The Elephant Who Made the Valleys

In the beginning, the land was flat and there were no rivers. The animals were always thirsty. The Great Elephant, the first of his kind, was so enormous that when he walked, his feet sank deep into the earth. One day, Unkulunkulu, the creator, called the Elephant and said, "The people and the animals are thirsty. You must make a path for the water." The Elephant obeyed. He began to walk from the high mountains of the Drakensberg all the way to the great sea. His immense weight carved a deep, winding path into the flat land. All the other animals followed him. When he reached the ocean, the water flowed back into the great track he had made, and it became the Tugela River. The smaller paths he made became the valleys and streams. This is why elephants are considered sacred—they are the engineers of the landscape, the ones who carved the very valleys and riverbeds that give life to the land of the Zulu people.