78-575: Bagamoyo ( Mji wa Bagamoyo , in Swahili ) is a historic coastal town and capital of Bagamoyo District in the Pwani Region of Tanzania . Much of the settlement was founded at the end of the 18th century, though it is an extension of a much older (8th century) Swahili settlement, Kaole . It was chosen as the capital of German East Africa by the German colonial administration and it became one of
156-565: A 'little bit' of some characteristic, like -y or -ish in English). For example, there is kijani "green", from jani "leaf" (compare English 'leafy'), kichaka "bush" from chaka "clump", and kivuli "shadow" from uvuli "shade". A 'little bit' of a verb would be an instance of an action, and such instantiations (usually not very active ones) are found: kifo "death", from the verb -fa "to die"; kiota "nest" from -ota "to brood"; chakula "food" from kula "to eat"; kivuko "a ford,
234-756: A Monkey ;" " Mwalimu Goso, " "Goso the Teacher," a cumulative tale ; and " Sungura na Simba, " "The Hare and the Lion," a story about the trickster hare . Here are some of the proverbs that Steere recorded in Swahili: Here are some of the riddles that Steere recorded in Swahili: Zaramo Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include
312-572: A crossing over the Kingani River. The German defences of Bagamoyo included trenches along the shore, around the Arab and German forts, and on a hill just south of the town. German artillery included at least two small field guns on the shore, plus one of the 105 mm naval guns that had been salvaged from the cruiser SMS Königsberg , and installed in an emplacement on the hill with 100 rounds of ammunition. Königsberg ' s gun engaged
390-407: A destination for recreation and rest. The original settlement, Kaole , was founded c. 800 CE, and grew into an important trading town by the 13th century. The Kaole Ruins contain the remnants of two mosques and 30 tombs , dated back to the 13th century. Until the 18th century, Bagamoyo, the settlement 5 kilometres (3 mi) north of Kaole , was a small trading center where most of
468-467: A fraction of that. According to other sources, around 40% of the Swahili vocabulary comes from Arabic. What also remained unconsidered was that a good number of the borrowed terms had Bantu equivalents. The preferred use of Arabic loan words is prevalent along the coast, where local people, in a cultural show of proximity to, or descent from Arab culture, would rather use loan words, whereas the people in
546-736: A historical process in which /l/ became elided between the second last and last vowels of a word (for example, kondoo , "sheep" was originally kondolo , which survives in certain dialects ). As a consequence, long vowels are not considered phonemic . A similar process exists in Zulu . Where not shown, the orthography is the same as IPA. Some dialects of Swahili may also have the aspirated phonemes /pʰ tʰ tʃʰ kʰ bʱ dʱ dʒʱ ɡʱ/ though they are unmarked in Swahili's orthography. Multiple studies favour classifying prenasalization as consonant clusters, not as separate phonemes. Historically, nasalization has been lost before voiceless consonants, and subsequently
624-451: A large amount of grammar, vocabulary, and sounds inherited from the Sabaki language . In fact, while taking account of daily vocabulary, using lists of one hundred words, 72–91% were inherited from the Sabaki language (which is reported as a parent language) whereas 4–17% were loan words from other African languages. Only 2–8% were from non-African languages, and Arabic loan words constituted
702-481: A load off your heart." Your load is supposed to be lifted by the words in order to help you feel at peace. This is a reference to Bagamoyo's renown as a town of porters in the nineteenth century. The mediaeval settlement served as the destination for thousands of porters who travelled with the caravan and carried, on average, 70-pound loads across their shoulders, principally ivory tusks. After a taxing journey and months of hiking over dangerous terrain, Bagamoyo appealed as
780-522: A major role in spreading both Christianity and Islam in East Africa . From their arrival in East Africa, Arabs brought Islam and set up madrasas , where they used Swahili to teach Islam to the natives. As the Arab presence grew, more and more natives converted to Islam and were taught using the Swahili language. From the arrival of Europeans in East Africa, Christianity was introduced to
