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ARTICLE

Copyright 2004 SAGE Publications (www.sagepublications.com)

ISSN 1469-6053 Vol 4(2): 181199 DOI: 10.1177/1469605304041074

Cultured representation
Understanding formlings, an enigmatic motif in the rock-art
of Zimbabwe
SIYAKHA MGUNI
Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

ABSTRACT
A rock-painting panel in the Matopo Hills, Zimbabwe, illustrates the
distinctive features of the formling motif, a striking peculiarity of
Zimbabwean San (Bushman) rock-art. The debate regarding the
derivation and meaning of this motif has proceeded unabated until
very recently. The motif has been interpreted variously as depicting
natural and cultural material phenomena. In contrast to previous
interpretations, this paper advocates an approach that considers San
art imagery as cultured representations, which is a notion that foregrounds the understanding of San image-making principles, the San
world-view and the concomitant knowledge system of beliefs. Finally,
the paper provides a precise definition of the features of formlings
that can be tied in with a particular subject.
KEYWORDS
abstraction cultured formling Matopo Hills picturing purpose
representation

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Figure 1 A map of southern African showing places mentioned in the paper,

the circled areas show distributions of regional rock-art concentrations and,
for Zimbabwe, the triangles show the environs where formling sites are
located (prepared by Wendy Phillips)

THE FORMLING MOTIF

From the Matopo Hills, Zimbabwe (map in Figure 1), I preface my
discussion with a description of a panel (Figure 2), in which the main
element is a formling, as an illustration of the complexity of these motifs.
It also serves to demonstrate why it is essential to analyse their contextual
parameters in order to understand the symbolic significance of their associations. For years this panel was neglected, while another, less elaborate,
panel (Figure 3) about 60 metres to the right in the same shelter was repeatedly reinterpreted (Garlake, 1995). Yet, the first formling carries more
information through its particular complexity.
The motif comprises 14 vertical cores. The midsections of most cores are
darker and they merge with one another in parts, while at the top and
bottom they have clearly distinct interstices. Around the cores is a thick

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Figure 2 An intriguing panel showing a central form enmeshed with a

range of powerful animals, partial human figures and arboreal motifs (traced
and redrawn by S. Mguni, J. Lewin and R. Pickering)
outline, on the bottom right edge of which emerges a plant form with multifurcating shoots. This association of arboreal forms with formlings is
repeated at many other sites. On the left of the formling, a leafless tree,
with two giraffe (Giraffa Camelopardalis) underneath, is painted on a
horizontal line or ground level that connects to the formling. Next to the
two giraffe, two vertical funicular lines extend above and below the ground
level line. Another partially faded line continues from outside the formling
and terminates near the middle of the cores.
A finely detailed polychrome giraffe with retiform marks is superimposed
on this formling. Kudu cows (Tragelaphus stepsiceros), identifiable by their
elongated slender necks and large ears, are below and within the motif. A
little below the formling is a tsessebe (Damaliscus lunatus). A partially faded
line descends from the formling and then goes behind the leg of one kudu
cow and a partial human figure to link with the tsessebe. Superimposed over
the right side is a multiple-legged blue wildebeest (Connochaetes taurinus)
and under its forelegs are 20 oval flecks. A final notable feature on the panel
is a partial, large and turgid zoomorphic outline image and hippo-shaped
which superimposes the formling.
What does this panel represent and how does one begin to understand
its symbolic significance? I consider, first, the earlier views about the formling motif and, second, I explore a new approach to understanding them.
This paper, focusing on an enigmatic motif in San rock-art, develops a
way to approach this motif through, first, understanding the general San

