HEAVENLY BODIES IN S.A. MYTHOLOGY. 433 



of the Khoi-Khoi," quotes corroborative testimony from other old 

 travellers, from which it would appear that //Khab, the Moon, 

 and !Khub the Lord are not clearly distinguished in Hottentot 

 mythology.* 



The following tale, common also among other nations than 

 the Hottentots, in various forms explains how death came into 

 the world. The moon on one occasion sent the chameleon with 

 this message to men: "Oh men, as I die and am renewed again, 

 so you will die, and be renewed again." Now the chameleon was 

 a slow fellow, and as he went he forgot the message, so he turned 

 back again to get it correctly. The moon was angry and called 

 the hare and said to her, "You are a quick runner. Take this 

 message to men: "Oh, men, as I die and am renewed again, so you 

 will die and be renewed." Away ran the hare, and on the journey 

 forgot the message, and delivered it in this form: "Oh, men, as I 

 die and am not renewed so you will die for ever." When the hare 

 returned the moon questioned her as to the form of the message 

 she had delivered, and when she heard the manner in which it had 

 been delivered, seized a stick and struck the hare in the mouth, 

 splitting her lip, and so every hare has a cleft lip to this day, and 

 that is how death came into the world. In some variants of the 

 story it is one of the men, to whom the message is delivered, who 

 lifts a stone and strikes the hare in the mouth, splitting her lip. 

 There are many different forms of this story, but the central idea 

 in all of them is the same. Here the moon is evidently some kind 

 of Lord of Creation or minor divinity. There are other tales in 

 which the moon figures prominently also. The sun does not appear 

 to have such power over the lives and fortunes of men as the moon. 

 He seems rather malevolent in some conceptions of his relation 

 to man and the animals. The origin of the jackal's stripe is 

 explained thus. Some men on a journey saw the sun sitting by 

 the wayside, but took no notice of him. A jackal who was follow- 

 ing up the men saw him sitting, and going up to him said, "What 

 a nice little boy the men have left behind." He then took the 

 sun up and put him on his back, but by and bye the sun began 

 to burn him, and he ordered him to get down. The sun stuck 

 faster, with the result that he burnt the jackal's back black to this 

 day. The sun sometimes uses other animals such as the horse and 

 the ox. The former when he catches him to ride on cannot bear 

 his weight, so he curses the horse, who had previously been immortal, 

 with death. The ox does much better, and bears the sun's 

 weight quite easily besides being good tempered. As the Hotten- 

 tots used ridiug oxen it was quite natural for them to exalt the 

 ox above the horse or quaggfa. They never succeeded in domesti- 

 cating the zebra or quagga that abounded in their country, though 

 from this tale it would appear as if the attempt had been made. 

 According to Sparrman and other travellers the quagga was com- 

 paratively good tempered. The quagga and zebra were probably 

 no wilder or more intractable than the herds of wild horses that 



Th. Hahn. " Tsuni // Goam," p. 39. 1X/ © s V^-<^ 



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