858-578: A means of national integration in Tanzania. Key activities mandated for the organisation include creating a healthy atmosphere for the development of Swahili, encouraging use of the language in government and business functions, coordinating activities of other organisations involved with Swahili, standardising the language. BAKITA vision are: "1.To efficiently manage and coordinate the development and use of Kiswahili in Tanzania 2.To participate fully and effectively in promoting Swahili in East Africa, Africa and
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#1732780487210936-652: A pass" from -vuka "to cross"; and kilimia "the Pleiades ", from -limia "to farm with", from its role in guiding planting. A resemblance, or being a bit like something, implies marginal status in a category, so things that are marginal examples of their class may take the ki-/vi- prefixes. One example is chura ( ki-ura ) "frog", which is only half terrestrial and therefore is marginal as an animal. This extension may account for disabilities as well: kilema "a cripple", kipofu "a blind person", kiziwi "a deaf person". Finally, diminutives often denote contempt, and contempt
1014-433: A prenasalized consonant, they are pronounced as [e] , [ɪ] , [o] , and [ʊ] . E is also commonly pronounced as mid-position after w . Polomé claims that /ɑ/ is pronounced as such only after w and is pronounced as [a] in other situations, especially after /j/ ( y ). A can be pronounced as [ə] in word-final position. Long vowels in Swahili are written as doubled vowels (for example, kondoo , "sheep") due to
1092-468: A second language spoken by tens of millions of people in the five African Great Lakes countries ( Kenya , DRC , Rwanda , Uganda , and Tanzania ), where it is an official or national language. It is also the first language for many people in Tanzania, especially in the coastal regions of Tanga, Pwani, Dar es Salaam, Mtwara and Lindi. In the inner regions of Tanzania, Swahili is spoken with an accent influenced by other local languages and dialects. There, it
1170-626: A subject in schools or have developed plans to do so. Shikomor (or Comorian ), an official language in Comoros and also spoken in Mayotte ( Shimaore ), is closely related to Swahili and is sometimes considered a dialect of Swahili, although other authorities consider it a distinct language. In 2022, based on Swahili's growth as a prominent international language, the United Nations declared Swahili Language Day as 7 July to commemorate
1248-462: A substitute for k in advertisements. There are also several digraphs for Arabic sounds, which many speakers outside of ethnic Swahili areas have trouble differentiating. The language used to be primarily written in the Ajami script , which is an Arabic script. Much literature was produced in this script. With the introduction of Latin, the use of Ajami script has been diminished significantly. However,
1326-516: A system of concord but, if the noun refers to a human, they accord with noun classes 1–2 regardless of their noun class. Verbs agree with the noun class of their subjects and objects; adjectives, prepositions and demonstratives agree with the noun class of their nouns. In Standard Swahili (Kiswahili sanifu) , based on the dialect spoken in Zanzibar, the system is rather complex; however, it is drastically simplified in many local variants where Swahili
1404-695: A variety of gender-concord prefixes. This list is based on Swahili and Sabaki: a linguistic history . Modern standard Swahili, written in Latin, is based on Kiunguja, the dialect spoken in Zanzibar City . Swahili literature and poetry, traditionally written in Swahili Ajami , is based on Kiamu , the dialect of Lamu on the Kenyan Coast. But there are numerous other dialects of Swahili, some of which are mutually unintelligible, such as
1482-666: Is a compulsory subject in all Kenyan primary and secondary schools. Swahili is recognized as a national language in the Democratic Republic of The Congo and is widely spoken in the eastern regions. The local dialects of Swahili in Congo are known as Congo Swahili and differ considerably from Standard Swahili. In order to strengthen political ties with other East African Community nations, both Kiswahili and English have been taught in Burundian elementary schools since
1560-550: Is a first language for most of the people who are born in the cities, whilst being spoken as a second language in rural areas. Swahili and closely related languages are spoken by relatively small numbers of people in Burundi , Comoros , Malawi , Mozambique , Zambia and Rwanda . The language was still understood in the southern ports of the Red Sea in the 20th century. The East African Community created an institution called
