African Myths of Origin (Penguin Classics)

by Stephen Belcher

  The baboon did come looking for her. It asked the people it met where she was but none of them had seen her. But it could sniff her trail through the ground, so it followed her trace until it arrived at Qwanciqutshaa’s camp. There it demanded that Qwanciqutshaa hand over the woman to be its wife. But Qwanciqutshaa said he had no wife there. The two of them fought and the baboon was beaten. So Qwanciqutshaa told it to go off into the mountains and act the way baboons always do now, eating bugs and things like that. Then he took the young woman out of his hair and told her to go home.

  After that, young men came and asked the girl to marry them, but she said she had fallen in love with Qwanciqutshaa because he had saved her from the baboon, and she would not marry them. So the young men became jealous and they contrived to poison Qwanciqutshaa by putting snake fat on the meat that he was roasting. When he felt himself poisoned, Qwanciqutshaa threw all of his belongings into the sky, and then he himself jumped into the river. He became a snake and swam through the waters. When he came near villages, women often tried to catch him, but he avoided them because women had caused his downfall.

  But the woman he had saved was still there, and she went and prepared charms with canna, a herb. She baited a trail from the river up to her hut with magical foods. That night, the snake came out of the water and ate her charmed food, then returned to the water. The next night, it ate the food, and then it took out a mat and flew into the sky to collect the belongings that had been thrown there. The third night, the woman waited outside while the snake came, eating the magic foods laid in a trail, and then Qwanciqutshaa took off his snake-skin and went into her hut to eat the rest of the food. Then he fell asleep, and while he was asleep she climbed on top of him to force more food into his mouth. He woke up and struggled against her, and asked her why she was doing this, since she was the reason the young men had poisoned him. She said it had not been her fault or her wish to have him killed, and that she loved him. Then she rubbed the canna all over him, and the two of them remained in the hut for three days. Qwanciqutshaa underwent a ritual of purification with his new wife, then he took the canna and ground it up and spread it about. All the elands that had died came to life again. He and his wife lived there, in a small valley surrounded by cliffs. The only pass that led to it was blocked by a frigid mist so that nobody could come through to them. Eventually, though, they were reunited with his family.

  THE MARKING OF THE ANIMALS

  The following two stories were collected more recently among the Ju/hoan of the Kalahari desert, and according to the collector they are paired in the culture. The first story, based on fire, is a male-centred vision of the creation process that ordered the world as it is now, with the different species marked distinctively and assigned their roles as food animals, carnivores and scavengers. The second story features a watery milieu in which birth takes place, and is considered the female vision of creation.

  The different people were together, all alike, with no distinctive markings or signs to identify them. They were sitting, talking about what they liked to do, and they decided to create something to make everyone different. They would put markings on the hides and shape the animals. They would give a name to each animal.

  They lit a big fire, and of course the animals collected round it to see what it was. The first there was the zebra, who was all blank and colourless. Then they marked the giraffe. They marked the kudu. They took the n/om that they had made with the fire and began to brand the zebra, tracing stripes up and down all over the zebra’s body. The giraffe was standing there, and so they called to the giraffe and it came and they marked it up and down, all over the body and the long, long neck. They branded the male kudu with stripes and curled horns, and they gave the female somewhat different markings. They shaded the wildebeest a sooty brown. They branded the gemsbok. As the animals stood there, having been marked, the people all admired their appearance, and some people tried to put the same markings on themselves, as they do today in the rituals named for the animals.

  The hyena heard what they were doing, and thought it was the initiation that is practised today, when a boy becomes a man. This happens after the boy has killed a large game animal. He asked people what he should bring them to receive markings, and the people answered he should bring a small antelope. So the hyena went out and caught and killed a steenbok. When he brought it back to his camp, his wife told him he should cook the meat for his family and not worry about getting markings. He was a hyena, and he should recognize this and not try to act like something that was not a hyena. The people would not be kind to him. But he disregarded her advice.

  He came to the people. Their children were watching, and as he arrived they shouted out that the hyena had come. The adults rebuked the children, for it is considered impolite to shout out people’s names. One should use terms of respect that avoid direct mention of a person’s name. But although they scolded the children, they had no intention of marking the hyena the way they had marked the other animals. They took the steenbok he had brought, and some of them immediately began to cook it on the fire. The others took a long iron rod and heated it in the fire.

  The hyena was having doubts. His wife had called him a hyena, the children had called him a hyena… would the people make him something different? But the people called him, and told him to come near the fire and to lie down. He should spread his legs out and lie flat on his belly. He should not look while they were preparing to brand him, or the markings would not be properly fixed on him.

  When the hyena was lying there, they took the iron rod that had been heated in the fire and rammed it up his anus, so that he jumped up and howled. His stomach convulsed and he sprayed faeces everywhere and then he ran off. As he ran, the people threw old bones at him. ‘Go!’ they called. ‘You are a hyena, you should gnaw these bones. That is what you should eat.’