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Figure 3 In the same shelter as Figure 2 is this formling, comprising 13

near-vertical cores, oval-shaped flecks, animals and three human figures with
their equipment, and a possible transformed figure in the middle of the flecks
(traced and redrawn by S. Mguni)
image-making principles, and second, analysing its formal attributes in
order to tie it to a particular subject. Formlings are a peculiarity of
Zimbabwean rock-art and the Matopo Hills (Cooke, 1969; Hall, 1911;
Tredgold, 1968) abounds with fine examples. In the whole of Zimbabwe
they are estimated to number several thousand (Garlake, 1990: 17; Walker,
1996: 32, 60). From a casual judgement based on their visual dominance
and elaborateness, formlings appear to have been a significant motif for the
Zimbabwean San artists (Walker, 1987, 1996). Formlings are rare outside
Zimbabwe (Cooke, 1969; Frobenius, 1930; 1931; Garlake, 1995; Goodall,
1959; Walker, 1996; Willcox, 1984). They occur in low frequency in northern
South Africa (Hampson et al., 2002; Mguni, 2002) and in western Namibia
(Lenssen-Erz and Erz, 2000; Mason, 1958: 35768; Pager, 1989), seldom if
ever in other areas. Although formlings have pervaded the literature as a
subject, uncertainty has lingered as regards their interpretation.

PREVIOUS FORMLING INTERPRETATIONS

Uncertainty begins at the level of definition as, regrettably, the term
formling has for many writers become synonymous with any nebulous

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form. Understanding what formlings depict has been a vexed issue from the
time they were first published. Some formling interpretations were topographical in nature. Richard Hall (1912), the first writer to recognize this
as a distinctive motif, also proffered the first interpretation of a formling in
Matopo, which he said depicted the Victoria Falls. Later other writers
argued that formlings represented granite boulders (Breuil, 1944, 1966;
Cooke, 1969; Frobenius, 1929, 1930, 1931; Goodall, 1959; Lee and
Woodhouse, 1970; Mason, 1958). Many writers in the first phase of rockart research approached formlings with preconceived, often erroneous,
ideas about San art and culture. As we shall see, the formling motif is far
too complex to be explained in these terms.
Apart from landscapes, formlings were also said to be the kings monuments and pietas that decorated ancient tombs (Frobenius, 1931) or ceremonies for the dead royals (Cripps, 1941; Goodall, 1959). These views,
based on dubious ethno-history (Taylor, 1927), were inherently flawed.
First, the burials in question were not contemporary with the art (Garlake,
1992: 58; Walker, 1996: 64); second, the Shona made these comparatively
recent burials, whereas the San made the art.
Formlings were also said to represent cultural and natural phenomena:
animal skin karosses (Goodwin, 1946), villages or mud huts (Rudner and
Rudner, 1970), cornfields, quivers, mats, xylophones (Cooke, 1969), grain
bins (Holm, 1957), and beehives (Cooke, 1959; Crane, 1982; Woodhouse,
1982). Others inferred thunderclouds (Rudner and Rudner, 1970) or,
specifically, strato-cumulus clouds (Lee and Woodhouse, 1970) and water
pools or rainwater (Breuil, 1966). These interpretations, guided by the
writers own perceptions, were based on weak resemblances between
specific motifs and what they were asserted to depict.
All this was consistent with understanding San art in terms of the
physical world those San communities inhabited. Because formlings did not
seem closely to resemble physical subjects like the kudu and giraffe depictions they did not make much sense to most researchers. They were thus
considered as representations of unrecognized subjects, or perhaps abstract
images. By contrast, the revelatory developments in San rock-art studies
that began with the work of Patricia Vinnicombe (1976) and David LewisWilliams (1981a) led us instead to learn from San ethnography, to expect
across the art representations that go beyond physical subjects of the
physical world, and specifically to take notice of San notions of supernatural
potency (Garlake, 1995).
Notions of supernatural potency from San ethnography allowed the
identification of honey-gathering practices in rock-art (Guy, 1972; Pager,
1971, 1973) and placed this view within San life and belief. Thomas
Huffman (1983: 501) links some formlings with bees, particularly the idea
that San people are able to acquire the potency of the bees. This view that
some motifs depict honey-gathering activities is indeed plausible, especially

