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The Maasai are a Nilotic ethnic group inhabiting northern, central and southern Kenya and northern Tanzania. They are among the best known local populations internationally due to their residence near the many game parks of the African Great Lakes, and their distinctive customs and dress. The Maasai speak the Maa language, a member of the Nilotic language family that is related to the Dinka, Kalenjin and Nuer languages. Except for some elders living in rural areas, most Maasai people speak the official languages of Kenya and Tanzania, Swahili and English. The Maasai population has been reported as numbering 1,189,522 in Kenya in the 2019 census, compared to 377,089 in the 1989 census.
The Nilotic peoples are peoples indigenous to the Nile Valley who speak Nilotic languages. They inhabit South Sudan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, DR Congo, Rwanda and Tanzania. Among these are the Burun speaking peoples, Karo peoples, Luo peoples, Ateker peoples, Kalenjin peoples, Datooga, Dinka, Nuer, Atwot, Lotuko and the Maa-speaking peoples.
The Kalenjin are a group of Southern Nilotic peoples indigenous to East Africa, residing mainly in what was formerly the Rift Valley Province in Kenya. They number 6,358,113 individuals as per the Kenyan 2019 census. They are divided into 11 culturally and linguistically related tribes: Kipsigis, Nandi, Keiyo, Marakwet, Sabaot, Pokots, Tugen, Terik, Sengwer, Lembus, and Ogiek. They speak Kalenjin languages, which belong to the Nilotic language family.
The Abagusii is an East African ethnic group that largely originate from the Pre-Bantu Agropastoralist inhabitants of present-day Kenya particularly former Nyanza and Rift Valley provinces of Kenya. However, a minority of the Abagusii are believed to have been assimilated from the Olusuba speaking Suba people (Kenya) that are believed to have migrated from the West of Lake Victoria that is present-day Buganda and Busoga. The Abagusii are closely related to the Maasai, Kipsigis, Abakuria,and Ameru of Kenya. They also have close linguistic relationship with Ngurimi, Rangi, Mbugwe, Simbiti, Zanaki and Ikoma people. However, a lot of evidence from studies of East African Bantu languages and anthropology suggests that the Abagusii and the mentioned related tribes emerged from the Pre-Bantu Agropastoralists of East Africa believed to have come from the North of Mt. Elgon. The Abagusii traditionally/natively inhabit Kisii County and Nyamira County of former Nyanza Province of Kenya as well as parts of Kericho County and Bomet County of the former Rift Valley province of Kenya. The Abagusii are also found in other regions of geographical Western Kenya including former Nyanza Province such as Homa Bay County, and the rest of Luo-Nyanza as well as the rest of Kenya through recent migrations in post-colonial Kenya. There is also a significant diaspora population of Abagusii in countries such as United States, United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa among other countries within and outside Africa. The Abagusii speak Ekegusii language which is classified together with the Great Lakes Bantu languages. However, the inclusion of Abagusii in the Bantu language group is a subject of debate given that studies on East African Bantu languages have found the Ekegusii together with Kuria, Simbiti, Ngurimi, Rangi and Mbugwe languages to be far distinct from the typical Bantu in terms of structure and tense aspect. Mogusii is culturally identified as their founder and patriarch. The Abagusii are however, unrelated to the Kisi people of Malawi and the Kissi people of West Africa, other than the three very distinct communities having similar sounding tribal names. The traditional occupation of Abagusii in pre-colonial Kenya included hunting and gathering, pastoralism/herding and cereal, fruit (pumpkin) and root crop farming forms of Agriculture with pastoralism being the dominant occupation of Abagusii in pre-colonial Kenya. Today the Abagusii have adopted other forms of agriculture through interaction with the European colonists that introduced new crops and new cultivation methods to Gusiiland and Kenya as a whole with the same applying to the other African countries/communities. Some of these factors have ensured farming to be the most dominant economic activity among Abagusii as opposed to pre-colonial Kenya where they were pre-dominantly pastoralists and hunters and gatherers.
The Eastern Nilotic languages are one of the three primary branches of the Nilotic languages, themselves belonging to the Eastern Sudanic subfamily of Nilo-Saharan; they are believed to have begun to diverge about 3,000 years ago, and have spread southwards from an original home in Equatoria in South Sudan. They are spoken across a large area in East Africa, ranging from Equatoria to the highlands of Tanzania. Their speakers are mostly cattle herders living in semi-arid or arid plains.
The Southern Nilotic languages are spoken mainly in western Kenya and northern Tanzania. They form a division of the larger Nilotic language family, along with the Western Nilotic languages and the Eastern Nilotic languages.
The Kalenjin languages are a family of a dozen Southern Nilotic languages spoken in Kenya, eastern Uganda and northern Tanzania. The term Kalenjin comes from an expression meaning "I say " or "I have told you". Kalenjin in this broad linguistic sense should not be confused with Kalenjin as a term for the common identity the Nandi-speaking peoples of Kenya assumed halfway through the twentieth century; see Kalenjin people and Kalenjin language.
Pökoot is a language spoken in western Kenya and eastern Uganda by the Pokot people. Pökoot is classified to the northern branch of the Kalenjin languages found in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. The Pökoot are usually called "Kimukon" by the other Kalenjin peoples. A 1994 figure of SIL puts the total number of speakers at 264,000, while the only little more recent Schladt (1997:40) gives the more conservative estimate of 150,000 people, presumably based on the figures found in Rottland (1982:26) who puts the number at slightly more than 115,000.
