Some Notes On IsiNgoni v. isiZulu

SOME NOTES ON ISINGONI AND ISIZULU

When the Ngoni left what is now called Zululand there were several dialects that were spoken in that part of South Africa. One of those dialects was the one spoken by the Zulu clan which then was a small clan. The Ngoni and their cousins the Shangaan spoke a dialect found in the Ndwandwe area then under the control of Zwide the archenemy of Shaka Zulu. 

With the defeat of the Ndwandwe, the dialect spoken by Zulu clan gained prominence and the area later came to be known as Zululand too. So that by the time the missionaries came all the dialects and the land had come to be associated with the Zulu clan. So when they heard the language spoken by the Ngoni they called it a form of isiZulu or a dialect of isiZulu. This was definitely not the way things were when the Ngoni left as their language and isiZulu could rightly have both been called dialects of isiNguni.

Last year I had the task of editing and revising an old Ngoni grammar book and Ngoni language translation of the Gospel of Mark and these are my notes on the nuances between the two languages.

THE USE OF RELATIVE CLAUSES

One of the things that jump to you when you read the Ngoni translation of the gospel of Mark is in Mark chapter 1:2

Ngoni: bona, ngithuma ithenga lami phambili kwobuso bakho, lona lelo liyakulungisa indlela yakho (Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.KJV)

Zulu: “Bheka, ngiyasithuma isithunywa sami phambi kwakho esiyakulungisa indlela yakho,” (Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.KJV)

THE USE OF BONA AND BHEKA 

Both Ngoni and Zulu use both bona and bheka. They only differ in its employment here and there with the Ngoni preferring bona where the Zulu prefers bheka. You will notice that in the Mzimba Tumbuka language, which is a mismash of Ngoni and Tumbuka, you will stil hear the word Bheka to mean see.

ITHENGA AND ISITHUNYWA: 

In Ngoni the word for messenger is ithenga while Zulu it is isithunywa. Even among the Tumbuka speaking Ngoni you will still find wide use of ithenga. For example in matters of marriage the one who is sent is called thenga. I am not sure of its origin but I assume that it comes from the old Ndwandwe. I could be wrong as I have failed to find its use in Ndebele another close language to Ngoni.

SONA LESO VERSUS ESI

Here is another major difference between Zulu and Ngoni. Zulu employs the relative clause to represent words like "that" and "who". This time Zulu has used esi- as "who" to represent the isithunywa. Here Ngoni represents this by employment of lona lelo. lona means this for class 5 nouns such as ithenga and lelo means that that for class 5 (ili) nouns. If both Ngoni and Zulu had employed isithunywa to mean messenger the Ngoni would have translated the "who" as sona leso siyakulungisa (who will make straight)

https://www.learnngonilanguage.co.uk/.../ngoni-pronouns.html

PHAMBILI VS PHAMBI 

Here there is not much difference as all scholars agree that phambili is a full form of phambi in Nguni languages.

NGONI NOUNS VS ZULU NOUNS

Another difference that you will notice is found in the very first chapter of Mark 1:1

Ukuqala kwelivangeli likaYesu Kristu umtwana kaMkulumqango. (Ngoni) The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God;

Ukuqala kwevangeli likaJesu Kristu, iNdodana kaNkulunkulu. (Zulu) The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God;

In the use of nouns Ngoni is closer to isiXhosa than Zulu in that it has present the longer forms of the nouns. For example all scholars will tell you that the original word for heaven, sky in Nguni language was ilizulu. For most Ngoni the call heaven, lizulu but the Zulu have shortened it further to izulu. Therefore in the verse above the Ngoni translated the english world gospel, greek evangelo as ivangeli or livangeli where the zulu and even Xhosa have ivangeli. And use of livangeli affects the translation of "of the gospel" as Ngoni as Kwelivangeli (kwa +(i)livangeli) and Zulu has kwevangeli (kwa + ivangeli). When "a" follows "i" in both Zulu and Ngoni it changes to "e".

Before I end on this one there is a famous Ngoni ingoma which as the sentence zinkomo zakwa Ngwazi (cattle of the Ngwazi(conqueror)). Here you can see the use of zinkomo from the full Nguni word izinkomo. Here the Zulu will nowadays use "inkomo" with as stress on the "i" to differentiate it from inkomo (singular). The Ngoni has no such problems as they already use zinkomo.