1638-434: Is an active body part, and mto is an active natural force, but they are also both long and thin. Things with a trajectory, such as mpaka 'border' and mwendo 'journey', are classified with long thin things, as in many other languages with noun classes. This may be further extended to anything dealing with time, such as mwaka 'year' and perhaps mshahara 'wages'. Animals exceptional in some way and so not easily fitting in
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#17327804872101716-540: Is disputed whether this refers to the slave trade which passed through the town (i.e. "give up all hope") or to the porters who rested in Bagamoyo after carrying 16-kilogram (35 lb) cargoes on their shoulders from the Great Lakes region (i.e. "take the load off and rest"). There is considerable debate regarding the extent of the slave trade as a major export in Bagamoyo, with archival analysis suggesting that ivory
1794-597: Is generally only spoken by Somali nationals who have resided in Kenya and subsequently returned to Somalia. Lastly, a closely related language Mushunguli (also known as Zigula, Zigua, or Chizigua) is spoken by some of the Somali Bantu ethnic minority mostly living in the Jubba Valley . It is classified as a Northeast Coast Bantu language as Swahili is and has some intelligibility with Swahili. Swahili played
1872-575: Is not a native language, such as in Nairobi. In non-native Swahili, concord reflects only animacy: human subjects and objects trigger a-, wa- and m-, wa- in verbal concord, while non-human subjects and objects of whatever class trigger i-, zi- . Infinitives vary between standard ku- and reduced i-. ("Of" is animate wa and inanimate ya, za. ) In Standard Swahili, human subjects and objects of whatever class trigger animacy concord in a-, wa- and m-, wa-, and non-human subjects and objects trigger
1950-430: Is one of the early developers. The applications include a spelling checker , part-of-speech tagging , a language learning software , an analysed Swahili text corpus of 25 million words, an electronic dictionary , and machine translation between Swahili and English. The development of language technology also strengthens the position of Swahili as a modern medium of communication. Furthermore, Swahili Misplaced Pages
2028-556: Is one of the few Wikipedias in an African language that features a substantial number of contributors and articles. The widespread use of Swahili as a national language in Tanzania came after Tanganyika gained independence in 1961 and the government decided that it would be used as a language to unify the new nation. This saw the use of Swahili in all levels of government, trade, art as well as schools in which primary school children are taught in Swahili, before switching to English (medium of instruction) in secondary schools (although Swahili
2106-602: Is one of three official languages (the others being English and French) of the East African Community (EAC) countries, namely Burundi , Democratic Republic of the Congo , Kenya , Rwanda , Somalia , South Sudan , Tanzania , and Uganda . It is the lingua franca of other areas in the African Great Lakes region and East and Southern Africa . Swahili is also one of the working languages of
2184-960: Is sometimes expressed against things that are dangerous. This might be the historical explanation for kifaru " rhinoceros ", kingugwa " spotted hyena ", and kiboko " hippopotamus " (perhaps originally meaning "stubby legs"). Another class with broad semantic extension is the m-/mi- class (Bantu classes 3/4). This is often called the 'tree' class, because mti, miti "tree(s)" is the prototypical example. However, it seems to cover vital entities neither human nor typical animals: trees and other plants, such as mwitu 'forest' and mtama 'millet' (and from there, things made from plants, like mkeka 'mat'); supernatural and natural forces, such as mwezi 'moon', mlima 'mountain', mto 'river'; active things, such as moto 'fire', including active body parts ( moyo 'heart', mkono 'hand, arm'); and human groups, which are vital but not themselves human, such as mji 'village', and, by analogy, mzinga 'beehive/cannon'. From
