Eland Hunting Rituals among Northern and Southern San Groups: Striking Similarities

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Opening Paragraph: The prominence of the eland in San thought is suggested by the frequency with which this antelope was depicted in rock paintings and also by the myths and rituals in which it features. In this paper we describe and compare certain eland beliefs and hunting rituals drawn from two San groups, the !Kung of Botswana and the now extinct \Xam of the Cape Province. The relevance of material obtained from the northern !Kung to the explication of the limited southern \Xam ethnographic record and rock paintings has been regarded as questionable in view of the ecological and linguistic differences between the two societies. Using the results of recent field work among the !Kung, we attempt to show that, in spite of the linguistic and ecological differences, there is evidence for a conceptual framework common to both groups.
Keywords

This publication has 24 references indexed in Scilit: