Bantu languages

The Bantu languages (English: /ˈbæntuː/, Proto-Bantu: *bantʊ̀ )

Bantu
technically the Narrow Bantu languages, as opposed to "Wide
Bantu", a loosely defined categorization which includes other Narrow Bantu
"Bantoid" languages, are a large family of languages spoken by the Ethnicity Bantu peoples
Bantu peoples throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. Geographic Africa, mostly Southern
distribution Hemisphere
As part of the Southern Bantoid group, they are part of the Benue-
Congo language family, which in turn is part of the large Niger– Linguistic Niger–Congo
Congo phylum. classification
Atlantic–Congo

The total number of Bantu languages ranges in the hundreds, Benue–Congo

depending on the definition of "language" versus "dialect", and is Southern Bantoid
estimated at between 440 and 680 distinct languages.[2] The total Bantu
number of Bantu speakers is in the hundreds of millions, estimated
around 350 million in the mid-2010s (roughly 30% of the total Proto- Proto-Bantu
population of Africa, or roughly 5% of world population).[3] Bantu language
languages are largely spoken east and south of Cameroon, Subdivisions Zones A–S (geographic)
throughout Central Africa, Southeast Africa and Southern Africa. (Jarawan–Mbam)
About one sixth of the Bantu speakers, and about one third of Manenguba
Bantu languages, are found in the Democratic Republic of Congo
Sawabantu
alone (c. 60 million speakers as of 2015). See list of Bantu peoples.
Basaa
The Bantu language with the largest total number of speakers is Bafia
Swahili; however, the majority of its speakers use it as a second Beti
language (L1: c. 16 million, L2: 80 million, as of 2015).[4] Makaa–Njem
Kele–Tsogo
Other major Bantu languages include Zulu, with 27 million
speakers (15.7 million L2), and Shona, with about 11 million Teke–Mbede
speakers (if Manyika and Ndau are included).[5][6] Ethnologue Mboshi–Buja
separates the largely mutually intelligible Kinyarwanda and Bangi–Tetela
Kirundi, which, if grouped together, have 12.4 million speakers.[7] Mbole–Enya
Lega–Binja
Boan

Contents Lebonya
Nyanga–Buyi
Name
Northeast Bantu
Origin and history
Tongwe-Bende
Classification
Mbugwe–Rangi
Language structure
Reduplication
Kilombero
Noun class Kongo–Yaka–Sira
By country Kimbundu
Geographic areas Chokwe–Luchazi
Bantu words popularised in western cultures Luyana
 Writing systems Mbukushu
See also Pende
References Luban
Bibliography Lunda
External links Rukwa
Sabi–Botatwe
Nyasa
Name Rufiji–Ruvuma
The similarity between dispersed Bantu languages had been Umbundu
observed as early as in the 17th century.[8] The term "Bantu" as a Kavango–Southwest Bantu
name or the group was coined (as Bâ-ntu) by Wilhelm Bleek in Bara Sakalava languages
1857 or 1858, and popularised in his Comparative Grammar of
Yeyi
1862.[9] The name was coined to represent the word for "people"
Shona
in loosely reconstructed Proto-Bantu, from the plural noun class
Southern Bantu (unclassified):
prefix *ba- categorizing "people", and the root *ntʊ̀ - "some
Buya
(entity), any" (e.g. Zulu umuntu "person", abantu "people"). There
is no native term for the group, as Bantu populations refer to ISO 639-2 / 5 bnt

themselves by their tribal endonyms but did not have a concept for Glottolog narr1281 (http://glottolog.or
the larger ethno-linguistic phylum. Bleek's coinage was inspired by g/resource/languoid/id/narr128
the anthropological observation of groups self-identifying as 1)[1]
"people" or "the true people" (as is indeed the case, for example,
with the Khoikhoi of South Africa).[10]

The term "narrow Bantu", excluding those languages classified as

Bantoid by Guthrie (1948), was introduced in the 1960s.[11]

The prefix ba- in Bantu specifically refers to people, not language.

In Bantu itself, the term for languages is formed with the ki- noun
class (Nguni ísi-), as in Kiswahili "coast-language" and isiZulu
"Zulu language". Apparently inspired by this pattern, there was a
suggestion in South Africa to refer to Bantu languages as "Kintu"
in the 1980s. The suggestion was immediately abandoned. Not
only does the word kintu exist, meaning "thing" with no relation to
the concept of "language",[12] it was also reported by delegates at
the African Languages Association of Southern Africa conference
in 1984 that in some Bantu languages, the term 'Kintu' has a
derogatory significance,[13] that is, kintu refers to "things" and is
used as a dehumanizing term of people who have lost their Map showing the distribution of Bantu vs. other
dignity.[14] In addition, Kintu is a figure in some Bantu African languages. The Bantu area is in orange.
mythologies.[15] The term "Kintu" apparently still saw occasional
use in the 1990s in South Africa.[16]

Origin and history

The Bantu languages descend from a common Proto-Bantu language, which is believed to have been spoken in what is now
Cameroon in Central Africa.[17] An estimated 2,500–3,000 years ago (1000 BC to 500 BC), although other sources put the start
of the Bantu Expansion closer to 3000 BC,[18] speakers of the Proto-Bantu language began a series of migrations eastward and
southward, carrying agriculture with them. This Bantu expansion came to dominate Sub-Saharan Africa east of Cameroon, an
area where Bantu peoples now constitute nearly the entire population.[17][19]

The technical term Bantu, meaning "human beings" or simply "people", was first used by Wilhelm Bleek (1827–1875), as this is
reflected in many of the languages of this group. A common characteristic of Bantu languages is that they use words such as
muntu or mutu for "human being" or in simplistic terms "person", and the plural prefix for human nouns starting with mu- (class
1) in most languages is ba- (class 2), thus giving bantu for "people". Bleek, and later Carl Meinhof, pursued extensive studies
comparing the grammatical structures of Bantu languages.

Classification
The most widely used classification is an alphanumeric
coding system developed by Malcolm Guthrie in his
1948 classification of the Bantu languages. It is mainly
geographic. The term 'narrow Bantu' was coined by the
Benue–Congo Working Group to distinguish Bantu as
recognized by Guthrie, from the Bantoid languages not
recognized as Bantu by Guthrie.

In recent times, the distinctiveness of Narrow Bantu as

opposed to the other Southern Bantoid languages has
been called into doubt (cf. Piron 1995, Williamson &
Blench 2000, Blench 2011), but the term is still widely
used. A coherent classification of Narrow Bantu will
likely need to exclude many of the Zone A and perhaps
Zone B languages.

There is no true genealogical classification of the

(Narrow) Bantu languages. Until recently most
attempted classifications only considered languages that
happen to fall within traditional Narrow Bantu, but
there seems to be a continuum with the related
languages of South Bantoid.
The approximate locations of the sixteen Guthrie Bantu
zones, including the addition of a zone J around the Great
Lakes. The Jarawan languages are spoken in Nigeria.

At a broader level, the family is commonly split in two depending on the reflexes of proto-Bantu tone patterns: Many Bantuists
group together parts of zones A through D (the extent depending on the author) as Northwest Bantu or Forest Bantu, and the
remainder as Central Bantu or Savanna Bantu. The two groups have been described as having mirror-image tone systems: where
Northwest Bantu has a high tone in a cognate, Central Bantu languages generally have a low tone, and vice versa.

Northwest Bantu is more divergent internally than Central Bantu, and perhaps less conservative due to contact with non-Bantu
Niger–Congo languages; Central Bantu is likely the innovative line cladistically. Northwest Bantu is clearly not a coherent
family, but even for Central Bantu the evidence is lexical, with little evidence that it is a historically valid group.

Another attempt at a detailed genetic classification to replace the Guthrie system is the 1999 "Tervuren" proposal of Bastin,
Coupez, and Mann.[20] However, it relies on lexicostatistics, which, because of its reliance on similarity rather than shared
innovations, may predict spurious groups of conservative languages that are not closely related. Meanwhile, Ethnologue has
added languages to the Guthrie classification which Guthrie overlooked, while removing the Mbam languages (much of zone A),
and shifting some languages between groups (much of zones D and E to a new zone J, for example, and part of zone L to K, and
part of M to F) in an apparent effort at a semi-genetic, or at least semi-areal, classification. This has been criticized for sowing
confusion in one of the few unambiguous ways to distinguish Bantu languages. Nurse & Philippson (2006) evaluate many
proposals for low-level groups of Bantu languages, but the result is not a complete portrayal of the family. Glottolog has
incorporated many of these into their classification.[1]

The languages that share Dahl's law may also form a valid group, Northeast Bantu. The infobox at right lists these together with
various low-level groups that are fairly uncontroversial, though they continue to be revised. The development of a rigorous
genealogical classification of many branches of Niger–Congo, not just Bantu, is hampered by insufficient data.

Computational phylogenetic analyses of Bantu include Currie, et al. (2013)[21] and Grollemund, et al. (2015).[22]

Language structure
Guthrie reconstructed both the phonemic inventory and the vocabulary of Proto-Bantu.

The most prominent grammatical characteristic of Bantu languages is the extensive use of affixes (see Sotho grammar and Ganda
noun classes for detailed discussions of these affixes). Each noun belongs to a class, and each language may have several
numbered classes, somewhat like grammatical gender in European languages. The class is indicated by a prefix that is part of the
noun, as well as agreement markers on verb and qualificative roots connected with the noun. Plural is indicated by a change of
class, with a resulting change of prefix.

The verb has a number of prefixes, though in the western languages these are often treated as independent words.[23] In Swahili,
for example, Kitoto kidogo amekisoma (for comparison, Kamwana kadoko karikuverenga in Shona language) means 'The small
child has read it [a book]'. Kitoto 'child' governs the adjective prefix ki-('ki' being a prefix representing the diminutive form of the
word) and the verb subject prefix a-. Then comes perfect tense -me- and an object marker -ki- agreeing with implicit kitabu 'book'
(from Arabic kitab). Pluralizing to 'children' gives Watoto wadogo wamekisoma (Vana vadoko varikuverenga in Shona), and
pluralizing to 'books' (vitabu) gives Watoto wadogo wamevisoma.

Bantu words are typically made up of open syllables of the type CV (consonant-vowel) with most languages having syllables
exclusively of this type. The Bushong language recorded by Vansina, however, has final consonants,[24] while slurring of the final
syllable (though written) is reported as common among the Tonga of Malawi.[25] The morphological shape of Bantu words is
typically CV, VCV, CVCV, VCVCV, etc.; that is, any combination of CV (with possibly a V- syllable at the start). In other words,
a strong claim for this language family is that almost all words end in a vowel, precisely because closed syllables (CVC) are not
permissible in most of the documented languages, as far as is understood.

This tendency to avoid consonant clusters in some positions is important when words are imported from English or other non-
Bantu languages. An example from Chewa: the word "school", borrowed from English, and then transformed to fit the sound
patterns of this language, is sukulu. That is, sk- has been broken up by inserting an epenthetic -u-; -u has also been added at the
end of the word. Another example is buledi for "bread". Similar effects are seen in loanwords for other non-African CV
languages like Japanese. However, a clustering of sounds at the beginning of a syllable can be readily observed in such languages
as Shona,[26] and the Makua languages.[27]

With few exceptions, notably Swahili, Bantu languages are tonal and have two to four register tones.

Reduplication
Reduplication is a common morphological phenomenon in Bantu languages and is usually used to indicate frequency or intensity
of the action signalled by the (unreduplicated) verb stem.[28]

Example: in Swahili piga means "strike", pigapiga means "strike repeatedly".

Well-known words and names that have reduplication include
 Bafana Bafana, a football team
Chipolopolo, a football team
Eric Djemba-Djemba, a footballer
Lomana LuaLua, a footballer
Ngorongoro, a conservation area
Repetition emphasizes the repeated word in the context that it is used. For instance, "Mwenda pole hajikwai," while, "Pole pole
ndio mwendo," has two to emphasize the consistency of slowness of the pace. The meaning of the former in translation is, "He
who goes slowly doesn't trip," and that of the latter is, "A slow but steady pace wins the race." Haraka haraka would mean
hurrying just for the sake of hurrying, reckless hurry, as in "Njoo! Haraka haraka" [come here! Hurry, hurry].