UMKULUMQANGO AND UNKULUNKULU: 

The Ngoni have various names for God and UMkulumqango is one of those names. The Zulu use nkulunkulu. All these names were solicited by the European and American missionaries as they tried to find a word for God. Both the Ngoni and the Zulu had a faint idea of God. Their old religion focused on praying to ancestors through the use of zifuyo (animals like cattle, goats for the poor). But you can notice both have mkulu or nkulu great

UMNTWANA VERSUS INDODANA: The Ngoni prefer to use umntwana (child) in almost all cases where they want to mention the word child. They usually don't differentiate between male child (son) and indodakazi (daughter). This is not different from other tribes north of Limpopo that use a variation of mwana (Nyanja for child). The Ngoni would certainly understand indodana a dimunition of indoda (man). But the Ngoni are more likely to use indoda to refer to husband. Such as in the song from the Maseko Ngoni, Indoda ilalephi? Ngiyamufuna (where has my husband slept, I am looking for him). Or among the Mbelwa Ngoni as seen in Mark 10:12: Ngati yena yedwa amukise indoda yakhe, athathe eyinye, uyaphinga (And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to another, she committeth adultery.). Ngoni uses ngati for uma (isiZulu).

THE TEACHING OF ZULU AS NGONI

Because of the dominance of Zulu and the similarities in the two languages most people teach Zulu as Ngoni. The same can be said of the Ndebele where they use Zulu grammar books. This was popularized by the early missionaries who thought it convenient to use Zulu grammar books instead of developing another grammar book for the Ngoni and Ndebele dialects. I should, however, acknowledge the work of Elmslie in preparing the introductory Grammar of the Ngoni Language 1890

I respect those that do that but I would prefer to say lona lelo liyakulungisa than eliyakulungisa (who will straighten). I feel that my ancestors would be happy that way. I would also rather say lizulu than izulu or zinkomo than inkomo for the sake of preserving my ancestors' dialect. But that is me. 

I would rather say Yekelani ukuhamba (Do not go) than Musani ukuhamba. By the way, I noticed in our Amasiko abenguni whatsapp group that some northern Maseko clan relative in northern Zululand still use Yekela or Yekelani.  

As to the assertion that Ngoni and Ndebele have been corrupted, I would say all languages including Zulu have changed over the years. Zulu uses borrowed words such as itafula which is from Afrikaans as Ngoni has borrowed words such as nyaze (sea). There is no language that has remained static.

I am at the moment very busy with other things and I wished I had written a more exhaustive article. So expect more to come as soon as I have more free time. Hopefully, it is soon. I am not a scholar by any stretch of the imagination so feel to correct any mistakes I have made.

Correction From Datu Manzolwandle on the paragaph about Zinkomo.

A bit of correction, differentiation and clarification here,

Izinkomo is cattle in IsiZulu that's the correct way of writing it the only difference is that AmaZulu don't pronounce -zi- when they speak ,so inkomo is a single cow

izinkomo is cattle

That's the correct way of writing IsiZulu.

IsiXhosa is the language that tend to use ii- even in plural form

In singular form they use i-.

You posted an informative article keep teaching

HOW WAS THE NGONI LANGUAGE LOST? MY PRESENT VIEW

Most scholars take the view that marrying wives from other tribes was a major factor. 

While I agree that Nyanja, Senga, etc speaking mothers played a role in the loss of the Ngoni language I have now come to a point where I believe that it is overplayed.  

If that was the major factor how do you explain the fact that the Ndebele who also had assimilated thousands of Karanga Shonas still maintained their language even though they intermarried with the locals?

In fact,  it is the locals who adopted the Ndebele language and not vice-versa. 

How about the Mbelwa Ngoni who also assimilated huge numbers of Chewa, Senga, Tumbukas among them but managed to maintain Ngoni languages well into the early 1900s. 

Even to this day, you will still find pockets of Ngoni speakers in a few villages. My own grandfather even though he spoke Tumbuka most of the time knew the Ngoni language. 

For example, when I asked him for Ngoni names he did not have to read a Zulu book to find names, he gave me unique Ngoni names based on his knowledge of the Ngoni language. (The Ngoni had a slightly different way of naming their children which is a bit different from modern Zulu). 

It would have been different had I contacted my Maseko Ngoni paternal grandfather who passed away some 40 years ago. He was a proud Ngoni who still lamented the loss of lobola system among them but I am sure knew very little if any Ngoni word even though I was too young to know then.

When I was young my mum used to tell me that when she was growing up the elders in her area in Endindeni, Mzimba, used to speak in Ngoni among themselves and as children felt out of place with this "strange" language. 

