One day while hunting, Tauetona came upon
some mysterious footprints that looked somewhat
like his own, but they were much smaller. He
turned to ask someone about them and the only
animal he saw was Brown Hyena. So he asked
Brown Hyena, “Do you know what these are?”
Brown Hyena answered, “No, I do not know this
animal.” Actually, Brown Hyena was not interested
in the footprints because whoever made the foot-
prints seemed much too large for him to catch.
Tauetona looked around and saw Giraffe. He
asked, “From your great height can you tell what
animal made these footprints?” Turning his head
toward the valley where the women were made,
Giraffe said, “I can see some bipeds who look some-
what like men. I shall go and ask them to return
with me.” Tauetona was impressed that he might
know more about these animals. Giraffe went and
spoke to the women, and he told them that there
were men waiting to meet them. The women, appar-
ently, were eager to meet the men as well, and they
followed Giraffe across the plains, dancing and
singing that they were going to meet men.
While all of this rejoicing was going on among
the women, the Mother of God made some medi-
cine from the Mimosa seed and placed the medicine
on the tongue of each man so that they would have
the gift of speech and be able to speak eloquently to
the women, marry them, and have many children.
The Tswana tell this narrative as a part of their
instructions to children that the important value
in life is to have families and to participate in
procreation. Although the people are largely
associated with Botswana, they live mostly in
northeastern South Africa.
Molefi Kete AsanteSeealsoWamala
Further Readings
Chigwedere, A. (1982).Birth of Bantu Africa. Bulawayo,
Zimbabwe: Books for Africa.
Davis, N. E. (1978).A History of Southern Africa.
Nairobi, Kenya: Longman.
Morton, F., Murray, A., & Ramsay, J. (1989).Historical
Dictionary of Botswana. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow
Press.
Thompson, L. (1978).African Societies in Southern
Africa. London: Heinemann.
TEFNUT
Tefnut is the deity of moisture in ancient Egypt.
TheBook of Knowing the Creation of Rarecounts
that Tefnut was expectorated by Atum-Ra and
that she was brought up in joy by Nun. The
Supreme Deity created Shu, air, and Tefnut at the
beginning of time. Together with Shu, Tefnut cre-
ated Geb and Nut, who gave birth to Ausar, Seth,
Auset, and Neb-het. Heru was the son of Ausar
and Auset and was a deity alongside the gods of
the Ennead in the city of No or Iunnu (Heliopolis),
where Tefnut was the deity of water.
The role of Tefnut in the religious imagination
of the ancient Egyptians is seen in the idea of
Atum-Ra’s reliance on the ability of Tefnut to pur-
sue that which is lost. According to theBook of
Knowing the Creation of Ra, Tefnut, along with
Shu, brought back Atum-Ra’s far-wandering Eye,
thus giving Tefnut a role in the mythological and
magical quality of the Eye of God.
According to one oral narrative, Tefnut left
Egypt for Nubia after an argument with Atum
and took all the water and moisture with her. As
a result, Egypt plunged into chaos for dryness,
and Atum, in despair, sent Shu and Tehuti to
Nubia after her. They found that Tefnut had
meanwhile turned herself into a lioness. Other
narratives refer to Atum-Ra’s Eye being sent to
retrieve Tefnut as the lioness, eventually bringing
her back to Atum-Ra to restore his Eye in its place
and thus drive chaos away from Egypt.
It is not unusual, therefore, that Tefnut is depicted
as both a savior of Atum-Ra’s Eye and a lioness,
strongly linked to the sun as the Eye of Ra, but also
with water for which she stands as the powerful
force. Also, thePyramid Textsseem to indicate mul-
tiple progenitors of Ausar. He is called the son of
Geb, Atum, and Shu and of the goddesses Nut,
Tefnut, and Hathor. Thus, it appears that Tefnut is
seen alongside two female personalities in the ancient
religion who are among the most identifiable charac-
ters in ancient Egyptian religion. Nut is the Sky god-
dess and Hat-hor is the goddess most identified with
Auset because of her powerful strength in fertility
and productivity. Tefnut, conjoined with them,
creates an impressive cadre of female powers.
Furthermore, in the Ptah section, or right-hand
section of the Shabaka Stone, which deals with the650 Tefnut