weather and seabed. This diversity has allowed it to produce a unique ecological system, absent elsewhere. Just as iSimangaliso Wetland, the Cape Floral Protected area offers 20% of flora present in entire African continent. Amazingly, this 553,000 hectare is only 0.5% of the entire African landscape.

One hundred and twenty kilometers south of Johannesburg lay Vredefort Dome . It is the only existing proof of astrobleme on earth. For scientist, this area provides full geological profile of earth before the single most powerful energy releasing event took place. With a radius of 190 km, it is also considered to be the largest and most deeply eroded.

Mixed Type

The Drakensberg Park is included in UNESCO list for its role as shelter to many endemic and globally endangered species. The beautiful vista of this park also contains large number of high quality cave paintings made by San people, 4000 years ago.