Having feet in both the Maseko Ngoni and the Zwangendaba Ngoni I can tell you for a fact that if the Ngoni had followed the regimental system of the Ndebele at least in Mzimba Malawi everyone would be speaking Ngoni today. 

The only weakness was that they still kept their language too. So they spoke Ngoni in the military and before the leaders but spoke Tumbuka at home. It was therefore a fight between two languages and identity and sadly Tumbuka prevailed. Actually, it was already winning already in the 1890s when the Scottish and Xhosa missionaries arrived. This was because as Ngoni power waned so did the influence of their language.  

The Ndebele military was however fashioned differently from the Ngoni. Even though Mzilikazi Mzilikazi was born of Nompethu "The maggot" the daughter of Chief Zwide of the Ndwandwe people (tribe) he abandoned Zwide and joined his archenemy Shaka Zulu as a general. 

Because of this, the Ndebele was structured in the style of Shaka Zulus regiments where young people were spread around in barracks away from home. It was a way to indoctrinate them with Shaka Zulu's doctrines and military-style. 

In the case of the Ngoni, barracks were area-based as a result the youth remained with their families. This made it easy for the children to maintain their mothers' language and culture and in some instances made it easy for people to rebel. 

A case in point is the Malawi Tonga and Tumbuka rebellions. These would not have been easy if the children had been spread around in barracks as they would have no time to plot such rebellions. 

Both the Ngoni and the Ndebele insisted on the use of the Ngoni language in the barracks. This worked better for the Shaka Zulu regimental system as the barracks were permanent keeping the children away from their parents. 

In the case of the Ngoni, these children were still in their areas and still were at home with their fathers and mothers. They were only called upon when needed by the indunas for military training and war.

You can imagine that if you are away from your parents and are only allowed one language you are bound to lose your mom's language. And over time even the mothers will be forced to learn the language of the new majority.

In the case of the Maseko Ngoni, it was a numbers game. The Maseko Ngoni returned to Domwe after the defeat and therefore must have been very few in number. They did not leave Songea in peace. In fact, I believe that there are more Maseko Ngoni in Songea now than in Malawi.

That group that came from Songea spoke pure Ngoni as testified by the Xhosa Presbyterian missionary William Koyi who spoke with Nkosini elders around the 1870s near Cape Maclear. Even then the language was confined to the elders as the children he met were speaking to each other in Nyanja according to Dr. Robert Laws. In fact, according to William Koyi, the Maseko elders still had maintained all the Zulu clicks in their language. 

This was not the case up north in Mzimba due to the adoption of the language by the natives who struggled with clicks. However, among the elders in Mzimba, all the Nguni clicks were still being used. 

By the time of the war of the 1890s, even the elders were all speaking in Nyanja among themselves. R. C. F.Maugham who participated in the war and was a Zulu linguist says he tried to speak Zulu to the captured leaders (Indunas) and no one could understand it. He also said he kept his ears open to hear any Zulu or Nguni words but heard none as all he could hear was Nyanja. At the same time, all the Europeans who passed through Mzimba noted that almost anyone including the Tumbuka you met in Mzimba that time knew Ngoni

The influence of Nyanja could be seen in the area names among the Southern Ngoni in Malawi. You will be hard placed to find Tumbuka area names in Mzimba, Malawi.

Even among the royal family, you will see Chewa names in the leaders such as Chidyaonga, Chathanthumba. In the case of the Northern Ngoni, most of the names are Ngoni except for nicknames in the case of Inkosi Chimtunga whose real name was Mbalekelwa. It is his Chewa subjects who gave him the name Chimtunga, the knobkerry.

I wish I could say something about the Mpezeni Ngoni but I have only managed to find very few historical documents about them. I however think that the departure of Mpherembe to join Mbelwa (M'mbelwa) weakened them in terms of Ngoni speakers. I, therefore, believe that it was because of this that the Ngoni language failed to take root in Mpezeni's area as it did in Mbelwa's. 

I could be wrong here and I hope people like Mr. Lastone Richard Tembo can shed more light on this. By the way, every time I hear the surname of Tembo I am always reminded of the most prolific Ngoni songwriter, Mawelera Tembo. My favorite song from him is Israel Buyela, buyela kuYehova. (Israel come back to Jehova).