  After the hyena had been chased away, they continued to mark other animals with the n/om that they had made from the fire. They marked the hartebeest and the little duiker and the gazelles. The kori bustard came and they marked it, but since the bustard was a bird they gave him feathers all over his body, and they adorned his head with a tuft of longer feathers that reached back. The python came and they marked her carefully all along her body, tracing delicate designs on the scales.

  When they had finished they looked over all the animals they had marked and agreed that they had done good work. They agreed among themselves that the animals they had marked would count as meat animals, because they were so pretty and they had been marked individually.

  THE PYTHON WIFE

  The animals lived together. The kori bustard was considered a leader of the animals, and many of them wished to marry him. The jackal in particular admired his looks. No one was surprised when the kori bustard married the python, because she was so beautiful in her markings and her sinuous movements and her shiny skin. But the jackal was very disappointed, and found herself wishing that the python might die or disappear so she could take the python’s place next to the kori bustard.

  One day, the jackal and the python went down to the spring to get water. They saw that the berries on the n=ah tree that overhang the spring were ripe and ready to be plucked.

  ‘Oh, let us get some of the fruit while we are here,’ said the jackal, but when she tried to climb up the tree she slipped back down the trunk. So the python went up instead, although she was pregnant and heavy. She plucked the n=ah berries. She threw some down to the jackal, and some she ate herself. She worked her way around the tree, and then she approached out on a limb that hung over the water.

  ‘I shouldn’t go out here,’ she said. ‘The branch looks too thin.’

  ‘But see,’ answered the jackal, ‘there are lots of perfectly ripe berries at the end. You can get out there; you aren’t as heavy as I am. You don’t need to worry. I can pull you out of the water if you fall in.’

  So the python wound her way around the branch to the end where the berries were clustered,
and the branch broke. She fell into the water and sank to the bottom.

  The jackal went running home, delighted that the python had vanished and she could take her place. She went to the kori bustard’s fire and sat down just where she had often seen the python sitting. The kori bustard’s relatives came and said, ‘Where is the python? Where is our beautiful sister-in-law?’ But the jackal said nothing. So the relatives did as they usually did: they dipped a tuft of grasses in some fat and spread it across the jackal’s face. They did this to the python because it made her skin glossy. But the jackal simply licked the fat off her face, and the relatives laughed at her.

  ‘You aren’t our sister-in-law,’ they said. ‘You think everything is food.’

  The jackal said nothing and waited until night-time. Then she went to join the kori bustard at his sleeping place. But he had not been fooled. Before nightfall, he had planted lots of bone-headed arrows tipped with poison in the ground, buried in the sand with the heads up. When the jackal came to spread out the skin on which she slept, he made her spread it over the concealed arrows. When she lay down, the jackal complained that things were sticking into her from the ground, that there were thorns under her. The kori bustard told her to be quiet, that it was where she always slept and there was nothing to bother her there. So the jackal lay there, until the poison from the arrows killed her.

  In the morning the kori bustard examined the jackal. The poison had made her anus stick out, and he saw there were n=ah seeds in her bowels, and he guessed that the jackal and the python had gone together to a place where there was a n=ah tree, and so he decided that his wife, the python, must be in the spring.

  He went to the spring to look for the python, and although he reached down, he could not feel what was in the spring. So he called all the animals to help him. They came and gathered around the spring. In the meantime, the jackal’s little sister had found the jackal lying dead, with the n=ah seeds sticking out of her behind. She cried out to her grandmother that her sister was there with n=ah seeds in her behind, and the grandmother scolded her for speaking so loud about a private matter. The grandmother came and saw that the jackal was indeed dead. So the grandmother and the little sister cooked the jackal over a fire and spent the day eating this big meal.

  The animals at the spring were trying to reach down and find the python. But none of them could reach far enough into the water. Finally, they called the giraffe, who had the longest legs. The giraffe stretched its leg down into the water, as far as it could, and it felt something.

  ‘The python is there,’ said the giraffe. ‘But I think she is not alone. There is something else there with her. I think perhaps she has given birth.’

  ‘Then we must prepare for a newborn,’ said the kori bustard, and he sent animals back to the camp to fetch mats on which to place the newborn, to make it a creature of the camp. Then the giraffe reached down again and this time the giraffe was able to bring up the python and the new baby she had borne while in the depths of the spring. The kori bustard greeted his wife joyfully, and his relatives surrounded her and the new child, and they all returned to the camp.