In contrast, there are some words in some of the languages in which reduplication has the opposite meaning. It usually denotes
short durations, and or lower intensity of the action and also means a few repetitions or a little bit more.

Example 1: In Xitsonga and Shona, famba means "walk" while famba-famba means "walk around".
Example 2: in isiZulu and SiSwati hamba means "go", hambahamba means "go a little bit, but not much".
Example 3: in both of the above languages shaya means "strike", shayashaya means "strike a few more times
lightly, but not heavy strikes and not too many times".
Example 4: In Shona kwenya means "scratch", Kwenyakwenya means "scratch excessively or a lot".

Noun class
The following is a list of nominal classes in Bantu Languages:[29]

Singular classes Plural classes

Typical meaning(s)
Number Prefix Number Prefix
1 *mʊ- 2 *ba- Humans, animate
3 *mu- 4 *mi- Plants, inanimate
5 *dɪ- 6 *ma- Various; class 6 for liquids (mass nouns)
7 *ki- 8 *bɪ- Various, diminutives, manner/way/language
9 *n- 10 *n- Animals, inanimate
11 *du- Abstract nouns
12 *ka- 13 *tu- Diminutives
14 *bu- Abstract nouns
15 *ku- Infinitives
16 *pa- Locatives (proximal, exact)
17 *ku- Locatives (distal, approximate)
18 *mu- Locatives (interior)
19 *pɪ- Diminutives

By country
Following is an incomplete list of the principal Bantu languages of each country.[30] Included are those languages that constitute
at least 1% of the population and have at least 10% the number of speakers of the largest Bantu language in the country. An
attempt at a full list of Bantu languages (with various conflations and a puzzlingly diverse nomenclature) can be found in The
Bantu Languages of Africa, 1959.[31]
Most languages are best known in English without the class prefix (Swahili, Tswana, Ndebele), but are sometimes seen with the
(language-specific) prefix (Kiswahili, Setswana, Sindebele). In a few cases prefixes are used to distinguish languages with the
same root in their name, such as Tshiluba and Kiluba (both Luba), Umbundu and Kimbundu (both Mbundu). The bare (prefixless)
form typically does not occur in the language itself, but is the basis for other words based on the ethnicity. So, in the country of
Botswana the people are the Batswana, one person is a Motswana, and the language is Setswana; and in Uganda, centred on the
kingdom of Buganda, the dominant ethnicity are the Baganda (sg. Muganda), whose language is Luganda.

Lingua franca Namibia

Swahili (Kiswahili) (350,000; tens of millions Ovambo (Ambo, Oshiwambo) (1 500,000)

as L2) Herero (200,000)
Angola Republic of the Congo (Congo-Brazzaville)

South Mbundu (Umbundu) (4 million) Kituba (1.2+ million) [a Bantu creole]

North Mbundu (Kimbundu) (3 million) Kongo (Kikongo) (1.0 million)
Ovambo (Ambo) (Oshiwambo) (500,000) Teke languages (500,000)
Luvale (Chiluvale) (500,000) Yombe (350,000)
Chokwe (Chichokwe) (500,000) Suundi (120,000)
Botswana Mbosi (110,000)
Lingala (100,000; ? L2 speakers)
Tswana (Setswana) (1.6 million)
Rwanda
Kalanga (Ikalanga) (150,000)
Burundi Kinyarwanda (Kinyarwanda) (10 - 12
million)
Kirundi (8.5 - 10.5 million)
South Africa According to the South African National
Cameroon Census of 2011[32]

Beti (1.7 million: 900,000 Bulu, 600,000 Zulu (Isizulu) (11,587,374[32])