Ogiek is a Southern Nilotic language of the Kalenjin family spoken or once spoken by the Ogiek peoples, scattered groups of hunter-gatherers in Southern Kenya and Northern Tanzania. Most if not all Ogiek speakers have assimilated to cultures of surrounding peoples: the Akiek in northern Tanzania now speak Maasai and the Akiek of Kinare, Kenya now speak Gikuyu. Ndorobo is a term considered derogatory, occasionally used to refer to various groups of hunter-gatherers in this area, including the Ogiek.
The Maa languages are a group of closely related Eastern Nilotic languages spoken in parts of Kenya and Tanzania by more than a million speakers. They are subdivided into North and South Maa. The Maa languages are related to the Lotuko languages spoken in South Sudan.
The Yaaku, are a people who are said to have lived in regions of southern Ethiopia and central Kenya, possibly through to the 18th century. The language they spoke is today called Yaakunte. The Yaaku assimilated a hunter-gathering population, whom they called Mukogodo, when they first settled in their place of origin and the Mukogodo adopted the Yaakunte language. However, the Yaaku were later assimilated by a food producing population and they lost their way of life. The Yaakunte language was kept alive for sometime by the Mukogodo who maintained their own hunter-gathering way of life, but they were later immersed in Maasai culture and adopted the Maa language and way of life. The Yaakunte language is today facing extinction but is undergoing a revival movement. In the present time, the terms Yaaku and Mukogodo, are used to refer to a population living in Mukogodo forest west of Mount Kenya.
Yaaku is an endangered Afroasiatic language spoken in Kenya. It is Cushitic, but its position within that family is unclear. Speakers are all older adults.
The Ilchamus, are a Maa-speaking people living south and southeast of Lake Baringo, Kenya. They numbered approximately 32,949 people in 2019 and are closely related to the Samburu living more to the north-east in the Rift Valley Province. They are one of the smallest ethnic groups in Kenya.
The Akie are a Tanzanian ethnic and linguistic people living in western Arusha Region. In 2000 the Akie population was counted at 5,268. The Akie, like other hunter-gatherer peoples in Kenya and Tanzania, are sometimes called by the derogatory and misleading term Dorobo or Wandorobo. The Akie were featured by Bruce Parry in the BBC series "Tribe".
The Okiek, sometimes called the Ogiek or Akiek, are a Southern Nilotic ethnic group native to Tanzania and Southern Kenya, and Western Kenya. In 2019 the ethnic Okiek population was 52,596, although the number of those speaking the Akiek language was as low as 500.
The Kalenjin people are an ethnolinguistic group mistaken to be a tribe in Kenya, though they are actually a collection of tribes indigenous to East Africa, with a presence, as dated by archaeology and linguistics, that goes back many centuries. Their history is therefore deeply interwoven with those of their neighboring communities and, most notably, with the Iraqw, who are known to them as Sirikwa, as well as with the histories of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, South Sudan, and Ethiopia.
Mutai is a term used by the Maa-speaking communities of Kenya to describe a period of wars, usually triggered by disease and/or drought affecting widespread areas of the Rift Valley region of Kenya. According to Samburu and Maasai tradition, two periods of Mutai occurred during the nineteenth century. The second Mutai lasted from the 1870s to the 1890s.
The Sirikwa culture was the predominant Kenyan hinterland culture of the Pastoral Iron Age, c.2000 BP. Seen to have developed out of the Elmenteitan culture of the East African Pastoral Neolithic c.3300-1200 BP, it was followed in much of its area by the Kalenjin, Maa, western and central Kenyan communities of the 18th and 19th centuries.
The Mukogodo, are a people who are said to have lived in regions of central Kenya around Mt. Kenya, possibly through to the 18th century. A community known as the Yaaku later moved into their territory and the Mukogodo, adopted the Yaaku language, referred to as Yaakunte. The Yaaku community was later assimilated by a food producing population and they lost their way of life. Their language, Yaakunte, was kept alive for some time by the Mukogodo who had all along maintained their own hunter-gathering way of life. However, the Mukogodo were later assimilated by the Maasai and adopted the Maa language. The Yaakunte language is today facing extinction but is undergoing a revival movement. In the present time, the terms Yaaku and Mukogodo, are used to refer to a population living in Mukogodo forest west of Mount Kenya.
References
- Distefano, John A. (1990) 'Hunters or hunted? Towards a history of the Okiek of Kenya', History in Africa, 17, 47–57.
- Hobley, C.W. (1903) 'Notes concerning the Eldorobo of Mau, British East Africa', Man, 3, 33-34 (with a 100-item vocabulary on page 35).
- Hobley, C.W. (1905) 'Further Notes on the El Dorobo or Oggiek', Man, 5, 39–44.
- Hobley, C.W. (1906) 'Notes on the Dorobo People and other Tribes; gathered from Chief Karuri and others', Man, 6, 119–120.
- Huntingford, G.W.B. (1931) 'The Taturu, Mosiro, and Aramanik dialect of Dorobo', Man, 31, 226–228.
- Kenny, Michael G. (1981) 'Mirror in the forest: the Dorobo hunter-gatherers as an image of the other', Africa, 51, 1, 477–495.
- Maguire, R.A.J. (1948) 'Il-Torbo', Tanganyika Notes & Records, 25, 1–27. [reprint of a 1928 article published in the Royal African Society's Journal]
- Rottland, Franz & Vossen, Rainer (1977) 'Grundlagen für eine Klärung des Dorobo-Problems', in Möhlig & Rottland & Heine (eds.) Zur Sprachgeschichte und Ethnohistorie in Afrika. Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 213–238.
