^{page 347 note 2} The four clicks of the !Kung language are symbolized as follows: the dental click, /; the alveolar, ≠; the alveolar palatal, /; the lateral, //. The rendering of Bushman words is only approximate.

^{page 347 note 3} During the years from 1951 to 1961, Laurence Marshall conducted six expeditions to the Kalahari Desert for the purpose of studying Bushmen. The dates of these expeditions were 1951, 1952–3, 1955, 1957–8, 1959, 1961. They were sponsored by the Peabody Museum of Harvard University, by the Smithsonian Institution, and by the Transvaal Museum of Pretoria. The author was a member of all of the expeditions except that of 1957–8.

^{page 347 note 4} ‘Band ’ is the term we apply to the unit of people who live together, bound by kin and affinal ties. Among the !Kung, bands are composed of several families, which may be either nuclear or extended; or the band may be composed of both kinds of family. See Marshall, Lorna, ‘!Kung Bush-man Bands’, Africa, xxx, 4, October 1960Google Scholar.

^{page 347 note 5} During a twelve-month period in 1952–3, we observed thirty-one medicine dances. These were not, however, all given by the same bands.

^{page 349 note 1} Hunting parties, though not limited to members of one band, are small—sometimes one hunter, oftener two to four or five, rarely larger—and they are composed of men who like to hunt together. The size of gathering parties is ordinarily from about four to eight women, who are usually related or are close friends. Gift-giving, which is such an important factor in weaving a mesh of inter-relationships throughout the whole Nyae Nyne region (see Marshall, Lorna, ‘Sharing, Talking, and Giving: Relief of Social Tensions among !Kung Bushmen ’, Africa, xxxi, 3, July 1961Google Scholar), takes place between individuals, however many people may have engaged in talking about the gift. The formal games, such as the women's Ball Game and the men's Porcupine Game, are sexually segregated.

^{page 350 note 1} In my previous publications, the name of the great god has been spelled ≠ Gao!na.

^{page 351 note 1} Scleroptila levaillanti levaillanti.

^{page 353 note 1} The medicine dance is one of the ‘certain circumstances’, mentioned earlier, in which fire has n/um.

^{page 353 note 2} The ‘mangetti ’ (or ‘mongongo ’) tree is Ricinodendron rautanenii Schinz. (See Story, Robert, D.Sc., Some Plants Used by the Bushmen in Obtaining Food and Water. Botanical Survey of South Africa, Memoir No. 30 [Pretoria: Department of Agriculture, Division of Botany, 1958], p. 30Google Scholar.) Dr. Gordon Gibson of the Smithsonian Institution tells me that ‘mangetti ’ comes from omungete, the word for the tree in Hereto and in Ovambo. The !Kung word is //kxa. Tsĩ is Bauhinia esculenta Burch. (Story, Some Plants, p. 25.) Both //kxa and tsĩ are cherished foods of the !Kung.

^{page 353 note 3} At Gam the dances took place on 31 July, 4, 10, 14, 19, 23, 26 August. At Gautscha they took place on 9, 14, 24 September, 3, 17, 30 October, 7, 14, 16, 23, 25 November. At Cho/ana dances took place on 9, 12, 16, 30 January, 17, 20, 22, 28 February, 1 March. Back at Gautscha dances were held on 27 April, 20, 24 May, 20 June.

^{page 355 note 1} We had not made gifts of food previously, wanting to observe the !Kung in their own ways of gathering and hunting, but during this illness we gave food and water to all.

^{page 356 note 1} This was in another year—1955. See Thomas, Elizabeth Marshall, The Harmless People (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1959), pp. 230–9Google Scholar.

^{page 358 note 1} The identification of this moth appears in Nicholas England's study (see p. 366, n. 2).

^{page 359 note 1} Dr. Ernest E. Williams of Harvard University, who kindly gave me the identification of these tortoises, states that the third specimen does not match any tortoise known from South West Africa.

^{page 359 note 2} Anthoscopus minutus. I am grateful to Dr. Charles Handley, Jr., of the Smithsonian Institution, for this identification.

^{page 359 note 3} The !Kung make at least two kinds of sweet-smelling powder which they call sã. The one in question here is made from the bulb (resembling an iris bulb) of a fragrant grass-like plant which our expedition did not identify.

^{page 359 note 4} The two plants and the tree were among nineteen plants and trees which the !Kung believe have n/um and which are used (by anyone who wishes; they are not used exclusively by medicine men) as curative or protective agents or for bringing luck in hunting.

^{page 359 note 5} Story, Some Plants, p. 23.

^{page 359 note 6} Dr. Marjorie Whiting, in a study as yet unpublished, provides this identification.

^{page 360 note 1} I am grateful to Dr. Robert Story for the identification, by personal communication, of //kharu; it is Lapeyrousia cyanescens Bak.

^{page 361 note 1} ‘The Sociology of !Kung Bushman Trance Performances ’, in Prince, Raymond (ed.), Trance and Possession States (Montreal: R. M. Bucke Memorial Society, 1968), pp. 35–54Google Scholar.

