The Meaning and Mystery of Crocodiles

Their presence is recorded in the works of Herodotus, Shakespeare and many other classical writers. They have been part of Africa and African mythology since ancient times, but years ago crocodiles were mysteriously dying off in the rivers of South Africa’s Northern provinces in the area around the Kruger Park.  Some 120 carcasses were found and scientists were studying what is happening to the animals.  Many believe that the deaths of the crocodiles are linked to climate change.

I traveled to South Africa’s Limpopo Province to find out what it all means to the people who live alongside the crocodiles.

John Ngwenya sits on the ground outside his hut.  He wears a short black cloth.  It is an ancient ceremony,  and he pours a gourd of traditional sorghum beer and dribbles it onto a rock.  As the beer pours into the fissures of stone, John talks quietly to his ancestors, honouring them, requesting their blessings.

John’s surname, Ngwenya, means ‘crocodile’ and he and his family have revered the beast for centuries.  He can tell me the names of his ancestors going back for seven generations.  He stands up from the rock and drinks from the gourd, and spits the beer over a black goat tethered nearby.

‘That is to share the blessings with the goat, who is part of our family,’ he tells me.  ‘Our family is very proud of the crocodile.  It is clever, strong and does not like to attack unless it is attacked.’   He pauses when I ask him about the dying of the crocodiles in the nearby rivers.  ‘That makes us very unhappy,’ he says.  His family has a communal memory going back to the time of Shaka, the great Zulu king of the early nineteenth century.  ‘During the wars, when our family fled to this area, they prayed to the crocodiles when they crossed the rivers, and the crocodiles always let them pass safely.’

30 minutes drive away, however, on the banks of the Levhubu river, Emmalina Shuma hoes her fields.  Nearby we can see the patches of water and the long reeds where crocodiles live.  She rests on her hoe as she says.  ‘Crocodiles might be important to some people,’ she says, ‘ but to me they are just dangerous.  Only a few months ago, a little girl went swimming near here.  They hid her body under the water, and then somebody killed a crocodile and they found her arm and her shoe in its stomach.

John Hlengani is an ‘nyanga’ or traditional healer in the village of Josefa.  In the shadowed interior of his hut, he casts the bones onto a straw mat.  ‘Look,’ he tells me, pointing to the patterns the bones, seashells and dried nuts have made.  He picks a bone.  ‘There is a man,’ he says carefully.  Then he points to a shell.  ‘And a woman.  They are killing the crocodiles.’

‘But why?’ I ask.  He hesitates.  ‘The man is doing it for cruelty; the woman to protect her children.  They are putting poison in the river.  And the government must do something about it, before other animals start dying too.’

I contacted Paul Oberholster from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research in Pretoria.  ‘The catchment area for these rivers is heavily polluted with mining effluent and other nutrients which allow for cyano bacteria to grow.’

‘Cyano bacteria?’ I ask.

‘Yes,’ he tells me.  ‘The oldest form of life on earth.  They are part-plant; part-animal.’  He pauses.  ‘I never used to believe in global warming, but we are seeing so many cyanobacteria now, and it is because the water temperatures are rising.  They kill the fish and then the crocodiles die because they eat the rotten fish.’

That evening as the sun goes down, I find myself sitting around a fire with Daniel Shirinda and some of his 44 children.  He holds a walking stick with its head carved in the shape of an elephant.  Daniel or ‘MD’ as he is known, is a musician and storyteller.  In the flickering light, he begins to narrate a tale of a crocodile and a honey badger.  They were companions and gave each other fish and honey until one day their other friend the rabbit became jealous.

‘Go on,’ the children cry.  ‘Tell us more!’

“The honey badger hates you,” the rabbit told the crocodile, “and knows your weakness.  If he hits you on the nose, he will kill you.  So you must never go to the honey badger again.  The crocodile was very sad, and years later he met the honey badger at the river.  “But I never planned to kill you,” the honey badger said.

As I listen to his story it occurs to me that the crocodile exerts a powerful hold on human memory and imagination.  It has preyed on our species since before we began even to make tools or tell stories.  Its presence and its power repels and fascinates us at the same time.

MD leans forward on his stick, his eyes bright with the joy of the story.  ‘So,’ he tells his children, ‘what we learn from the crocodile is that we must always ask our friends for the truth.  And not believe the lies of others.’

Crocodiles have been on this earth for some 200 million years.  Now in this corner of Africa because of pollution and global warming caused by humans even their ancient existence is threatened.