Ewondo, 120,000 Fang, 60,000 Eton,
30,000 Bebele) Xhosa (Isixhosa) (8,154,258[32])
Basaa (230,000) Northern Sotho (Sesotho sa Leboa)
(4,618,576[32])
Duala (350,000)
Tswana (Setswana) (4,067,248[32])
Central African Republic
Sotho (Sesotho) (3,849,563[32])
Mbati (60,000) Tsonga (Xitsonga) (2,277,148[32])
Democratic Republic of the Congo Swazi (Siswati) (1,297,046[32])
Venda (Tshivenda) (1,209,388[32])
Lingala (Ngala) (2 million; 7 million with L2
speakers) Ndebele (Isindebele) (1,090,223[32])
Luba-Kasai (Tshiluba) (6.5 million) TOTAL Nguni: 22,406,O49 (61.98%) TOTAL Sotho-
Kituba (4.5 million), a Bantu creole Tswana: 13,744,775 (38.02%) TOTAL OFFICIAL
Kongo (Kikongo) (3.5 million) INDIGENOUS LANGUAGE SPEAKERS: 36,150,824
Luba-Katanga (Kiluba) (1.5+ million) (69.83%[32])
Songe (Lusonge) (1+ million)
Swaziland
Nande (Orundandi) (1 million)
Tetela (Otetela) (800,000) Swazi (Siswati) (1 million)
Yaka (Iyaka) (700,000+) Tanzania
Shi (700,000)
 Yombe (Kiyombe) (670,000) Swahili is the national language
Equatorial Guinea
Sukuma (5.5 million)
Beti (Fang) (300,000) Gogo (1.5 million)
Bube (40,000) Haya (Kihaya) (1.3 million)
Chaga (Kichaga) (1.2+ million : 600,000
Gabon
Mochi, 300,000+ Machame, 300,000+
Vunjo)
Baka
Nyamwezi (1.0 million)
Barama
Makonde (1.0 million)
Bekwel
Ha (1.0 million)
Benga
Nyakyusa (800,000)
Bubi
Hehe (800,000)
Bwisi
Luguru (700,000)
Duma
Bena (600,000)
Fang (500,000)
Shambala (650,000)
Kendell
Nyaturu (600,000)
Kanin
Sake Uganda

Sangu Ganda (Luganda) (7.5 million)

Seki
Nkore-Kiga (3.5 million : 2.3 million
Sighu Nyankore, 1.2 million Kiga (Chiga))
Simba Soga (Lusoga) (2 million)
Sira Masaba (Lumasaba) (1.1 million)
Northern Teke Nyoro-Tooro (1.1 million)
Western Teke Kinyarwanda (Kinyarwanda) (750,000)
Tsaangi Konjo (600,000)
Tsogo Gwere (400,000)
Vili (3,600) Zambia
Vumbu
Wandji Bemba (3.3 million)
Wumbvu Tonga (1.0 million)
Yangho Chewa (Nyanja) (Chichewa) (800,000)
Yasa Kaonde (240,000)
Kenya Lozi (Silozi) (600,000)
Lala-Bisa (600,000)
Swahili and English are national Nsenga (550,000)
languages
Tumbuka (Chitumbuka) (500,000)
Gikuyu (7 million) Lunda (450,000)
Luhya (5.4 million) Nyiha (400,000+)
Kamba (4 million) Mambwe-Lungu (400,000)
Meru (Kimeru) (2.7 million) Zimbabwe
Gusii (2 million)
Shona languages (12 million incl. Karanga,
Mijikenda Zezuru, Korekore, Ndau, Manyika)
Taita Ndebele (2 million)
Kiembu Tonga
 Kimbere Venda
Giriama Kalanga
Lesotho

Sesotho (1.8 million)

Zulu (Isizulu) (300,000)
Malawi

Chewa (Nyanja) (Chichewa) (7 million)

Tumbuka (1 million)
Yao (1 million)
Mozambique

Makhuwa (3 million; 5.5 million all Makua)

Tsonga (Xitsonga) (3.1 million)
Shona (Ndau) (1.6 million)
Lomwe (1.5 million)
Sena (1.3 million)
Tswa (1.2 million)
Chuwabu (1.0 million)
Chopi (800,000)
Ronga (700,000)
Chewa (Nyanja) (Chichewa) (600,000)
Yao (Chiyao) (500,000)
Nyungwe (Cinyungwe/Nhungue)(400,000)
Tonga (400,000)
Makonde (400,000)

Geographic areas
Map 1 shows Bantu languages in Africa and map 2 a magnification of the Benin, Nigeria and Cameroon area, as of July 2017.
 Localization of the Niger–Congo languages