2262-567: Is spoken along the Benadir coast by the Bravanese people . Another Swahili dialect known as Kibajuni also serves as the mother tongue of the Bajuni minority ethnic group, which lives in the tiny Bajuni Islands as well as the southern Kismayo region. In Oman , there are an estimated 52,000 people who speak Swahili as of 2020. Most are descendants of those repatriated after the fall of
2340-582: Is still taught as an independent subject). After Tanganyika and Zanzibar unification in 1964, Taasisi ya Uchunguzi wa Kiswahili (TUKI, Institute of Swahili Research) was created from the Interterritorial Language Committee. In 1970 TUKI was merged with the University of Dar es Salaam , while Baraza la Kiswahili la Taifa (BAKITA) was formed. BAKITA is an organisation dedicated to the development and advocacy of Swahili as
2418-855: The African Union and of the Southern African Development Community . The East African Community created an institution called the East African Kiswahili Commission (EAKC) which began operations in 2015. The institution currently serves as the leading body for promoting the language in the East African region , as well as for coordinating its development and usage for regional integration and sustainable development. In recent years South Africa , Botswana , Namibia , Ethiopia , and South Sudan have begun offering Swahili as
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2496-495: The East African coast and adjacent littoral islands). Estimates of the number of Swahili speakers, including both native and second-language speakers, vary widely. They generally range from 60 million to 150 million; with most of its native speakers residing in Tanzania. Swahili has a significant number of loanwords from other languages, mainly Arabic , as well as from Portuguese , English and German . Around 40% of Swahili vocabulary consists of Arabic loanwords, including
2574-532: The Sultanate of Zanzibar . There are Swahili-based slangs, pidgins and creoles: In 1870, Edward Steere published Swahili Tales as Told by Natives of Zanzibar , a collection of 23 Swahili tales with facing-text English translation, along with a selection of proverbs and riddles. Some of the tales included are: " Kisa cha Punda wa Dobi, " "The Story of the Washerman's Donkey," also known as " The Heart of
2652-526: The Tanganyika African National Union used Swahili as a language of mass organisation and political movement. This included publishing pamphlets and radio broadcasts to rally the people to fight for independence. After gaining independence, Swahili was adopted as the national language. To this day, Tanzanians carry a sense of pride when it comes to Swahili, especially when it is used to unite over 120 tribes across Tanzania. Swahili
2730-453: The protected cruiser HMS Talbot on 1 August and battleship HMS Vengeance on 4 August. Before dawn on 15 August a flotilla anchored off Bagamoyo that included Vengeance , the protected cruiser Challenger , the monitors Severn and Mersey , the armed merchant cruiser Himalaya , and several auxiliary ships . The Royal Navy landed a force of 176 armed sailors, 65 Royal Marines and 55 Zanzibar Rifles to attack
2808-473: The Arabic script (an unmodified version as opposed to proposals such as that of Mwalimu Sikujua) was relatively high. There were also differences in orthographic conventions between cities and authors and over the centuries, some quite precise but others different enough to cause difficulties with intelligibility. Thus despite a lack of official governmental backing, attempts at standardization and Swahilization of
2886-482: The Arabic script continued into the 20th century. Swahili nouns are separable into classes , which are roughly analogous to genders in other languages. In Swahili, prefixes mark groups of similar objects: ⟨m-⟩ marks single human beings ( mtoto 'child'), ⟨wa-⟩ marks multiple humans ( watoto 'children'), ⟨u-⟩ marks abstract nouns ( utoto 'childhood'), and so on. And just as adjectives and pronouns must agree with
2964-569: The East African Kiswahili Commission (EAKC) which began operations in 2015. The institution currently serves as the leading body for promoting the language in the East African region , as well as for coordinating its development and usage for regional integration and sustainable development. Swahili is among the first languages in Africa for which language technology applications have been developed. Arvi Hurskainen
