Formlings, now better understood to depict termitaria (termites' nests) and termites, are a pervasive category of San (Bushman) rock art north of the River Limpopo. This article investigates the associations of termites' nests in San thought, belief, and ritual, in an attempt to explain formling symbolism and why termites' nests, and not other subjects, were chosen for depiction. Unequivocal ethnographic testimonies of San spiritual world-view are compounded with iconographic analysis to show nuances of San understanding and perception of the spirit world. In turn, this ethnographic hermeneutic reveals a significant but previously unexplored facet of spirit-world imagery which evokes notions of creative and transformative power. This newly highlighted vignette of San cosmology unlocks aspects of San imagery, such as the interface between the natural and the metaphysical, that have hitherto been less understood.
inhospitable terrain of the Maloti-Drakensberg to their advantage. This analysis illuminates the BaPhuthi as a culturally hybrid, ethnogenetic polity that attracted and discharged a disparate following as needed, while maintaining a degree of solidarity and chiefly hierarchy. The thesis details the BaPhuthi's peripatetic settlement strategy: BaPhuthi leaders established multiple dispersed political seats throughout their territories south of the Senqu River, which they would frequently activate and deactivate, enabling them to settle their heterogeneous following within their territories. It then explores archaeological corollaries of BaPhuthi lifeways: historical analysis suggests that the BaPhuthi's archaeological footprint would be ephemeral (despite their polity's regional significance), and archaeological approaches to Iron Age Farming Communities (based in the historical identities described above) currently do not fully accommodate polities such as the BaPhuthi. The thesis discusses a methodology designed to address the archaeology of the BaPhuthi polity and its results. Considering how the BaPhuthi fashioned a diverse, heterodox chiefdom that manipulated the ambiguities of colonial rule encourages revisiting prevailing conceptions of how cultural identities and economies are rooted in contingent historical circumstances; drawing on comparative cases from North and South America suggests revising longstanding views of the Maloti-Drakensberg as a marginal colonial theatre and repositioning heterodox actors as capable of influencing the terms of colonial encounters.
The author demonstrates that the complex images of rock art known as formlings depict or evoke the equally complex architecture of ant-hills. Presented in cutaway and full of metaphorical references, they go beyond the image into the imagination.
A rock-painting panel in the Matopo Hills, Zimbabwe, illustrates the distinctive features of the formling motif, a striking peculiarity of Zimbabwean San (Bushman) rock-art. The debate regarding the derivation and meaning of this motif has proceeded unabated until very recently. The motif has been interpreted variously as depicting natural and cultural material phenomena. In contrast to previous interpretations, this paper advocates an approach that considers San art imagery as cultured representations, which is a notion that foregrounds the understanding of San image-making principles, the San world-view and the concomitant knowledge system of beliefs. Finally, the paper provides a precise definition of the features of formlings that can be tied in with a particular subject.
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