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in the Drakensberg region of South Africa, where the imagery explained

in this way bears close correspondence with bees nests and honeycombs
(Lewis-Williams, 1983: 6). These motifs, however, fall outside the formling
category found across Zimbabwe. By contrast to the view that formlings in
Figures 3 and 4D depict honey-gathering activities, a closer examination of
their characteristic features that I describe subsequently and their contexts,
reveals that they derive from a different model.
Another explanation is that formlings represent the gebesi a Ju/hoan
(formerly !Kung San) word for the human abdomen and specifically the
liver and spleen (Garlake, 1995: 96) as the fountain of potency. Garlake
(1990: 19) argues further that formlings could even be dancers or trancers
themselves. This interpretation draws from the association of one impressive panel depicting a human figure with a formling core superimposed
around its abdomen. Close by is another less elaborate figure that has
similar, but elongated ovals attached to its body. This interpretation is
plausible considering that the Ju/hoansi say that potency in people resides
in the stomach. A common feature of San religious revelations and their
art is an idiosyncratic element and this remarkable and most unusual image
may not reliably be taken as a guide to understanding the whole broad class
of the formling motif.
Another view elevates the former literalist landscape interpretation to
a metaphorical level: some formlings are interpreted as metaphorical
maps (Smith, 1994) of transcendental journeys made by San trancers. In
this explanation, trance and supernatural potency are regarded as crucial
in the understanding of these motifs. By comparison to earlier interpretations, this view, like the gebesi explanation (Garlake, 1990, 1995),
correctly places the formling motif within a category of San religious life,
thought and belief.
While these new explanations have usefully advanced this study heuristically, several aspects of the formling motif remain unexplained. Even so,
the broader project from which this paper derives, has incorporated these
new ideas concerning the association of formlings and supernatural
potency. Apart from the suggestive associated images in the painted
contexts of formlings it is essential that the primary model of formlings be
ascertained in the same way that we strive for correct species identification
in the animal images before searching for their true significance in San
thought and belief. Until we have identified precisely the formling subject
matter, the aspects of San ethnography we may turn to may not be the right
ones. Evidently, the lack of fulfilment of this point in previous formling
interpretations has led to the idea that the subject matter of these motifs
is beyond precise diagnosis, which takes them into a quasi-abstract
category.

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CULTURED REPRESENTATION
The issue of whether or not there is an abstract element in San art requires
close consideration. The Western art tradition, on which so many of our
notions about non-Western art silently depend, has long and usefully
worked with notions of realism and abstraction. But the relevance of these
notions to the study of San rock-art is dubious for several reasons. On the
one hand, realism or mimesis is to be judged by the closeness of match
between the image and the physical form of the thing depicted, in an
approach finally realizing perfection in photographic realism (and then in
its painterly derivative, painted hyper-realism). Abstraction, on the other
hand, deals with other things, especially those entities that lack recognizable physical forms.
This is not a good starting-point from which to approach San rock-art, for
the art was not depictive in the sense of striving to produce accurate (in the
sense of quasi-photographic realism) representations of natural subjects. Nor
was it abstract, in the sense of making images of things which did not exist.
Instead, San rock-art can better be understood in its own terms as a
cultured representation of the San world as the San people knew it to be.
Eland, as is well known, are over-represented in San art of the southeastern mountains (the Malutis and Drakensberg) and the Cederberg mountains
of South Africa (Map 1), and they are oversized in relation to other animals,
and the heavy shoulders and swaying dewlaps of the eland bulls are exaggerated. But only over-represented and oversized and exaggerated from
that viewpoint of photographic realism; and certainly not abstract either.
The art in a cultured system works by a set of principles, which express
cultural judgements and priorities in what the art does and does not represent, and in how it chooses to represent various things. And the principles
of San art, like those of all other art traditions, are coherent with other traits
in the larger San cultural world. There is thus a systematics of San rock-art,
archaeologically evident to us in the material images we see and of which
the logic of the formlings is part and which will be consistent with the larger
pattern of San society and the San experience. Hence, the imperative of an
insiders understanding of the conventions implied (Parkington, 1989: 16),
in various ways they depicted their subjects. Working from this fundamental
is the starting point for the search of the significance(s) of difficult San art
depictions.

