886 LANGUAGES 



ancestors of the Masai, Turkana, and Nandi. The Masai and kindred 

 groups display, on the other [hand, marked affinities with the Nilotic 

 stock. The Somali element in them is probably due to an original 

 mixture of races. The Somali is a sex-denoting language, but this feature 

 is not unknown in Negro Africa. Not to mention the Hausa, which 

 betrays very distinct affinities with the Lybian (Berber) group of 

 1 anguages, and which is spoken in the Western Sudan, the Bongo in 

 the Bahr-al-Ghazal has sex-denoting pronouns and suffixes. In some of 

 the Nilotic languages there is also a change or distinction in the prefix 

 or pronominal particle. In the Masai-Turkana group this grows into a 

 masculine and feminine distinguishing prefix or particle, which sometimes 

 loses its distinct meaning of sex and indicates rather strong and weak, 

 large and small things. There are features in the Somali or Hamitic 

 group of tongues which recall the grammatical structure of the Bantu 

 languages, especially in regard to the verb ; but on the other hand, there 

 is absolutely no resemblance in word-roots, and in many respects the 

 two groups of languages are widely different. Yet it would be a most 

 interesting solution to the mystery of the genesis of the Bantu languages 

 if one could show that they arose much as the Bantu physical type was 

 formed, by the influence of Caucasian half-breeds (such as the Hamites) 

 acting on pure Negro stock. At the present time, however, there is no 

 real trace of this influence in regard to the Bantu, whereas there is 

 distinct evidence of linguistic influence, and possibly connection, between 

 the Somali language on the one hand, and the Nilotic and Masai 

 linguistic groups on the other. 



The Masai-Turkana-Bari constitutes a very loosely knit group of 

 languages, each of which, perhaps, resembles the other slightly more than 

 it approaches dialects outside this grouping. The nearest living relation 

 to the Masai tongue is Latuka (a word which would probably be spelt 

 El Atukan *). Latuka is spoken in the interior of the Bari District on 

 the high mountains between the Bari people on the west and the Acholi 

 or Karamojo tribes on the east. The language next nearest to Masai is 

 the Bari, spoken on both sides of the White Nile about Gondokoro. The 

 Bari people would appear to be a race allied in origin to the Madi or 

 some other group of Negroes speaking languages of West African affinities, 

 who were conquered by the ancestors of the Masai-Latuka, and had 

 imposed on them a variant of the early form of the Masai language. The 

 Bari, nevertheless, have retained in their speech words of an earlier tongue 

 and that remarkable feature of West African phonology, the guttural 

 labial — the " kp " and " gb." The Elgumi or Wamia language, spoken 



* This tribal name may have some connection with El Tfiken, which is the 

 real designation of the Kamasia (Nandi). 





