Until quite recently the African continent possessed not only the greatest concentration of wild animals in the world, but the greatest variety too. Sadly, those almost endless herds are now a thing of the past.
The interior of Africa was a place of mystery to all but a handful of adventurous (and often foolhardy) explorers, hunters and missionaries, until the early 1900s. The memoirs of men like Thomas Baines, David Livingstone, P. Courtney Selous and Jonathan Speake, tell us how rich and bountiful was the wildlife of such areas as the East African Plateau and the Karoo.
However, among them, the "gentlemen hunters," the Voortrekkers, the ivory hunters and eventually the farmers, started a slaughter so complete that in many areas of Africa the indigenous animals were exterminated.
Luckily, people have now come to recognize the richness and beauty of the few remaining wilderness areas, and much is being done to conserve them. The benefits of conservation are both financial and aesthetic-but it is future generations who pose the greatest threat to the remaining wildlife.
As Africa's population explodes at an alarming rate, people will require more food and therefore more land, which is a limited resource. Already game parks and sanctuaries are being eyed with envy by land-hungry people. Let us hope that we can develop the future without the destruction that has typified Africa's development in the past.
One of the legacies of Africa's erstwhile teeming wildlife is the wealth of folklore and mythology surrounding it. Indeed, the richness of the lore mirrors the richness of the wildlife. Many of the tales, although told by different tribes from region to region, are basically similar, and they remain a source of knowledge and enjoyment to us and to future generations.
This book attempts to illustrate to our ever-expanding urban population not only the folklore and mythology, but some of the more interesting facts about various animals of the African bush.
The tales of old need not be a thing of the past; the wildlife which inspired them, brought endearingly alive by these simple stories, is a part of Africa's heritage which should not be forgotten.
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