3042-548: The German Governor's house. The remainder of the town fell to British forces thereafter. British forces lost one Royal Marine officer and ten men. German forces lost two officers and ten men, and another 19 were captured by the British. Bagamoyo is a center for dhow sailboat building. The Department of Antiquities in Tanzania is working to maintain the ruins of the colonial era in and around Bagamoyo and to revitalize
3120-465: The academic year 2005/2006. Kiswahili is now used widely in Burundi but is not recognised as an official language; only French, Kirundi, and English have this distinction. Since 2013, Swahili has been included in the all Burundian education system. Uganda adopted Kiswahili as one of its official languages (alongside English ) in 2022, and also made it compulsory across primary and secondary schools in
3198-611: The alphabet system from Arabic to Latin. After the First World War, Britain took over German East Africa, where they found Swahili rooted in most areas, not just the coastal regions. The British decided to formalise it as the language to be used across the East African region (although in British East Africa [Kenya and Uganda] most areas used English and various Nilotic and other Bantu languages while Swahili
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3276-459: The central idea of tree , which is thin, tall, and spreading, comes an extension to other long or extended things or parts of things, such as mwavuli 'umbrella', moshi 'smoke', msumari 'nail'; and from activity there even come active instantiations of verbs, such as mfuo "metal forging", from -fua "to forge", or mlio "a sound", from -lia "to make a sound". Words may be connected to their class by more than one metaphor. For example, mkono
3354-515: The coast of East Africa played a role in the growth and spread of Swahili. With the arrival of the Arabs in East Africa, they used Swahili as a language of trade as well as for teaching Islam to the local Bantu peoples . This resulted in Swahili first being written in the Arabic script. The later contact with the Portuguese resulted in the increase of vocabulary of the Swahili language. The language
3432-522: The colony in 1891. The town was apparently where SS-Oberführer Julian Scherner was born in 1895. When the German Empire decided to build a narrow gauge railway from Dar es Salaam into the interior in 1905, Bagamoyo's importance began to decline. In the East African campaign of World War I , British and Empire forces attacked Bagamoyo in August 1916. The Royal Navy bombarded the town with
3510-468: The country. The Swahili language is not widespread in Somalia and has no official status nationally or regionally. Dialects of Swahili are spoken by some ethnic minorities on the Bajuni islands in the form of Kibajuni on the southern tip of the country and in the town of Brava in the form of Chimwiini ; both contain a significant amount of Somali and Italian loanwords. Standard Swahili
3588-605: The country. Bagamoyo is home to many ethnic groups, including the Wakwere , Wazaramo , Wazigua, Maasai , and Waswahili . Although Swahili culture dominates, many different cultures coexist in Bagamoyo, including people of Arab descent. In 2018, the new port construction began that will transform the area. In 2013, a large two berth intermodal container deepwater port terminal was proposed by Tanzanian government. Called Bagamoyo Port , it will be constructed at Mbegani , near Bagamoyo. China planned to invest US$ 10B to make Bagamoyo
3666-523: The date that Julius Nyerere adopted Swahili as a unifying language for African independence struggles. Swahili is a Bantu language of the Sabaki branch . In Guthrie's geographic classification , Swahili is in Bantu zone G, whereas the other Sabaki languages are in zone E70, commonly under the name Nyika. Historical linguists consider the Arabic influence on Swahili to be significant, since it takes around 15% of its vocabulary directly from Arabic , and
3744-481: The entire world over". Although other bodies and agencies can propose new vocabularies, BAKITA is the only organisation that can approve its usage in the Swahili language. Tanzanians are highly credited for shaping the language to appear the way it is now. In Kenya, Kiswahili has been the national language since 1964 and is official since 2010. Chama cha Kiswahili cha Taifa (CHAKITA) was established in 1998 to research and promote Kiswahili language in Kenya. Kiswahili
