In the foregoing chapters, the ǀKaggen narratives were discussed as a group displaying certain thematic, structural and cultural characteristics. Where single versions of narratives are concerned, however, the interplay between a particular story, its cultural density, and the individual narrator, becomes more visible. By comparing different versions of the same narrative the various ways in which narrators used a theme, plot or symbol can be shown. In this chapter two narratives (M1 and M9) are discussed and special attention is paid to the discrepancies between different versions. M1 and M9 are both narratives which, in certain versions, display more complexity than many of the other ǀKaggen narratives in the collection. M1 is very well known and has long interested students of San parietal art, since it centrally involves an eland, the antelope which features so prominently in rock painting throughout the Republic of South Africa. M9 has been referred to in passing several times in the previous chapters. Structurally and thematically it is anomalous, and, as will be seen, is also singular in other ways. Versions of both of these narratives were published by Dorothea Bleek (1923: 1ff, 34ff).

|Kaggen and the eland (M1)

In Mantis and His Friends Dorothea Bleek presented two versions of a narrative which she entitled ‘Mantis makes an eland’. Her ‘First version’ is a compound summary of three separate narratives, two given by ǁKabbo (B. II, 379–433; L. II, (4) 482–86) and one by Dia!kwain (L. V, (1) 3608–83). Her ‘Second version’ is a summary of a narrative given by ǀHang ǂkass'o (L. VIII, (6) 6505–83). The title is a little misleading as Dia!kwain's version and one of ǁKabbo's versions does not include ǀKaggen making the eland, and the version given by ǁKabbo that does include the eland creation has a quite different conclusion from that given in this published ‘First version’, i.e. it does not conclude with the creation of the moon.

Five versions of a narrative involving ǀKaggen and an eland were collected by Bleek and Lloyd, three from ǁKabbo and one each from Dia!kwain and ǀHang ǂkass'o.