A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO THE OLD PROBLEM

Difficult depictions in San art, such as the formlings, can only be understood through sensitivity to the San experience of the physical world. As

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a corollary, ascertaining the identity of formling subject matter must

necessarily proceed from, first, a reconsideration of how San artists made
their images and their governing principles and, secondly, an analysis of
formal attributes of formlings and their painted contexts. The principal
methodological problem in interpreting formlings concerns what they
depict. Formerly, writers erroneously approached San art with the belief
that it conveys its subject matter on a one-to-one basis and in a readily
recognizable and apprehensible manner. If an image seemed to lack a
recognizable subject, it was designated non-realistic or abstract (Mason,
1958). For San art and for rock-art in general we do not have a reliable
category that can be defined as abstract. All we have are, first, a category
of images for which we think we can recognize the subjects and, second, a
residual category we do not recognize.
Recognizing formlings is confounded by this problem of allowing
abstraction in San art. Hence, there has been a search for superficial resemblances between formlings and a range of subjects without an understanding of a compendium of features characteristic of this motif. Resemblance
or mimesis was not a necessary condition for representation in San art.
Symbolism lay neither with the naturalism of a depiction nor with its
aesthetic quality, although the beauty and naturalism of much San art is
beyond dispute. As others have argued for San art, a consideration of
content and composition can help us understand the intention of the artist
(Parkington, 1989: 16). Therefore, a useful approach to this art, specifically
for those images with subjects that appear to be intractable and unrecognizable, will begin with sensitive understanding of San image-making principles and the purpose(s) of the art.
Complexity is the hallmark of this art and it is partly a result of the fact
that subject matter in San art may be non-physical as much as it may be
physical. This is expected, because the visions of the spirit world seen by
San trancers and which inform the rock-art, just like our dreams, are often
derived from every-day experiences. Some motifs, however, such as the socalled infibulation (Breuil, 1948; Willcox, 1978; also known as penis
emblem (Garlake, 1995: 4950) or penis additament (Walker, 1996: 89;
Willcox, 1978)) lack material correlates. It is not useful to regard this motif
as abstract because, to the San, it may have been a straightforward depiction of a metaphysically informed subject, as real as eland depictions.
Another example is a motif often called the thin red line, which may
also to the outsider look abstract. This motif is so-called because it is usually
painted in red pigment, with a thickness of not more than 5 mm, and it is
often fringed with minute white dots, usually 2 mm in diameter. This line
motif appears in various contexts linking different images across painted
panels and in some cases it seems to be emerging and entering crevices and
nooks in the painted rock surfaces. As we shall see, with a careful consideration of this motif in the light of the notion of cultured representation

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within the San worldview, it begins to make sense. Previous abstracted or

odd elements in San rock-art, similarly approached with regard to the San
knowledge system antelope-headed human figures, trance buck and other
similar images become understood. Formlings are the last big San rockart category that looks, and has largely been treated as, abstract. Infibulation is perhaps another remaining class waiting to be unpacked. San art is
an integrated tradition, both internally consistent and necessarily congruent with the experience and worldview it derives from. Now that other
abstract-looking elements have been made non-abstract sense of in
relation to San knowledge, it is even less probable that formlings are in any
way abstract.
To avoid placing foreign values and judgements upon San art and to
perceive the subject of formlings I highlight, first, a general problem
encountered in making and apprehending images; that is, the complexity
of transforming a subject with volume into a 2-dimensional shape of its
picture. This process is necessarily reductive, as some features of the subject
must be lost in its image. Artists choose what information to retain and
what to lose. Different cultures deal with this problem in various ways.
However, depiction also allows the addition or emphasis of features. In San
art, usually small but significant subjects can be made bigger, while
powerful things can be omitted or dealt with in a special way. Importantly,
as is equally true for all other rock-art traditions, the process of making
depictions is dictated by the purpose(s) (Smith, 1998: 213) that the San
artists intended to achieve, all operating within an understood framework
of conventions.
These conventions or picturing norms can be defined as the principles
governing the logical choices that artists make in turning a real subject into
a picture. With the understood metaphoric intent of San art, depictions
were often contorted in various ways or painted in odd ways to emphasize significant aspects in known subjects with symbolic value. Eland depictions, for instance, usually have grossly exaggerated dewlaps. Although the
dewlap is a distinctive feature of eland, it was also important to the San due
to the large amounts of fat that it contains. In San thought, fat is a powerful
substance imbued with supernatural potency. The dewlap also connoted the
anomalous nature of eland relating to this antelopes sexual ambivalence
(Dowson, 1988: 1224): eland are the only antelope where bulls have more
fat than cows (Lewis-Williams, 1981a: 72). The big dewlap is indeed exaggerated in terms of the principles of a quasi-photographic realism; when
glimpsed in a manner that is more sympathetic to a San world-view, these
dewlaps are instead of fitting true size.
In San rock-art animals are not only depicted statically in lateral- or
front- or end-views, for the symbolism in the imagery lay in emphasizing
specific features of significance. Often, in the southeastern mountains of
South Africa, these features relate to the dying metaphor of trance the

