Why Bushmen Fear the Rainbow

The Bushmen are the indigenous people of the southern African region. Rain is sparse in their part of the world and one would think they would welcome the sight of a rainbow. Not really. Read on to find out why.

In the sky lived Rain, a beautiful woman. She was married to Flame, the brilliant god who lit up the skies. It was Flame who created the earth, and they lived happily with their three daughters. The girls were just as lovely as their mother.

When the eldest of them expressed her desire to visit the earth and see the world, her parents let her go. She went down and wandered far and wide, meeting people and learning their ways. Very soon, she met a young hunter whom she fell in love with and married. Of course, she never returned to her home in the sky after that.

Meanwhile, Rain had another child—this time, a boy. ‘And he shall be called Son-eib,’ said the happy mother. When Son-eib grew up, his sisters begged their parents to let them all see the world. ‘There’s no way I’ll allow that,’ cried Rain, for she still missed her firstborn. ‘I can’t lose the rest of my children too.’

‘There are three of us now and we’ll come back for sure,’ said the sisters but their parents refused to let them go.

Now, the Wicked Wolf, who saw all this from his quiet corner, approached Flame and Rain. He was sort of an acquaintance, but he spoke very confidently, as though he were a good friend of the family.

‘Do let them go. Trust me, it’s a good education. You don’t have to worry at all for I will personally escort them.’ Flame decided to trust him and agreed to let the three siblings go with the Wolf. But Rain wept as she watched the happy faces of her children bid her goodbye.

You may have guessed by now that the Wicked Wolf had nothing but malice in that vile heart of his. The children of Rain and Flame descended to the earth along with the Wolf. They came upon a village which had, like everywhere in this world, both good and bad people.

A woman passing by spotted Son-eib and exclaimed, ‘This can’t be! This boy has my mother’s eyebrows!’ She was generous of heart and offered them some food. The Wolf, who accepted the food on their behalf (he was their so-called guardian, remember), gave it to the two pretty sisters but none to the young boy. ‘He is not a person, just a thing,’ said the Wolf and the boy turned away angrily. As his sisters ate, he moved away and sat hidden amidst the long grass. A bright red bird fluttered by and the boy caught it and hid it in his coat.

That night, the woman (the same one who had offered the food) invited them to stay at her home. ‘It is not safe for such beautiful girls as yourselves to stay out in the dark—and you too, boy with my mother’s eyebrows.’ But again, the Wolf kept the boy out of the house and made him sleep alone in a little hut.

While everybody slept, the Wolf called some of the bad people from the village and together, they set fire to the hut where the boy lay sleeping. The little hut went up in flames and through the burning roof flew out a bright red bird, screeching into the blazing skies.

The bird flew up, up and up, where Rain and Flame lived. ‘Son-eib is dead! Burnt in a hut by the Wicked Wolf and his sisters don’t even know,’ he sang. Rain heard him and turned to her husband. ‘Do you hear the red bird sing? What are we going to do to those wicked people who killed our beloved Son-eib?’

That night, the people in the village, the good ones and the bad, saw a great big storm cloud descend. In the middle of it was a rainbow. Lightning flashed from the dark cloud and began to strike the earth, here and there. It singled out the Wicked Wolf and all his bad friends who had set fire to the boy’s hut, and struck them dead.

As the good people watched in horror, a voice was heard from above. ‘Do not kill the children of the sky!’ it bellowed. From that day on, the Bushmen fear the rainbow. And every time they see one in a rain-washed sky, they beat two sticks together and shout loudly, ‘Go away, go away and do not burn us!’