  2

  PYGMIES OF THE CENTRAL AFRICAN FORESTS

  The central African forests, from the Cameroon east to Rwanda, are home to groups of people who have been legendary since antiquity: the Pygmies. Characterized most particularly by their small stature (1.2 metres) and by their nomadic lifestyle as forest hunters, they have excited the imagination of outsiders for ages (they are mentioned in Homer). At times they have been considered subhuman and confused with the chimpanzees who are their neighbours in the forests. They have reached different sorts of agreements with their larger human neighbours; often they serve as professional hunters. Equally often, however, they have been mischievous raiders of banana plantations and other agricultural resources. Their life, until the advent of modernization (and the effects of deforestation), seemed to visitors in some ways an image of Eden-like delight: the forests provided ample foods at most times, and Pygmies were seen as carefree children of an older era. While Pygmy groups live throughout the forests of Cameroon, Gabon, Congo (Brazzaville) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (former Zaire), the major concentrations now appear to be in the eastern basin of the Congo river and in south-eastern Cameroon. Although they still live in association with the forest, the modern world is encroaching on their once isolated territory. The stories given below come from the Bambuti groups living west of Lake Kivu in the eastern Congo, and were collected early in the twentieth century. The term ‘Pygmy’ has recently come under criticism for its negative associations.

  THE CREATION OF HUMANS

  The creator, Khvum, lived alone in his village. He passed his time smoking, but he got bored. There was no one to prepare his food, or to share it. He decided to create people to keep him company. He went into the forest and collected many, many nkula nuts, so that they filled his game-bag. Then he returned to his village and went to the waterfront, where he had left his canoe. He got into the canoe and called his crocodile; the crocodile came, and he fastened a harness on it and told it to pull the canoe far out into the waters.

  The crocodile swam far, far out, until there was nothing but water all around them. There Khvum told it to stop. He removed a nut from his bag and rubbed it in his hands for some time, then blew on it and threw it back towards the land, saying ‘You shall be the first man.’ The next nut, he called a woman, and so on until all the nuts from his bag had been sent back towards the land.

  When he reached the shore, all the people were waiting for him in the village. He gave them their places, and for a time he lived with them there. It was a wonderful time.

  WHY PYGMIES LIVE IN THE FOREST

  Mungu created all people, and at first they lived together in one village, the Bambuti Pygmies with other groups such as the Babali. Mungu said they should go hunting, and bring their catch back to the village. The Babali went out, but failed to catch anything and returned empty-handed to the village. The next day, the Bambuti went out and succeeded in killing a pig. But they ate it on the spot, rather than bringing it back to the village. Mungu therefore decreed that they should no longer live in villages, but should live in the forest. But because Mungu was kind, he also provided them with many food-giving trees to sustain them in the forest.

  HOW THE PYGMIES GOT FIRE

  At one time, chimpanzees were human, but after conflicts with the other humans (particularly the Pygmies), they withdrew into the forest and took with them their specialized knowledge of such matters as growing bananas and fire. One day, a Pygmy came upon their village. They welcomed him hospitably, feeding him bananas and allowing him to warm himself by the fire. He came back again and again, and each time they gave him a good welcome.

  One day, he appeared wearing a strange costume of pounded bark, with a long tail. He came at midday, while the adult chimpanzees were out in their banana plantations and only small chimpanzees remained in the village. The small chimpanzees greeted him, as they had seen their parents do, and they offered him bananas and sat with him next to the fire. They saw that his tail was lying close to the embers and risked catching fire. They warned him about this, but he said that it did not matter. He ate his bananas and sat there talking with them. Eventually, his tail did catch fire, and then he rose up and leaped around as though he was trying to put it out, and crying as though he was suffering from the pain. The small chimpanzees followed him, shouting and laughing at the excitement. When he reached the edge of the village, however, he suddenly dashed straight into the forest. The small chimpanzees shouted out in surprise and alarm, and some of the adults came running to learn what was happening. They quickly guessed that the Pygmy had come in this costume to steal fire, and so they ran after him. But they came too late; by the time they reached the human village he had already distributed his prize among the other households.

  The chimpanzees reproached the humans for stealing the gift of fire, rather than paying honestly fo
r it, but the humans cared nothing for that. So the chimpanzees returned to the forest. They gave up the practice of all the arts they had possessed, and lived like animals.

  3

  THE SONGHAY HUNTERS OF THE NIGER RIVER

  The fertile Niger river has long sustained specialized populations of hunters and fishers. These groups have become assimilated to the larger populations that settled around them, and have adopted their languages. On some parts of the river, Bamana-speaking hunters are known as the Bozo; further downstream, in the orbit of the former Songhay empire, they are called the Sorko. The first two stories given here were collected upstream from Timbuktu at the start of the twentieth century from a Songhay-speaking population known at the time as the Gow. Nowadays, the term ‘Gow’ in Songhay refers to a spirit-medium or healer (perhaps a natural extension of the hunters’ knowledge of the secrets of nature, or a change in employment). The third story, of Fara Makan, has been collected in many versions through the past hundred years. The two heroes Musa Nyame and Fara Makan represent different populations along the Niger, but are nevertheless very similar. They also share some features with other regional heroes such as Sunjata. (For the Songhay, see also Chapter 61.)