Bantu words popularised in western cultures

A case has been made out for borrowings of many place-names and even misremembered rhymes – chiefly from one of the Luba
varieties – in the USA.[33]

Some words from various Bantu languages have been borrowed into western languages. These include:

Boma
Bomba
Bongos
Bwana
Candombe
Chimpanzee
Gumbo
Hakuna matata
Impala
Indaba
Jenga
Jumbo
Kalimba
Kwanzaa
Mamba
Mambo
Mbira
Marimba
Rumba
Safari
Samba
Simba
Ubuntu

Writing systems
Along with the Latin script and Arabic script orthographies, there are also some modern indigenous writing systems used for
Bantu languages:

The Mwangwego alphabet is an abugida that is used to write the Chewa language and other languages of
Malawi.
The Mandombe script is an abugida that is used to write the Bantu languages of the Democratic Republic of the
Congo, mainly by the Kimbanguist movement.
The Isibheqe Sohlamvu or Ditema tsa Dinoko script is a featural syllabary used to write the siNtu or Southern
Bantu languages.

See also
Bantu peoples
Meeussen's rule
Nguni languages
Noun class

References
1. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Narrow Bantu" (http://glottolog.org/reso
urce/languoid/id/narr1281). Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
2. "Guthrie (1967-71) names some 440 Bantu 'varieties', Grimes (2000) has 501 (minus a few 'extinct' or 'almost
extinct', Bastin et al. (1999) have 542, Maho (this volume) has some 660, and Mann et al. (1987) have c. 680."
Derek Nurse, 2006, "Bantu Languages", in the Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, p. 2. Ethnologue
report for Southern Bantoid (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=73-16) lists a total of 535
languages. The count includes 13 Mbam languages which are not always included under "Narrow Bantu".
3. Total population cannot be established with any accuracy due to the unavailability of precise census data from
Sub-Saharan Africa. A number just above 200 million was cited in the early 2000s (see Niger-Congo languages:
subgroups and numbers of speakers for a 2007 compilation of data from SIL Ethnologue, citing 210 million).
Population estimates for West-Central Africa were recognized as significantly too low by the United Nations
Department of Economic and Social Affairs in 2015 ("World Population Prospects: The 2016 Revision – Key
Findings and Advance Tables" (https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Publications/Files/WPP2017_KeyFindings.pdf)
(PDF). United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. July 2016. Retrieved
26 June 2017.). Population growth in Central-West Africa as of 2015 is estimated at between 2.5% and 2.8%
p.a., for an annual increase of the Bantu population by about 8 to 10 million.
4. Swahili (https://www.ethnologue.com/language/swh), Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015): "47,000,000 in Tanzania, all
users. L1 users: 15,000,000 (2012), increasing. L2 users: 32,000,000 (2015 D. Nurse). Total users in all
countries: 98,310,110 (as L1: 16,010,110; as L2: 82,300,000)."
5. "Ethnologue: Zulu" (https://www.ethnologue.com/language/zul). Ethnologue. Retrieved 2017-03-05.
6. "Ethnologue: Shona" (https://www.ethnologue.com/language/sna). Retrieved 2017-03-06.
7. "Statistical Summaries" (http://www.ethnologue.com/ethno_docs/distribution.asp?by=size). Ethnologue.
Retrieved 2012-06-29.
8. R. Blench, Archaeology, Language, and the African Past (2006), p. 119 (https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=es
Fy3Po57A8C&lpg=PP1&hl=de&pg=PA119#v=onepage&q&f=false).
9. Raymond O. Silverstein, "A note on the term 'Bantu' as first used by W. H. I. Bleek", African Studies 27 (1968),
211–212, doi:10.1080/00020186808707298 (https://www.doi.org/10.1080/00020186808707298).
10. R.K.Herbert and R. Bailey in Rajend Mesthrie (ed.), Language in South Africa (2002), p. 50 (https://books.google.
co.uk/books?id=cqaGb_SEQHUC&pg=PA50).
11. Studies in African Linguistics: Supplement, Issues 3-4, Department of Linguistics and the African Studies Center,
