July 14, 19 10] 



NATURE 



41 



THE AKIKVYV OF EAST AFRICA.' 



IT may be said at once that this is a very valuable 

 ctnuribution to^ the ethnology of Africa. In its 

 thoroughness it recalls work characteristic of the 

 latest German school. A trifling defect is the trick 

 which both authors have of separating their African 

 words into syllables, no doubt to facilitate immediate 

 pronunciation by the unlearned ; but, although this 

 plan might be recommended in certain important 

 words at their first appearance, it becomes irritating 

 to the eye when perpetuated throughout the book, 

 and sometimes the separation of syllables cuts 

 athwart the etymology of root-words. The same 

 remarks apply to the introduction of the apostrophe 

 after the initial " m " or '" n." To anyone really 

 versed in Bantu studies this apostrophe is anathema, 

 as it is quite unnecessary. A writer fastidious about 

 Bantu prefi.NCs supplies a hyphen between the prefix 

 and the root, and not an apostrophe. 



Perhaps, without ungraciousness, another criticism 

 might be added — that the book would have been even 

 more valuable than it is if the authors had either 

 been more widely read in regard to other African 

 studies or had submitted their MS. to a specialist 

 in comparative African ethnology in England or 

 Germany, who could have explained many points 

 which are acknowledged as obscure by the authors, 

 and enabled them to have instituted the most in- 

 teresting comparisons. The book is such a good 

 one, so likely to take a permanent place as a standard 

 work, that it is to be hoped in a further edition 

 these suggestions may be taken note of. 



The Akikuyu (.4- is a corruption of the plural prefix, 

 Ba-. ki- is probably the eighth prefix often applied 

 to ••languages," "sorts," or "kinds," and the root 

 of Lhe name is really kiiyii) are a collection of clans 

 of Bantu-speaking negroes which inhabit the elevated 

 plateaus of equatorial East Africa on the eastern side 

 of the great Rift \'alley. In language, and perhaps 

 -partly in racial origin, they are akin to the Bantu 

 tribes round the slopes of Mount Kenia and the river- 

 side people of the Tana River ; also, less markedly, to 

 the .A-kamba of the East African plains between these 

 highlands and the sea coast. The Akikuvu speciallv 

 are greatly interfused with Masai blood, so that 

 many of them have a strong facial resemblance to the 

 Masai, though not so tall in stature. It is very 

 seldom that one meets amongst them the rather 

 piog-nathous Pigmy type observable here and there 

 amongst the nomad Ndorobo, who dwell on the 

 fringe of their territory to the north. Obviously, thev 

 are a remnant of the" Bantu invasion of East Africa, 

 of a generalised negro type which at one time or 

 another has intermixed very freelv with the Masai, 

 retaining, however, their own Bantu dialect. This, 

 by some centuries of comparative isolation, has be- 

 come distinctly peculiar in the form of its prefixes 

 and some elements of its grammar. The dense 

 forests of their plateau country have enabled them 

 to resist complete extermination and absorption at 

 the hands of the Masai, when some century ago that 

 bold offshoot of the Nilotic peoples overran the 

 countries between the Victoria Nyanza and the Indian 

 Ocean. 



According to the traditions collected bv Mr. and 

 Mrs. Rputledge, the Akikuyu were preceded in their 

 occupation of these forests by a diminutive race 

 known as the .Agumba, and also bv the Ndorobo. 

 The last-named is a nomadic people of verv mixed 

 elements— composed partly of Bushmanlike 'Pigmies 



1 "With a Prehistoric Peopla The Akikuyu of British East .'\frica." Being 

 some Account of the Method of Life and Mode of Thoueht found existent 

 amongst a Nation on its First Contact with European Civilisation. By W. 

 Scoresby Romledge and Katherine Routledge (born Pease). Pp. vxxii+tqz 

 (London : Edward Arnold, 1910.) Pnce 21s. net. 



NO. 2124, VOL. 84] 



and degraded Hamites — which ranges in scattered 

 hunting colonies all over equatorial East Africa. The 

 .Agumba may have been the Bushmanlike Pigmv race 

 which seems to have inhabited East Africa in ancient 

 times, and to have left many traces of its presence 

 in existing tribes between Abyssinia on the north and 

 Nyasa on the south. Or, again, the Agumba may 

 have been a branch of the Congo Pigmies, the 

 physical tvpe of which can apparently be traced as far 

 east at the present day as the western slopes of 



a Neophyte as he dances pri-^r to 

 Manhood. From " With a Prehistoric People. " 



Mount Elgon. According to the traditions collected 

 by the authors, these Agumba finally went west- 

 wards to "a big forest." 



Mr. and Mrs. Routledge think that the root-word 

 kuyii refers to the great fig-trees which are abundant 

 in the forests of the Akikuyu country, fig-trees, prob- 

 ably, that produce bark cloth. But it mav also be 

 a word meaning "up above," the lofty region, from 

 the Bantu root kulu, gulu, or zulu, the letter I being 