3822-508: The following: Maho (2009) considers these to be distinct languages: The rest of the dialects are divided by him into two groups: Maho includes the various Comorian dialects as a third group. Most other authorities consider Comorian to be a Sabaki language, distinct from Swahili. In Somalia , where the Afroasiatic Somali language predominates, a variant of Swahili referred to as Chimwiini (also known as Chimbalazi)
3900-442: The former are kisu "knife", kiti "chair" (from mti "tree, wood"), chombo "vessel" (a contraction of ki-ombo ). Examples of the latter are kitoto "infant", from mtoto "child"; kitawi "frond", from tawi "branch"; and chumba ( ki-umba ) "room", from nyumba "house". It is the diminutive sense that has been furthest extended. An extension common to diminutives in many languages is approximation and resemblance (having
3978-482: The gender of nouns in some languages with grammatical gender, so in Swahili adjectives, pronouns and even verbs must agree with nouns. This is a characteristic feature of all the Bantu languages . The ki-/vi- class historically consisted of two separate genders, artefacts (Bantu class 7/8, utensils and hand tools mostly) and diminutives (Bantu class 12/13), which were conflated at a stage ancestral to Swahili. Examples of
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#17327804872104056-583: The interior tend to use the Bantu equivalents. It was originally written in Arabic script . The earliest known documents written in Swahili are letters written in Kilwa , Tanzania , in 1711 in the Arabic script that were sent to the Portuguese of Mozambique and their local allies. The original letters are preserved in the Historical Archives of Goa, India . Various colonial powers that ruled on
4134-463: The language continues to have a tradition of being written in Arabic script. Starting from the later half of the 19th century, continuing into the 20th century, and going on in the 21st century, a process of "Swahilization" of the Arabic Script has been underway by Swahili scribes and scholars. The first of such attempts was done by Mwalimu Sikujua , a scholar and poet from Mombasa . However,
4212-738: The mission was intended to house children who were rescued from slavery, but it soon expanded to a church, a school, and some workshops and farming projects. But Bagamoyo was not only a trade centre for ivory and copra ; it was also a starting point for renowned European explorers. From Bagamoyo they moved out to find the source of the River Nile and explored the African inner lakes. Some of these were Richard Francis Burton , John Hanning Speke , Henry Morton Stanley and James Augustus Grant . Although often believed so, David Livingstone had never been to Bagamoyo in his lifetime. Only after his death he
4290-456: The monitors Severn and Mersey , which were some distance out to sea, but it could not be lowered enough to engage vessels nearer the shore. Three smaller Royal Navy vessels, including the armed tugboat HMS Helmuth , got within 500 metres of the German gun and opened fire on it with their 3-pounder guns . A British machine gun section then attacked the hill, eventually forcing the German artillerymen to abandon their gun and retreat. This
4368-476: The most important port in Africa by 2017. The port is part of the Maritime Silk Road . In 2018, the project got the go ahead and work started in about June/July. It will be built in association with the state-owned China Merchants Port , it will include a special economic zone . The US$ 10bn project is backed by an Omani sovereign wealth fund. In 2019 Tanzanian President John Magufuli announced
4446-663: The most important trading ports for the Germans along the East African coast along the west of the Indian Ocean in the late 19th and early 20th century. Bagamoyo lies 75 kilometres (47 miles) north of Dar-es-Salaam on the coast of the Zanzibar Channel , across from the island of Zanzibar . The town hosts Bagamoyo Historic Town , that is a National Historic Site of Tanzania . In 2011, the town had 82,578 inhabitants. In Kiswahili, Bagamoyo's name translates to "take
4524-402: The name of the language ( سَوَاحِلي sawāḥilī , a plural adjectival form of an Arabic word meaning 'of the coasts'). The loanwords date from the era of contact between Arab traders and the Bantu inhabitants of the east coast of Africa, which was also the time period when Swahili emerged as a lingua franca in the region. Due to concerted efforts by the government of Tanzania , Swahili