^{page 362 note 1} See p. 366, n. 2.

^{page 366 note 1} We were told of a few women who, informants said, had n/um; however, their role is not highly developed in the culture, and they do not cure.

^{page 366 note 2} Professor England's excellent and extraordinary work, Music among the Zũʼ/ʼwã-si of South West Africa and Botswana (in press), is a very welcome contribution to Bushman studies, as is his article, ‘Bushman Counterpoint ’, Journal of the International Folk Music Council, vol. xix, 1967. Professor England was a member of the Marshall Expeditions in 1957–8, 1959, and 1961.

^{page 366 note 3} The name that I have spelled /Ti!kay is spelled /Ki!kei by Professor England; N!ani here is Ŋ!ani in England's book; Kubi is K”abi; ≠ Toma is ≠ Koma; and Gao Medicine is K”ao Feet.

^{page 366 note 4} For this item of information about the great god, and for the image of //Gauwa as covered with yellow hairs, see Lorna Marshall, ‘!Kung Bushman Religious Beliefs ’, Africa, xxxii, 3, 1962, pp. 236, 240–1.

^{page 367 note 1} This list of thirteen songs does not purport to be a complete list of all the medicine songs in the Nyae Nyae area. People spoke of other songs which they had heard sung by other groups, but we had no opportunity to record them.

^{page 369 note 1} We have heard of men occasionally performing the curing rite over each other before setting out to hunt. It is definitely not an expressed purpose of the medicine dance as a whole or of the curing rite in particular to influence the hunt, but, on these occasions, in some way which remained obscure, the men sought to increase their prowess by performing the curing rite. This was by no means a general practice.

^{page 372 note 1} Koa was the word she used. It means ‘to be afraid of’, as one is afraid of a lion; and it also means ‘to respect and avoid ’. A woman ‘fears ’ her mother-in-law, the !Kung say, and avoids speaking to her—i.e. ‘fears ’ to speak to her.

^{page 372 note 2} The !Kung know about dagga, but say they do not have any. We saw no indication of their using it at dances or anywhere else, and I can state with assurance that it is not a significant element in their culture. I am grateful to Robert Story for the information he has given me about it in personal communication. Dagga is the Hottentot word for Cannabis sativa, from which hashish and marijuana are made. The !Kung say that dagga grows far away, somewhere in Botswana, not in their area. Story confirms their statement that it does not grow in the Gautscha area.

^{page 374 note 1} Fighting is rare among the !Kung. They say it is dangerous: someone might get hurt. It is indeed dangerous, with quantities of deadly poisoned arrows within anyone's reach. People do their best to cool each other's flares of temper.

^{page 375 note 1} I derive this phrase from the definition of trance given by Bateson, Gregory and Mead, Margaret in Balinese Character (New York: Special Publications of the New York Academy of Sciences, vol. ii, 1942), p. 4Google Scholar: ‘Trance is … an interval of extremely narrow concentration.’ Balinese trance, as it is described, is quite similar to Bushman trance. Gill, Merton M. and Brenman, Margaret, in Hypnosis and Related States (Austen Riggs Center Monograph No. 2; New York: International Universities Press, 1959)Google Scholar, discuss the Balinese trance as one of the ‘related states ’ of the title. Gill and Brenman (p. 300) quote Bateson and Mead (p. 35), apparently with approval: ‘The trance itself approximates closely to the phenomenon of hypnosis, and comparison of our trance films and records … with materials on hypnotic subjects in this country, has revealed no discrepancies, except for the substitution of a formalized situation for the hypnotist.’

^{page 376 note 1} A common profanity heard in the everyday speech of !Kung men is nuwa a n!u, skin back your penis (n!u)’. ‘Die ’, added to the above—-! kei, nuwa a n!u—makes a more emphatic variant. Men may insult someone by calling him ‘big penis ’, or ‘hyaena-’ or ‘elephant- ’ or ‘lion-penis ’. ‘Uncovered penis ’ means circumcised. The !Kung do not circumcise, but they know that the Bantu do. The idea to them is so ridiculous that they howl and roll on the ground with laughter when they talk about it. To call a man an ‘uncovered penis ’ is an insult which is serious, not merely a friendly joke. Mi ≠ xara a, ‘I peel you ’, is another insult which refers to circumcision. ‘Thrown-away penis ’ jokingly threatens mutilation. The phrase is accompanied by a gesture of cutting and throwing (the right hand makes the gesture of throwing over the right shoulder). Excrement is another subject for !Kung profanity: ‘You will shit (zz)’ is a common insult; ‘filthy face ’ is another, meaning a face covered with faeces. The medicine men might shout any of the above profanities at //Gauwa and the //gauwa-si.

^{page 378 note 1} It is the n/ that ≠ Gao N!a converts into a //gauwa, a ‘spirit of the dead ’ (see p. 350).

^{page 379 note 1} ‘Voodoo Death ’, American Anthropologist, n.s., vol. xliv, 1942.