I, therefore, submit that even though mothers played a role, the real reason for the loss of Ngoni among the Southern Ngoni was a question of numbers. Whereas in the case of the Zwangendaba Ngoni it was because of the way their military was structured. It was based on areas and therefore the captives still maintained links with their families. 

Once again I am not a scholar by any stretch of the imagination so I await your points of view on this.

SOME NOTES ON THE NGONI AND THE NDEBELE

 A few days ago, I came across an excellent article titled, “Markers of Ethnic Identity and Factors that Contributed to the Death of the Ngoni Language of Zambia”. You can find this article on https://www.rsisinternational.org/.../volume.../625-628.pdf. 

While reading the article I came across the following excerpt which reminded me of the differences between the Ndebele and the Ngoni. 

"It is clear that although the Ngoni dominated militarily, they did not have a policy regarding their own language like the Ndebele of Mzilikazi who changed the names and totems of the Karanga they defeated. Naturally, all the people the Ngoni captured learned to speak the Ngoni language….."

This excerpt shows something that I too have noticed as I have interacted with some Ndebeles here in the UK and also the writings of G. Liesegang.

The fact is that while the Shangaans, Ndebele, and Ngoni leaders were originally under Zwide and have family connections with Zwide’s family, Mzilikazi’s time with Shaka (Tshaka) changed the way he ruled his people. The Ndebele were structured along the lines of the Zulus while the Ngoni maintained the Ndwandwe structure of Zwide.

As I pointed out in an area article on the death of the Ngoni language except for a few villages in Mzimba and I am told in some few villages in Tanzania, the Ngoni military structure was different from the Ndebeles. The Ngoni had what may be called area armies and not purely military barracks villages like the Ndebele and the Zulus did, where children from different areas could form a barracks village so to say.

As a result of this children still lived with their parents in their own areas and therefore maintained their language besides the Ngoni language which was the language used in the military and during royal functions and in courts.

The article above about the Zambia Ngoni mentions the fact that the Ngoni had no language policy and the Ndebelerisation of the captured Karanga as the main difference. While that had some influence I honestly do not think it was the main reason for the demise of Ngoni. 

I now believe that it was the fact that there was no intermixing of the various groups among the Ngoni that led to the demise of the language. The Ngoni social structure had the abenzansi, the Ngoni aristocracy at the top, and the abenhla,  the "people from the upcountry" in the second position and the rest of the people derogaratively referred to as abafo, pronounced as "awafo" at the bottom. 

Abafo (singular, umfo or mufo as the Ngoni pronounce it) in Ngoni is not brothers or strangers as in Zulu but slaves. These are the people that replaced the izinceku (confidential servants of the king and royals while they were in South Africa). These would therefore be the people that cared for the abenzansi, and abenhla's cattle and farming besides taking care of their own farms.

This separation resulted in people living in separate villages with their own kin and people and this, therefore, meant they also kept their language. They were for all intents and purposes speaking two languages, Ngoni and their mother tongue, be it Senga, Chewa, Tumbuka, etc. And therefore, in the end, it is the mother languages that prevailed and eventually, even the people at the top ended up picking these languages.

Another interesting difference pointed out by the authors is the fact that the Ndebele forced the Karanga to change their totems and names to Ndebele names and totems.  That means for example that if your surname were Njobvu, the elephant in Chewa it would be changed to Ndlovu in Ngoni. Mzilikazi was following the example of Shaka Zulu who tried with some success to make his captives Zulu in language and culture with some huge success. He managed to make various clans start to see themselves as Zulus which was a small clan compared to many of the clans then. Though they maintained their totems and names, unlike the captured Karanga.

However, while I think that this had little effect on the language, it is something that the Ngoni should have embraced to make their captives feel part and parcel of the group.

Robert Moffat, a British missionary wrote the following about the Ndebele:

"The Matabele take from the conquered tribes boys and girls, the boys ofcourse acquire the language and the habits and customs of their captors and are reared for soldiers, so that by far the greatest majority of that people are composed of such tribes. At each town of any consequence of these people is generally a Matabele officer, and some soldiers to receive tribute, and to such natives, Mzilikazi, in general, gives over a number of cattle to be taken charge of. In conversing with such I have observed that there is nothing they deplore so much as their children being taken from them just at a time when they become useful to their parents. It is therefore quite common to see a soldier having a boy or youth, whom he calls his servant, whom he has taken int he above manner to rear up for war." - The Matabele Journals of Robert Moffat, 1829-1860 ed., J.P.R. Wallis (London, 1945), vol. 1. p. 319