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Traditional Myths and Linguistic Analysis: Singwaya Revisited

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 May 2014

Thomas T. Spear
Thomas T. Spear*
Affiliation:
LaTrobe University
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Extract

In a previous article in this journal I warned about the dangers of facile generalization and misinterpretation of traditional origin myths leading to the elaboration of historians' myths which bear little resemblance to the traditional, linguistic, cultural, or documentary data. I then proceeded to analyze the Singwaya (Shungwaya) myth pertaining to the origins of the peoples of the Kenya coast to show how earlier interpretations cannot be sustained by the evidence, before demonstrating that the myth is nevertheless valid for the Mijikenda, Pokomo, Swahili, Taita, and Segeju, where such evidence supports its basic veracity.

As chance would have it, while the above article was in press I delivered a related paper on the same panel as Thomas Hinnebusch who, on the basis of extensive linguistic fieldwork and analysis of the same area, had found a number of fallacies in the published linguistic data on which I had relied. While confirming the exclusion of the highlanders (Thagicũ-speakers) from the same language group as the coastal peoples and hence presumably from common origins with the others at Singwaya, Hinnebusch also excludes both the Taita and Segeju from that group while adding the Swahili to it, thus calling into doubt the integrity of the Singwaya group as I had reconstructed it. Hinnebusch's data and his analysis of it, then, obviously require a reexamination of the role of the Taita, Segeju, and Swahili peoples in the migration from Singwaya while, at the same time, casting doubt anew on the validity of origin myths or legends. But the linguistic data also extends our view enormously.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 4 , 1977 , pp. 229 - 246
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1977

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References

Notes

1. “Traditional Myths and Historians' Myths: Variations on the Singwaya Theme of Mijikenda Origins,” History in Africa, 1(1974), pp. 67–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The historians' myths cited are of two varieties: those which included in the Singwaya myth the Kamba, Kikuyu, and related peoples who do not themselves claim such origins [see, eg., Mcintosh, B. G., “The Eastern Bantu Peoples” in Ogot, B. A. and Kieran, J. A. (eds.), Zamani, pp. 198–215 (Nairobi, 1968)]Google Scholar and those which deny Singwaya origins for even the Mijikenda and others who themselves claim such origins [see Morton, R. F., “The Shungwaya Myth of Miji Kenda Origins: A Problem of late Nineteenth Century Kenya Coastal History,” IJAHS, 5(1973), pp. 397–423].Google Scholar

2. “The Shungwaya Hypothesis: A Linguistic Reappraisal,” paper delivered to the African Studies Association, Chicago, 1974.Google Scholar A revised manuscript taking into account some of my earlier criticism is to be published under the same title in Eastern African Studies (Syracuse University, Program of Eastern African Studies). All references here are to the revised manuscript. My thanks to Dr. Hinnebusch for allowing me to see this revised copy at an early stage.

3. In addition to Hinnebusch's paper, a number of related articles and theses have appeared subsequent to my original article. Two specifically address themselves to the Morton article cited above: Chittick, H. N., “The Book of Zenj and the Mijikenda,” IJAHS, 9(1976), pp. 68–73Google Scholar and Turton, E. R., “Bantu, Galla and Somali Migrations in the Horn of Africa: A Reassessment of the Juba/Tana Area,” JAH, 16(1975), pp. 519–537.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Chittick's analysis of the Swahili chronicle, the Kitab al Zanuj, parallels my own earlier analysis, while Turton accepts uncritically Morton's dismissal of Singwaya origins for the Mijikenda, but this has little bearing on the original part of his article dealing with early Somali and Galla movements in the Juba River area. These movements are fully compat-able with Mijikenda traditions. Other recent works have substantially added to our knowledge of Taita, Pokomo, and Swahili history and will be considered more fully below.

4. In its vernacular form ‘Makayachenda’, Mijikenda means, quite literally, the nine kayas or settlements, which define the Mijikenda peoples. The Nine are the Giriama, Chonyi, Kauma, Kambe, Jibana, Ribe, Rabai, Duruma, and Digo.

5. Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” pp. 69–74.Google Scholar

6. Guthrie, M., The Classification of the Bantu Languages, (London, 1967), pp. 42–46Google Scholar; Bryan, M., The Bantu Languages of Africa, (London, 1959), pp. 125–129.Google Scholar

7. Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” pp. 2–7.Google Scholar

8. Hinnebusch's own work was largely with the Kenyan coastal languages, those he labels Sabaki, but he was able to draw on the work of Nurse and Philippson on the Tanzanian languages in his classification of the group as a whole. See Hinnebusch, T., “Prefixes, Sound Changes, and Sub-grouping in the Coastal Kenyan Bantu Languages” (unpub. Ph.D. thesis, UCLA, 1973)Google Scholar; Nurse, D. and Philippson, G., “A Linguistic Sketch of the North-East Bantu Languages, with particular reference to Chagga History” (mimeo, University of Dar es Salaam, 1974)Google Scholar; and idem, “The Northeast Bantu Languages: A Tentative Classification” (mimeo, University of Dar es Salaam, 1974) as cited in Hinnebusch, “Shungwaya Hypothesis.”

9. Ibid., Table I. While several of these names drawn from Guthrie's classification do not conform to modern linguistic usage, I have retained them in order to avoid confusion.

10. Ibid., p. 5 and Table I. The five groups are E.70 (Pokomo, Giriama, Digo, and Taita), G.10 (Gogo, Kaguru), G.20 (Tubeta, Pare, Shambala, Bondei), G.30 (Zigula, Ndwele, Zaramo, Nguru, Luguru, Kami, Kutu, Sagara), and G.40 (Swahili). As is readily apparent, Hinnebusch's classification excludes several of these and extensively reorganizes the others.