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lowered head, crossed legs, extended hind leg, lifted tail, defecation, exudations from the snout (Dowson, 1988; Lewis-Williams, 1981a). Ethological
studies illuminate various aspects of animal behaviour that lead us to
specific areas of San life, beliefs and rituals; those animal behavioural traits
are again congruent with the San cognitive system and the artistic conventions.
The embellishment and exaggeration of features in San art often went
beyond the essential identifying traits of particular species. Consider the
use of colour in the paintings of kudu cows in some parts of southern
Zimbabwe and northern South Africa (Figure 1), where the inner parts of
their ears and the genital areas were accentuated in red pigment. In reality,
the vulvas of kudu cows do become slightly swollen and acquire a reddish
tinge during oestrus (Eastwood and Cnoops, 1999: 114). The artists here
went beyond conventionalized depictions the large rhombic ears and
elongated necks for cows, the twisted horns and thickset necks attended by
exaggerated manes for bulls to use colour in emphasizing aspects of kudu
symbolism. This kudu symbolism concerns a unified complex of beliefs and
female gender concepts about fertility and marriageability among the San
hunter-gatherers of the Shashe-Limpopo area of Zimbabwe and South
Africa.
The manner in which images are embellished shows that the repertoire
of San artistic skills was not restricted to reproducing typical views or
photo-perfect naturalism in depictions. Artists embellished their depictions
using salient subject features that would not normally be visible from the
plane of observation used in the rest of the picture; in some cases these
features were non-physical in character. The common thin red line motif
alluded to is now understood to depict San beliefs about threads of light
and shamanic journeys (Lewis-Williams et al., 2000: 131). This line motif is
embellished with white dots on the edges, probably to capture the essence
of the non-physical, but neurologically generated, entoptic phenomena of
endless chains of brilliant white dots (Lewis-Williams et al., 2000: 133) that
are integral to these, ethnographically reported, worldwide shamanic
preternatural pathways. As for rock-art imagery, more examples of San
ways of depicting difficult subject matter can be drawn, but I now return to
formlings with a caution against guessing at their subject based on an
outsider world-view and expectations of how representations should look.
The dictum cannot be overstated that San art is not necessarily mimetic
in intent and that the picturing purpose is rarely as simple as a desire for
mere iconic representation. If one acknowledges the fundamental
metaphoric intent of San art, one realizes how complex San image-making
was. It is true that side-on and top-down animal viewpoints are dominant
in most rock-art traditions of pre-literate societies including the San,
because they convey the most typical views of the subjects (Deregowski,
1995). But not always: these often-encountered planes can be said to be

