LANGUAGES 887 



to the west and south-west of Mount Elgon, also in some particulars offers 



a resemblance to the Masai. Turkana and Karamojo come next in their 



affinities. Turhana has a few more words in it betraying Hamitic 



{Somali) affinities than the other languages of the same group. On the 



other hand, the Karamojo people in their physical type are closely related 



to the Bantu, and in the dialects they speak they use a few words which 



are obviously survivals of some totally different language spoken by them 



before they were conquered by the Masai race that imposed on them a 



variant of the Turkana dialect. The Silk people, as might be imagined 



from their geographical position, speak a language which is closely allied 



to Turkana on the one hand and on the other to Nandi. The sub-group 



of Nandi languages (all of which are merely dialectal variations of one 



common speech) is a ^'ery well marked one, but is sufficiently near to 



Masai in its grammar and vocabulary to be classed as a sub-group and not 



as an independent stock. Besides marked affinities in numerals (which may 



be due to direct borrowing) and in some pronouns, most of the Masai languages 



share with the Hamitic the same negative prefix "Ma-." There are two 



exceptions to this rule — Turkana, where the negative prefix is " Nye-,"' 



and Bari, which uses the negative suffix " -ti " that is also characteristic 



of Makarka, and of some of the Bantu tongues. One Nilotic language, 



the Lango, would appear to ha\e borrowed from the Masai or Hamitic 



families both the negative particle "Ma- ' and also some of its numerals, 



such as the word for "ten" ('-tomon"). This word for "ten" (''tomon," 



" tama," " toban," " taman ") is widespread amongst all, or nearly all, 



the Hamitic languages and the tongues of the Masai group. Bari, it is 



true, departs from its allies and retains an old word for ten ("puok"), 



which no doubt comes from the Negro tongues to the west. There is an 



obvious relationship between the Masai and the Nilotic tongues — Dinka* 



Shiluh {Shivolo), Dyur, Shangala, Acholi, Aluru (or Aluo), Lango, and 



Ja-luo. This resemblance can be seen by consulting my vocabularies. It 



is particularly noticeable in some of the numerals, such as the word for 



"four," a numeral not as likely to have been borrowed as ten. The 



■geographical range of the Nilotic family is considerable (as has been 



described in Chapter XVIII.), but the different languages or dialects do 



not vary as widely one from the other as is the case with the component 



members of the Masai group. There is a constant prevalence, too, of 



"Luo" as a tribal name. The Dyur, far up in the direction of the Bahr- 



al-Ghazal, call themselves "Luo." The Aluru of the Albert Nyanza more 



often pronounce their name "A-luo," and this form appears again in the 



north of Unyoro and among the Ja-luo of Kavirondo. Acholi is also related 



as a tribal name to Shiuoli (Shiluk). A marked phonetic peculiarity shared 



* The real pronunciation of the tribal name of this people is "Dyange." 



VOL. n. ^' 