11. Ibid., p. 12 (Figure 4).

12. Ibid., p. 17.

13. Ibid., pp. 16-20.

14. Ibid., p. 20.

15. Cf. Morton, , “Shungwaya Myth” and Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” pp. 75–77.Google Scholar

16. It should also be noted that such proto-languages are hypothetical reconstructions only and do not necessarily represent the actual ancestral languages as spoken.

17. The Seuta appear to have their own common myth. See Feierman, Steven, The Shambaa Kingdom, (Madison, 1974), pp. 67–69.Google Scholar

18. Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” pp. 71–72Google Scholar citing unpublished data collected by Philip Sedlak; Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” pp. 15, 17.Google Scholar

19. Ibid., p. 9.

20. Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” pp. 69–74.Google Scholar As with the Mijikenda, the core clans of each Pokomo clan alliance, or territory, cite Singwaya origins. These were the initial settlers In each area and the ones which gave permission to subsequent migrants to settle. Bunger, R. L. Jr., Islamization among the Upper Pokomo, (Eastern African Studies, no. 11) (Syracuse, 1973), pp. 7-13, 29-30, 36–37.Google Scholar

21. Bryan classifies Swahili as coordinate with languages of the central Tanzanian and the Kenyan coasts (Bantu Languages, pp. 125-219), while Guthrie places Swahili in a separate group, G.40, adjacent to the languages of the central Tanzanian coast (Classification, pp. 42-46). It was for this reason that I did not consider Swahili origins in my earlier article.

22. Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” pp. 22–23 (fns. 10 & 20).Google Scholar

23. Chittick, H. N., “The ‘Shirazi’ Colonization of East Africa,” JAH, 6(1965), pp. 275–294CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, “An Archaeological Reconnaissance of the Southern Somali Coast,” Azania, 4(1969), pp. 115-130; idem, “The Peopling of the East African Coast,” p. 41, Grottanelli, V. L., “The Peopling of the Horn of Africa,” pp. 64–73Google Scholar, Trimingham, J. S., “The Arab Geographers and the East African Coast,” pp. 128–219Google Scholar, and Southall, A. W., “The Problem of Malagasy Origins,” p. 206Google Scholar, all in Chittick, H. N. & Rotberg, R. I. (eds.), East Africa and The Orient, (New York, 1975)Google Scholar; Berg, F. J., “The Swahili Community of Mombasa,” JAH, 9 (1968), pp. 36-37, 42–48Google Scholar; MacKay, W. F., “A Precolonial History of the Southern Kenya Coast,” (unpub. Ph.D. thesis, Boston University, 1975), pp. 56–68.Google Scholar

24. Chittick, , “Book of Zenj,” p. 72.Google Scholar

25. Prins, A. H. J., “The Somaliland Bantu,” Bulletin of the International Committee on Urgent Anthropological and Ethnological Research, 3(1960), pp. 28–31Google Scholar; Andrzejewskl, B. W., “The Position of Linguistic Minorities in Somalia” (mimeo, School of Oriental and African Studies, 1970)Google Scholar; Grottanelli, , “Peopling of the Horn of Africa,” p. 62.Google Scholar

26. Trimingham, , “The Arab Geographers,” p. 128Google Scholar; Grottanelli, , “The Peopling of the Horn of Africa,” p. 68.Google Scholar

27. Tomacheva, M., “The Origin of the Name ‘Swahili’,” Tanzania Notes and Records, 77/78(1976), pp. 27–37.Google Scholar

28. Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” p. 79nGoogle Scholar; Chittick, , “Book of Zenj,” p. 72.Google Scholar

29. Kitab al Zanuj in Cerulli, E., Somalia, (Rome, 1957), Vol. I, pp. 253–266Google Scholar; Elliot, J. A. G., “A Visit to the Bajun Islands,” Journal of the Royal African Society, 25(1925/1926), pp. 150–152.Google Scholar See Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” p. 78 (fn. 21)Google Scholar and Chittick, , “Book of Zenj,” PP. 68–73 for a discussion of these sources.Google Scholar

30. The Pokomo are included later. See Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” p. 70Google Scholar for a discussion of the ascription of these names.

31. Ibid., pp. 71-72; Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” p. 15.Google Scholar

32. Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” pp. 69–73Google Scholar; Lewis, H. S., “The Origins of the Galla and Somali,” JAH, 7(1966), pp. 27–46CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Turton, , “Bantu, Galla, and Somali Migrations,” pp. 529–533.Google Scholar

33. From Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” Table I and pp. 15 and 23n.Google Scholar

34. Ibid., p. 15; Sedlak's figures for the Mijikenda are 61-88% as cited in Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” p. 72.Google Scholar

35. Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” p. 20.Google Scholar

36. Merritt, E. H., “A History of the Taita of Kenya to 1900,” (unpub. Ph.D. thesis, Indiana University, 1975), pp. 48–78Google Scholar; Liszka, S. W., “A Preliminary Report of Research on the Origins and Internal Migrations of the Taita Peoples,” Mila, 4(1974), pp. 38–64.Google Scholar

37. Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” pp. 22–23 (fn 15)Google Scholar citing Nurse and Philippson, , “The Northeast Bantu Languages,” p. 8.Google Scholar Hinnebusch's own figures are 40-44%.

38. Hinnebusch, , “Shungwaya Hypothesis,” pp. 23–24 (fn. 21).Google Scholar

39. Spear, , “Traditional Myths,” p. 72.Google Scholar

40. Monclaro in Freeman-Grenville, G. S. P. (ed.), The East African Coast, (Oxford, 1962), p. 141.Google Scholar

41. For a full reconstruction of the migration and subsequent history, see my The Kaya Complex: A Eistory of the Mijikenda Peoples of the Kenya Coast to 1900 (in press).