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normal (Clegg, 1987; Smith, 1998), but not universal. Usually it was not
the general appearance or body shape that was key to recognizing a
depicted subject, but certain species-specific traits which are emphasized
(Smith, 1998: 215, citing Lewis, 1986). Immediate subject matter is sometimes deliberately disguised in depictions (Smith, 1998: 215). To illustrate
this point, consider Chewa Nyau or Chinamwali rock-art traditions of
eastern Zambia and some parts of Malawi, where, for particular purposes,
subject recognition is not desired. Encoded messages are esoteric and the
art is designed so that the uninitiated or outsiders cannot read the depicted
imagery (Smith, 2001). Therefore, the picturing purpose, itself operating
within an understood cultural framework of conventions, allows symbolic
aspects of the subject matter to be highlighted or hidden.
San rock-art should be approached with this caution as its imagery
served various purposes. The artists wish to communicate symbolism influenced their choices of viewpoints of specific traits in selected natural models
for depiction. It is in these choices that the significance of formlings is found.
Mindful of the complexity of the relationship between the shape of the
subject and the shape of the depicted image, even the way an image is
oriented can make it hard for outsiders to recognize the depicted subject
matter (Chippindale, 2001: 261). What do formlings depict? In depicting
that subject, which traits were chosen and from which viewpoint or orientation? Within the scope of this paper, I focus on the definition of observable traits of formlings, which, in a formal analysis, require to be tied in
with a particular natural subject. Defining the formling motif is fundamental in the understanding of the subject that we are dealing with.

DEFINING FEATURES OF FORMLINGS

The definition of the formal attributes of formlings has previously been
tackled at a superficial level. In the full study (Mguni, 2002), from which
this paper derives, I have covered comprehensively the compendium of
formling features, their typical shapes and embellishments in order to
clarify their definitive variables. In contrast to most San depictions, formlings depict their subject deviously. Even the term formling is not
self-explanatory. Coined originally by Leo Frobenius (1931), the EnglishGerman word formlinge is a nominalization of the English word form
using regular German grammar (Lenssen-Erz, 2000, pers. comm.) to
describe a specific range of composite motifs based on certain distinctive
features, to which I turn shortly. While the word form is abstract, the suffix
-ling(e) means a thing or object with a shape that is hard to specify.
Because of their complexity and diversity, formlings were considered
difficult to define, but, as will be clear now, a precise definition is a

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Figure 4 This diagram illustrates four examples of formlings: (A) This

formling comprises five prominent crenellations at the top end and contains a
combination of dot and fleck motifs placed on the vertical cores with
elongated caps (redrawn from Garlake, 1995: Fig. 102). (B) A similar motif
showing a more rounded outline than the first one comprises five vertical
cores with elongated caps, two crenellations (and a possible tapering orifice at
the top) and dot motifs (redrawn from Garlake, 1995: Fig. 103). (C) This
formling comprises five horizontal cores without caps, seven crenellations, an
oval outline and a faded orifice with a human figure approaching it from
outside and an ethereal long-tailed figure in the interior (redrawn from
Garlake, 1995: Fig. 33). (D) This formling is composed in a similar way to motif
C but has six horizontal cores with light coloured caps on the middle ones,
then dot motifs on these caps, an oval-shaped outline, and oval-shaped flecks
around this outline.The outline has an orifice out of which issues oval flecks
that transform into forms that have appendages, then swirl next to a human
figure holding an object in what was formerly interpreted as a honey gatherer
smoking bees out of their nest (Pager copy in the RARI archives)
prerequisite in the study of their derivation and significance. Variability is
a feature of formlings, and indeed of all other classes in San art imagery,
but within the variability of the formling motif abounds elements of unity
and constancy. Here I define the motif under two headings, shape and
embellishment, and I subsequently deal with each in turn.

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Shape and embellishment are essential variables that can enable the
identification of depicted subjects in San (and indeed any other) rock-art
tradition. Among various observable characteristics in depictions, shape is
primary; we recognize subjects from their distinctive shapes. Yet, it is the
knowledge of the artistic conventions of a particular culture that helps us
discern these shapes. How shapes are decorated or embellished may also
be crucial; the considerable selectivity in what is depicted and what is
chosen to be depicted and embellished, what is left out or undermined may
hold the key to our recognition of the paintings significance and purpose.
There are nine defining features of formlings which place this motif in
its proper imagery category in southern African San rock-art. I deal with
shape first and end with embellishment or decoration.

