Although the city was founded in the late nineteenth century, the region has a long history of trading caravans passing through on the way to the Indian Ocean, from ports such as Sofala, to inland settlements, such as Great Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe is also renowned for its soapstone carvings and figurines which are evidence of these trade routes, dating as far back as the late African Iron Age (c. 900 AD) right up to the colonial period. A large hoard of soapstone carvings, jewellery, weapons, sherds and other objects were found in the vicinity of Mutare by the British archaeologist E M Andrews at the beginning of the twentieth century - they were later donated by the trustees of Cecil Rhodes to the British Museum in 1905. The soapstone figures, which are both anthropomorphic and zoomorphic, might have been part of a votive offering, as they were discovered near what appeared to be an altar.