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Concept
Mijikenda peoples
Summary
Mijikenda ("the Nine Tribes") are a group of nine related Bantu ethnic groups inhabiting the coast of Kenya, between the Sabaki and the Umba rivers, in an area stretching from the border with Tanzania in the south to the border near Somalia in the north. Archaeologist Chapuruka Kusimba contends that the Mijikenda formerly resided in coastal cities, but later settled in Kenya's hinterlands to avoid submission to dominant Portuguese forces that were then in control. Historically, these Mijikenda ethnic groups have been called the Nyika or Nika by outsiders. It is a derogatory term meaning "bush people."
The nine Ethnic groups that make up the Mijikenda peoples are the Chonyi, Kambe, Duruma, Kauma, Ribe, Rabai, Jibana, Giriama, and Digo. The Digo are southern Mijikenda while the others are northern Mijikenda. The Digo are also found in Tanzania due to their proximity to the common border.
Each of the Mijikenda groups has a sacred forest, a kaya, which is a place of prayer. Eleven of the approximately 30 kaya forests have been inscribed together as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Sacred Mijikenda Kaya Forests. Mijikenda people are also known for creating wooden kigango funerary statues which have been displayed in museums around the world and sold in the international art market. These artifacts were at one time legally sold by reputable art galleries and curio shops during the early 1970s to the 1990s; however, other kigango statues were found to have been stolen from cultural sites and illegally sold.
Each Mijikenda ethnic group has its own unique customs and dialects of the Mijikenda language, although the dialects are similar to each other and to Swahili.
The orthodox view of the Mijikenda's origins is that the Mijikenda peoples originated in Shungwaya (Singwaya) and various other parts of the northern Somali coast, and where pushed south by the Galla (Oromo) and reached Kenya around the 16th century. This view of the origins of the Mijikenda people was argued by Thomas Spear in the book The Kaya Complex, and was also confirmed by many Mijikenda oral traditions.
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