Shape
The overall shapes of formlings range from oval, circular to oblong forms,
sometimes inferable more from the arrangement of the features than by
outlines (Figure 2). Although varying in size and colour, formlings have
discrete cores as their basic building blocks. These cores are usually
oblong or elliptical (sometimes oval) depending on type, with the longitudinal sides nearly parallel. Cores rarely occur singularly, but are often
found in clusters of up to ten cores, or more, per single formling. Cores are
executed as sets, placed in a line vertically, side-by-side, or stacked horizontally, one above the other (Figures 2 and 3). Formlings are therefore,
by definition, composite type of forms (Goodall, 1959: 62) comprising
stacks or sets of cores. This is the sense in which the term formling was
originally intended. A single core cannot be a formling; it is only a part or
unit thereof in isolation.
Very often, sets or stacks of cores are separated by narrow spaces or
interstices in between. Although cores are kept distinct, sometimes they are
joined in a single pigment wash. This merging of cores may result from
fading that blurs their edges or pigments washing into each other. Yet, some
regional variants lack interstices, with the bases of cores clearly merged,
but becoming distinct as they rise to give a villiform appearance (i.e. their
shapes resemble the forms such as in the mammalian intestinal villi) (for
an illustration of this formling variation, see Mguni, 2002).
Formlings often have outlines comprising a single line, occasionally
multiple lines, defining formling shapes as outlines enclosing interior
features, such as the cores and interstices (Figure 4). Some motifs have
weathered outlines or the outlines were never painted at all, but their
interior cores remain curved or tucked in a similar manner to the ones with
outlines. Formlings tend to be symmetrical in structure. Formling variability falls within this limited range of shapes, and these basic forms remain
consistent in all areas (Garlake, 1995: 92). A motif may carry most or all of

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these features, but usually only a few are selected and depicted. Sometimes
the lack of some features could be due to poor preservation in most sites
exposed to weathering.

Embellishment
These basic formling shapes and their other features are embellished in
particular recognizable ways. Formling outlines occasionally have single
orifices or openings projecting outwards. These distinctive orifices can
protrude in the manner of a nozzle or the spout of a teapot. The outer edges
of formling outlines are sometimes decorated with triangular or linear
spiked crenellations (Figure 4). These crenellations may occur all around
the outlines, or only at the tops of cores or at the base of formlings; they
are not depicted at all in some cases.
Very common is the interior embellishment of formling cores comprising grids or lines of regularly spaced microdots (Figures 3 and 4). These are
usually standardized in size and are often painted in white; they also occur
in dark red, particularly where the background cores are of a lighter
pigment. Microdots in South Africa are found with the thin red line motif
(Lewis-Williams, 1981b; Lewis-Williams et al., 2000), therianthropes,
human figures, trance buck, animals, and also some types of geometrics
(Dowson, 1989). Similar to but different from microdots are flecks (short
strokes), which also occur with formlings. Flecks found with formlings are
of two types. The usual form is based on short strokes or dashes of pigment.
Unlike the microdots, these flecks are irregularly placed on formlings,
usually covering wider areas beyond the cores. This type also occurs with
a range of other subjects. The other kind of fleck is oval-shaped, often clustering on parts of or around the periphery of formlings (Figures 24). This
fleck type is occasionally executed as a trident motif or winged form. Ovalshaped flecks, stroke-flecks and microdots are allied in formling contexts.
In contrast to early writings where flecks and microdots are grouped as one
category, I argue that they are forms, which depict different things.
Formling cores often appear as domed or rounded in their extremities
because of the semicircular, and occasionally elongated, caps at their ends
(Figure 4; Garlake, 1987a: 23; see also Garlake, 1995, for what he describes
as cusps of ovals). These caps also appear in the same monochromatic
pigments as the rest of the cores. Occasional rectangular shapes result from
the fading of these caps leaving the nearly parallel-sided middle parts. Semicircular caps or cusps are also repeated in a series placed on top of formlings.
Although formlings may not have all these decorative features, some
elements such as microdots are almost invariably present. Their consistency is evidence that formlings are a distinct imagery category. Precise
formling shapes and embellishments vary, but variation is a hallmark of San