University of California, Los Angeles (1969), p. 7.
12. Joshua Wantate Sempebwa ,The Ontological and Normative Structure in the Social Reality of a Bantu Society: A
Systematic Study of Ganda Ontology and Ethics, 1978, p. 71.
13. Addendum: ALASA conference of 1984 doi:10.1080/02572117.1984.10587452 (http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/p
df/10.1080/02572117.1984.10587452)
14. Molefi Kete Asante, Ama Mazama, Encyclopedia of African Religion (2009), p. 173 (https://books.google.co.uk/b
ooks?id=B667ATiedQkC&pg=PT173).
15. David William Cohen, The historical tradition of Busoga, Mukama and Kintu (1972). Joseph B. R. Gaie, Sana
Mmolai, The Concept of Botho and HIV/AIDS in Botswana (2007), p. 2 (https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=ieiT
9tZMqBgC&pg=PA2).
16. as in Noverino N. Canonici, A Manual of Comparative Kintu Studies, Zulu Language and Literature, University of
Natal (1994).
17. Philip J. Adler, Randall L. Pouwels, World Civilizations: To 1700 Volume 1 of World Civilizations, (Cengage
Learning: 2007), p.169.
18. Gemma Berniell-Lee et al Genetic and Demographic Implications of the Bantu Expansion: Insights from Human
Paternal Lineages. (http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/content/26/7/1581.abstract) Oxfordjournals.com
19. Toyin Falola, Aribidesi Adisa Usman, Movements, borders, and identities in Africa, (University Rochester Press:
2009), p.4.
20. The Guthrie, Tervuren, and SIL lists are compared side by side in Maho 2002 (https://web.archive.org/web/20090
325021837/http://www.african.gu.se/maho/downloads/bantulineup.pdf).
21. Currie, Thomas E., Andrew Meade, Myrtille Guillon, Ruth Mace (2013). Cultural phylogeography of the Bantu
Languages of sub-Saharan Africa (http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/280/1762/20130695).
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 2013, Volume 280, issue 1762.
doi:10.1098/rspb.2013.0695 (https://doi.org/10.1098%2Frspb.2013.0695)
22. Grollemund, Rebecca Simon Branford, Koen Bostoen, Andrew Meade, Chris Venditti, and Mark Pagel (2015).
Bantu expansion shows that habitat alters the route and pace of human dispersals (http://www.pnas.org/content/
112/43/13296). PNAS October 27, 2015. 112 (43) 13296-13301. doi:10.1073/pnas.1503793112 (https://doi.org/1
0.1073%2Fpnas.1503793112)
23. Derek Nurse, 2008. Tense and aspect in Bantu, p 70 (fn). In many of the Zone A, including Mbam, the verbs are
clearly analytic.
24. Vansina, J. Esquisse de Grammaire Bushong. Commission de Linguistique Africaine, Tervuren, Belgique, 1959.
25. Turner, Rev. Wm. Y., Tumbuka–Tonga$1–$2 $3ictionEnglish Dictionary Hetherwick Press, Blantyre, Malawi 1952.
pages i–ii.
26. Doke, Clement M., A Comparative Study in Shona Phonetics University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 1931.
27. Relatório do I Seminário sobre a Padronização da Ortografia de Línguas Moçambicanas NELIMO, Universidade
Eduardo Mondlane. 1989.
28. Abdulaziz Lodhi, "Verbal extensions in Bantu (the case of Swahili and Nyamwezi) (https://web.archive.org/web/20
090325021837/http://www.african.gu.se/aa/pdfs/aa02004.pdf)". Africa & Asia, 2002, 2:4–26, Göteborg University
29. "Les classes nominales en bantu" (http://www.bantu-languages.com/fr/classes.html).
30. "According to Ethnologue" (http://www.ethnologue.org). Ethnologue.org. Retrieved 2012-06-29.
31. Bryan, M.A.(compiled by), The Bantu Languages of Africa. Published for the International African Institute,
Oxford University Press, 1959.
32. South African National Census of 2011
33. Vass, Winifred Kellersberger (1979). The Bantu Speaking Heritage of the United States (https://books.google.co
m/?id=Sbp1AAAAMAAJ&q=Here+we). Center for Afro-American Studies, University of California. p. 73.
ISBN 9780934934015. Retrieved 7 September 2014. "“Here we go looby-loo; here we go looby-la (or looby-light)
/ Here we go looby-loo; all on a Saturday night!” Both of these Luba words, lubilu (quickly, in a hurry), and lubila
(a shout) are words still in common usage in the Republic of Zaïre."