4602-494: The native population and by trading in salt, gathered from the Nunge coast north of Bagamoyo. In the first half of the 19th century, Bagamoyo became a trading port for ivory and slave , with traders coming from the African interior – places as far as Morogoro , Lake Tanganyika and Usambara - on their way to Zanzibar . This explains the meaning of the word Bagamoyo ("Bwaga-Moyo") which means "Lay down your Heart" in Swahili . It
4680-405: The original emphatic consonants /dˤ, sˤ, tˤ, ðˤ/ and the uvular /q/ , or lengthening a vowel, where aspiration would be used in inherited Bantu words. Swahili is now written in the Latin alphabet. There are a few digraphs for native sounds, ch , sh , ng ' and ny ; q and x are not used, c is not used apart from the digraph ch , unassimilated English loans and, occasionally, as
4758-626: The other classes may be placed in this class. The other classes have foundations that may at first seem similarly counterintuitive. In short, Borrowings may or may not be given a prefix corresponding to the semantic class they fall in. For example, Arabic دود dūd ("bug, insect") was borrowed as mdudu , plural wadudu , with the class 1/2 prefixes m- and wa- , but Arabic فلوس fulūs ("fish scales", plural of فلس fals ) and English sloth were borrowed as simply fulusi (" mahi-mahi " fish) and slothi (" sloth "), with no prefix associated with animals (whether those of class 9/10 or 1/2). In
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#17327804872104836-608: The population were fishermen and farmers. Their main trading goods were fish, salt and gum, among others. Around the 17th century this area began growing in prosperity and by the 18th century it was an important stop in the caravan and slave trade, acquiring the name Bagamoyo. It became the most important trading entrepot of the east central coast of Africa in the late 19th century. In the late 18th century, Muslim families settled in Bagamoyo, all of which were relatives of Shamvi la Magimba in Oman . They made their living by enforcing taxes on
4914-521: The process of naturalization of borrowings within Swahili, loanwords are often reinterpreted, or reanalysed, as if they already contain a Swahili class prefix. In such cases the interpreted prefix is changed with the usual rules. Consider the following loanwords from Arabic: Similarly, English wire and Arabic وقت waqt ("time") were interpreted as having the class 11 prevocalic prefix w- , and became waya and wakati with plural nyaya and nyakati respectively. Swahili phrases agree with nouns in
4992-407: The region. While the Arabs were mostly based in the coastal areas, European missionaries went further inland spreading Christianity. As the first missionary posts in East Africa were in the coastal areas, missionaries picked up Swahili and used it to spread Christianity, since it contained many similarities with other indigenous languages in the region. During the struggle for Tanganyika independence,
5070-421: The specifics, it has been historically purported that around 16–20% of the Swahili vocabulary is derived from loan words, the vast majority Arabic , but also other contributing languages, including Persian , Hindustani , Portuguese , and Malay . Omani Arabic is the source of most Arabic loanwords in Swahili. In the text "Early Swahili History Reconsidered". However, Thomas Spear noted that Swahili retains
5148-549: The spread of a standardized indigenous variation of Arabic script for Swahili was hampered by the colonial takeover of East Africa by the United Kingdom and Germany . The usage of Arabic script was suppressed in German East Africa and to a lesser extent in British East Africa . Nevertheless, well into the 1930s and 1940s, rural literacy rate in Arabic script as well as a local preference to write Swahili in
5226-604: The suspension of the project. Bagamoyo is served by the Bagamoyo Daladala stand near Bagamoyo road south east of Bagamoyo. Bagamoyo hosts the Bagamoyo Arts and Cultural Institute . Swahili language Swahili , also known by its local name Kiswahili , is a Bantu language originally spoken by the Swahili people , who are found primarily in Tanzania , Kenya , and Mozambique (along
5304-462: The town. A kite balloon flown by HMS Manica directed a naval bombardment of German positions ashore. A seaplane from Himalaya bombed German trenches in the town, and then assisted in directing naval gunnery. The Imperial German Army defended Bagamoyo with 60 German troops and 350 Askari Schutztruppe , commanded by German officers. However, many of the defenders were at Mtoni , about 6 kilometres (4 mi) west of Bagamoyo, defending
