Chivhu, originally known as Enkeldoorn, is a small town in Zimbabwe, with an estimated population of 10,000 in 2007.

Chivhu's original name, Enkeldoorn, is a Dutch and Afrikaans word meaning "lone thorn".

[1] It refers to the tree acacia robusta and implies that a single specimen once grew there.

[2] Enkeldoorn was founded by Afrikaans-speaking Boer farmers and settlers in around 1850, and was the first white settlement in Zimbabwe.

It became an Afrikaner stronghold in a predominantly English-speaking white Rhodesia, giving it the nickname of 'the Republic of Enkeldoorn'.