Bibliography
Biddulph, Joseph, Bantu Byways Pontypridd 2001. ISBN 978-1-897999-30-1.
 Finck, Franz Nikolaus (1908). Die Verwandtschaftsverhältnisse der Bantusprachen (https://books.google.com/bo
oks?id=Ph1WGXroFWoC). Vandenhoek und Ruprecht. Retrieved 25 August 2012.
Guthrie, Malcolm. 1948. The classification of the Bantu languages. London: Oxford University Press for the
International African Institute.
Guthrie, Malcolm. 1971. Comparative Bantu, Vol 2. Farnborough: Gregg International.
Heine, Bernd. 1973. Zur genetische Gliederung der Bantu-Sprachen. Afrika und Übersee, 56: 164–185.
Maho, Jouni F. 2001. The Bantu area: (towards clearing up) a mess. Africa & Asia, 1:40–49 (https://web.archive.o
rg/web/20090325021837/http://www.african.gu.se/aa/pdfs/aa01040.pdf).
Maho, Jouni F. 2002. Bantu lineup: comparative overview of three Bantu classifications (https://web.archive.org/w
eb/20090325021837/http://www.african.gu.se/maho/downloads/bantulineup.pdf). Göteborg University:
Department of Oriental and African Languages.
Nurse, Derek, & Gérard Philippson. 2006. The Bantu Languages. Routledge.
Piron, Pascale. 1995. Identification lexicostatistique des groupes Bantoïdes stables. (https://web.archive.org/web/
20130115224255/http://www.journalofwestafricanlanguages.org/Volume25.aspx) Journal of West African
Languages, 25(2): 3–39.
Stanford (2013). "Kiswahili" (http://swahililanguage.stanford.edu/). Retrieved 2013-06-20.(subscription required)

External links
Arte da lingua de Angola: oeferecida [sic] a virgem Senhora N. do Rosario, mãy, Senhora dos mesmos pretos (ht
tps://archive.org/details/artedalinguadean00dias) The art of the language of Angola, by Father Pedro Dias, 1697,
Lisbon, artedalinguadean
Comparative Bantu Online Dictionary (http://www.linguistics.berkeley.edu/CBOLD/) linguistics.berkeley.edu,
includes comprehensive bibliography.
Maho, Jouni Filip NUGL Online. The online version of the New Updated Guthrie List, a referential classification of
the Bantu languages (https://web.archive.org/web/20130607210512/http://goto.glocalnet.net/mahopapers/nuglonl
ine.pdf) goto.glocalnet.net, 4 June 2009, 120pp. Guthrie 1948 in detail, with subsequent corrections and
corresponding ISO codes.
Bantu online resources (http://www.bantu-languages.com/en/) bantu-languages.com, Jacky Maniacky, 7 July
2007, including

List of Bantu noun classes with reconstructed Proto-Bantu prefixes (http://www.bantu-languages.com/fr/class

es.html) bantu-languages.com (in French)
Ehret's compilation of classifications by Klieman, Bastin, himself, and others (https://web.archive.org/web/201206
24221430/http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/history/ehret/kinship/BantuClassification%204-09.pdf) pp 204–09,
ucla.edu, 24 June 2012
Contini-Morava, Ellen. Noun Classification in Swahili (http://www3.iath.virginia.edu/swahili/). 1994, Virginia.edu
List of Bantu language names with synonyms ordered by Guthrie number (https://web.archive.org/web/20121120
223537/http://www.linguistics.berkeley.edu/CBOLD/Lgs/LgsbyGN.html).linguistics.berkeley.edu 529 names
Introduction to the languages of South Africa (http://salanguages.com) salanguages.com
Narrow Bantu (https://web.archive.org/web/20110726212602/http://www.journalofwestafricanlanguages.org/Narr
owBantu.aspx) Journal of West African Languages
Uganda Bantu Languages (http://www.ugandatravelguide.com/bantu-people.html) ugandatravelguide.com

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