5382-499: The town. In 2006, the department applied for World Heritage Site status, in the cultural category. The Bagamoyo College of Arts ("Chuo cha Sanaa") has been an internationally famous arts college in Tanzania, teaching traditional Tanzanian painting, sculpture, drama, dancing, and drumming. In 2007 based on the college, the Bagamoyo Arts and Cultural Institute (TaSUBa) was established. Its history and proximity to Dar es Salaam has led Bagamoyo to be more diverse than some other areas of
5460-401: The voiced consonants have devoiced, though they are still written mb, nd etc. The /r/ phoneme is realised as either a short trill [ r ] or more commonly as a single tap [ ɾ ] by most speakers. [x] exists in free variation with h, and is only distinguished by some speakers. In some Arabic loans (nouns, verbs, adjectives), emphasis or intensity is expressed by reproducing
5538-480: Was formalised in an institutional level when the Germans took over after the Berlin conference . After seeing there was already a widespread language, the Germans formalised it as the official language to be used in schools. Thus schools in Swahili are called Shule (from German Schule ) in government, trade and the court system. With the Germans controlling the major Swahili-speaking region in East Africa, they changed
5616-495: Was initially spread by Arab slave traders along the East African coast. The word `Swahili' comes from an Arabic name for the area, meaning "coasts": The core of the Swahili language originates in Bantu languages of the coast of East Africa. Much of Swahili's Bantu vocabulary has cognates in the Unguja , Pemba , and Mijikenda languages and, to a lesser extent, other East African Bantu languages . While opinions vary on
5694-635: Was laid out in the Old Church's tower (nowadays named Livingston Tower) to wait for the high tide to come in and ship his body to Zanzibar. Bagamoyo was the first capital of the colony while serving as the German headquarters of German East Africa (first under the auspices of the German East African Company and then the German Imperial Government) between 1886–1891. Dar es Salaam became the new capital of
5772-586: Was mostly restricted to the coast). In June 1928, an inter-territorial conference attended by representatives of Kenya , Tanganyika , Uganda , and Zanzibar took place in Mombasa . The Zanzibar dialect was chosen as standard Swahili for those areas, and the standard orthography for Swahili was adopted. Estimates of the total number of first- and second-language Swahili speakers vary widely, from as low as 50 million to as high as 200 million, but generally range from 60 million to 150 million. Swahili has become
5850-562: Was officially prohibited in the year 1873, but continued surreptitiously to the end of the 19th century. In 1868, Bagamoyo local rulers, known as majumbe, presented the Catholic " Fathers of the Holy Ghost " with land for a mission north of the town, the first mission in East Africa. This caused resistance by the native Zaramo people which was mediated by representatives of Sultan Majid and, after 1870, by Sultan Barghash . Originally
5928-567: Was the first of Königsberg ' s guns to be captured by British forces. Many civilians, whatever their religion, took refuge in the church at the Catholic mission. One British 12-inch shell hit the church, damaging the baptistry , and the two priests in charge of the mission moved the civilians to the Mission House. By the evening, German forces were retreating from their trenches. Royal Marines, supported by Zanzibar Rifles, captured
6006-402: Was the primary export over slaves, and that many of the caravan porters on the ivory route were free wage laborers as opposed to slaves. However, the history of the slave trade features prominently in the shared culture of its residents and organizations such as UNESCO emphasize its importance as a cultural heritage site memorializing the slave trade in East Africa. The slave trade in East Africa
6084-571: Was used to strengthen solidarity within the nation, and remains to be a key identity of the Tanzanian people. Standard Swahili has five vowel phonemes : /ɑ/ , /ɛ/ , /i/ , /ɔ/ , and /u/ . According to Ellen Contini-Morava , vowels are never reduced , regardless of stress . However, according to Edgar Polomé , these five phonemes can vary in pronunciation. Polomé claims that /ɛ/ , /i/ , /ɔ/ , and /u/ are pronounced as such only in stressed syllables. In unstressed syllables, as well as before
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