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rock-art; even animals are painted differently in different areas although

their defining features remain constant. The underlying emphasis of this
comprehensive description of formlings is that, undoubtedly, this is a
coherent image category. It is now possible to turn to the question of their
origin, what they represent.
If we accept, as I argue we must, that formlings have a primary model,
which is a physical constant from which they originate, then this subject
matter must be precisely demonstrated and not merely asserted. The
various features of formlings that I have outlined their overall
oval/circular shapes, outlines themselves, internal cores, interstices, orifices,
microdots, flecks and crenellations are distinctive and they need all to be
accounted for in terms of their derivation. In probing their origin different
possibilities must be considered and, through elimination, discover the
subject that replicates closely the specified morphology of formlings. San
depictions contain symbolism that derives from natural creatures or
physical objects acting as their models (Mguni, 2002). Likewise, conflated
elements in the depictions of fantastic creatures such as trance-buck, therianthropes (part-human/part-animal figures) and rain animals derive from
physical phenomena. Similarly, we should expect formlings, as elements of
the same San rock-art tradition, to follow just this pattern.
An examination of formlings reveals that their features are not
consistent with the previously suggested subjects rocks, waterfalls, clouds,
rain pools, corn fields and skin karosses. In these former views, there has
been insufficient attempt to demonstrate the precise areas of correspondence between the formling motif and the various phenomena they were
asserted to depict. By contrast, the broader component of this study
explored possible subjects and consequently demonstrated feature-byfeature those areas of correspondence between formlings and their primary
model (Mguni, in preparation). Formlings indeed possessed a natural
biological model that informed their richly nuanced symbolism. But, what
if the artists chose to depict an aspect of this subject which is not usually
visible in ordinary circumstances, so it does not signal its natural cognate
to an uninformed viewer as, say, an antelope in clear side profile does?
Perhaps we have difficulty in recognizing formlings because their depiction
drew attention to an unfamiliar view of the subject, itself projected in a
devious orientation. Importantly, formling depictions were conditioned less
by the desire to produce facsimile copies of the subject than by the wish to
capture those often hidden elements of the subject that had deeper
symbolic meanings. My approach to the study of formlings takes heed of
this caution in exploring, in practical terms, ways of perceiving and understanding these motifs. In a forthcoming paper, I explore specifically the
subject matter of formlings (Mguni, in preparation).

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CONCLUSION
In sum, the approach that I advocate here works with San rock-art imagery
as cultured representations, a notion that foregrounds the San artists
world-view and their system of beliefs. Within this framework, rock-art as
its integral part was guided largely by understood principles and rules that
dictated what was depicted and what was ignored according to the artists
intended purpose(s) and how graphic representation was executed. In
analysing the formling motif, one of the last categories that writers could
not make sense of and thus classified as abstract, I proffered a precise definition of their characteristic features that can, at any rate, be isolated and
tied in with a natural model displaying the same distinctive features.
Combined with an ethnographic analysis, this approach allows the probing
of associated San beliefs in order to penetrate formling symbolism. If the
formlings are consistent with the San world-view, other things in San rockart and the manners in which they are depicted, their elucidation should
necessarily begin with an understanding of the insiders cultural perspective.

Acknowledgements
The University of the Witwatersrand and in particular, the Rock Art Research Institute are gratefully thanked for their support and provision of resources and also the
RARI staff, particularly Professor David Lewis-Williams, Dr Benjamin Smith,
Geoffrey Blundell and Jeremy Hollmann, David Pearce and students who have
helped in various ways in this project. I thank The Swan Fund, Oxford University,
for their generosity in funding this research. I extend special thanks to Dr Christopher Chippindale who has helped in many respects throughout this project and am
also grateful to Dr Janette Deacon for her encouragement. Finally, I thank
Professor Lynn Meskell for encouraging the publication of this work.

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SIYAKHA MGUNI is Research Officer at the Rock Art Research Institute, South Africa, where he also completed an MA degree on the rockart of Zimbabwe. He did his honours degree at the University of Cape
Town, and his thesis applied Harris matrices in the analysis of superpositioning in the rock-art of the Western Cape. He is currently a PhD candidate at the University of the Witwatersrand.
[email: siyakha@rockart.wits.ac.za]

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