A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.
Overview
The Water’s children are the extraordinary animals taken from a spring in this selected |Xam narrative. The contributor describes them in a note as beautiful and striped like a zebra. Their size is compared to calves, while the Water itself is said to be as large as a bull. The note also states that |kweiten ta ||ken had not seen them herself, but had heard this description. That distinction belongs with their appearance, rather than being removed to make the account sound like an eyewitness animal report.
An ill girl refuses the food supplied by her mother and other women, secretly killing the Water’s children and eating them instead. The women leave a younger girl at home to discover what she eats. The child watches her elder sister go to the spring, kill one of the beings, bring it home, boil its flesh and eat. She tells their mother, who recognises what the killed creature was. A whirlwind later carries the girl and her family into the spring, where they become frogs. The Water’s children are the victims that prompt the narrative’s dangerous outcome; they are not themselves identified as those transformed frogs.
Origins & earliest records
Bleek and Lloyd, Specimens of Bushman Folklore (1911), V.—41, The Girl’s Story; the Frogs’ Story, pp. 198–205. The original heading credits |kweiten ta ||ken, December 1874, who heard it from her mother #kamme-an. The final household-object explanation also explicitly invokes her mother.
Records & interpretation
Complete passage pp. 198–205 and surrounding notes inspected in cached official Archive OCR. The beautiful zebra-striped, calf-sized Water-child description is expressly hearsay for the contributor. The final frogs and growing household things are the narrative’s stated outcome, not an escape inferred from the adjacent Rain Bull account.
In the literature
“of calves, being the children of great things.”
V.—41, The Girl’s Story; the Frogs’ Story; complete pp. 198–205 and all notes; excerpt printed p. 199 · Bleek–Lloyd original English translation; Lucy C. Lloyd, editor
An ill girl secretly kills and eats water children instead of family food; a younger girl reports her actions. A whirlwind later carries the family into a spring, where they become frogs and their belongings become plants. An appearance note calls the children calf-sized and striped like zebras, with bull-sized parents; the contributor expressly says she has not personally seen them.
Selected bibliography
Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.
- 01
Specimens of Bushman Folklore
V.—41, The Girl’s Story; the Frogs’ Story, complete pp. 198–205, including mother/transmission heading, appearance note and final objects at the spring.
- 02
Specimens of Bushman Folklore — V.—41, The Girl’s Story; the Frogs’ Story; complete pp. 198–205 and all notes
London: George Allen & Company, 1911; original bilingual edition. Title-page OCR and live UNC/Internet Archive catalogue agree. Printed pages distinguished from manuscript marginal numbers and access-image indices.
Family & connections
A source-supported family tree or inspiration record has not yet been compiled for this profile. Related reading below indicates a connection in subject matter, not a proven lineage or creative influence.
Located primary passages
Specific passages supporting details in this entry, grouped by their published witness.
Specimens of Bushman Folklore
London: George Allen & Company, 1911; original bilingual edition. Title-page OCR and live UNC/Internet Archive catalogue agree. Printed pages distinguished from manuscript marginal numbers and access-image indices.
- An ill girl secretly kills and eats water children instead of family food; a younger girl reports her actions. A whirlwind later carries the family into a spring, where they become frogs and their belongings become plants. An appearance note calls the children calf-sized and striped like zebras, with bull-sized parents; the contributor expressly says she has not personally seen them.
V.—41, The Girl’s Story; the Frogs’ Story; complete pp. 198–205 and all notes
No entire volume or independent performance/manuscript archive read. Bilingual original retained, but no independent |Xam translation claimed. OCR name glyphs unreliable; contributor headings checked visually. No lyrics, prayers, formulas or practical treatment copied.
References
Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.
- Primary collected narrative and explanatory notesOriginal 1911 bilingual edition: The Girl’s Story; the Frogs’ StoryResearch access: 2026-10-05
Image credits
A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.
