Matsieng Footprints

Late Stone Age petroglyphs — human and animal footprints carved into sandstone — at a site sacred to the Batswana

The Matsieng rock carvings are about 15 km southwest of Mochudi, near the village of Rasesa. The site is well signposted from the A1 highway; a 2WD track leads the last kilometre to the boulders. The engravings cover several large sandstone surfaces: human and animal footprints of varying sizes, carved giraffes and other plains animals, and up to 170 individual images in total.

The site is one of four places considered by Batswana tradition to be a point of creation — where the first people emerged from the earth. It is treated with genuine respect by local communities and deserves the same from visitors. There are no facilities on site, no entrance fee, and no crowds. Go in the morning when the light is low and the carvings show up best.

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A story
According to Tswana tradition, Matsieng was one of the first ancestors of the Batswana people. One day he emerged from a hole in the rock followed by his animals and his people, and walked off across the wet earth to settle the surrounding lands. The footprints carved into the sandstone — some enormous, some ordinary human-sized — are held to be his tracks and those of the creatures that followed him. Archaeologists date the engravings to between 3,000 and 10,000 years ago, making them the work of the Late Stone Age San people who lived in this area long before the Tswana arrived.

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