Nguni
-
Who are the Nguni people?
The Nguni are a cluster of related Bantu-speaking ethnic groups residing in South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe. Their ancestors occupied a broad upland territory from the Great Fish River to Kosi Bay. Though they originally spoke a common Bantu language, distinct languages like Xhosa, Zulu, and Swati developed later.
At the start of the 19th century, the Nguni were divided into political entities, each with a chief. They cultivated millet and kept cattle, which played both a subsistence and social role. Men were associated with cattle husbandry, while women handled hoe cultivation. They followed patrilineal descent, virilocal residence, and exogamous marriage, with wives obtained through cattle as bridewealth.
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
Where do the Nguni people mainly live?
The Nguni people primarily reside in South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe. Their ancestors occupied a broad upland territory from the Great Fish River in the Eastern Cape to Kosi Bay, near KwaZulu/Natal province and Mozambique.
However, the Nguni speakers have become a major part of the economy and can be found as urban dwellers throughout South Africa, due to industrialization that has occurred since the discovery of gold deposits in 1886.
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What languages do the Nguni people speak?
The Nguni ethnic groups, located in South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe, speak related Bantu languages. Though the people of this zone originally spoke a Bantu language in common, distinct Bantu languages such as Xhosa, Zulu, and Swati developed during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These languages are unique among Bantu languages because they have imploded "clicking" phonemes that were integrated through intermarriage with Khoisan-speaking people.
3 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What are the main groups or subgroups within the Nguni people?
The Nguni people are a cluster of related Bantu-speaking ethnic groups residing in South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe. They are identified by their mutually intelligible dialects, such as Xhosa, Zulu, and Swati.
At the start of the 19th century, the Nguni were divided into political entities such as the Ndlambe, Gcaleka, Thembu, Mpondo, Mpondomise, Bhaca, Hlubi, Mtethwa, and Zulu. The Swazi nation is an amalgamation of more than 70 clans. The largest clan, the Dlamini, is the traditional hierarchy under the ngwenyama and ndlovukazi.
6 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What are some important customs or traditions of the Nguni people?
The Nguni people, residing in South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe, share several important customs and traditions. Cattle play a significant social role, and are used in the transfer of bridewealth (lobola).
There is a distinct division of labor, where women handle hoe cultivation and men manage cattle. The Nguni follow patrilineal descent, virilocal residence, and exogamous marriage.
Life cycle events such as birth, puberty, marriage, and death are commemorated with feasts and festivals. The transition into adulthood is celebrated through various rituals.
4 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
How have the Nguni people influenced the history and culture of southern Africa?
The Nguni people, a cluster of Bantu-speaking groups in southern Africa, have significantly shaped the region's history and culture.
At the start of the 19th century, the Nguni were divided into a number of political entities. Each had its own chief, who was drawn from any of a number of recognized chiefly lineages that had both political and ritual powers.
Shaka's Zulu empire spurred the Mfecane, a period of wars and resettlement that led to the formation of new states and military strategies across southern and central Africa. Nguni speakers are now a major part of South Africa's economy, found in urban areas throughout the country.
The Zulu nation, a branch of the Nguni, has close ties with the Swazi and Xhosa. Traditional Zulu religion involves ancestor worship and beliefs in a creator god. Despite urbanization, many Zulu maintain pride in their traditional culture.
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
Nguni, cluster of related Bantu-speaking ethnic groups living in South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe, whose ancestors inhabited a broad band of upland territory extending from the Great Fish River, in what is now Eastern Cape province, northward to Kosi Bay, near the border of KwaZulu/Natal province and Mozambique, that paralleled the Indian Ocean. Although the people of this zone originally spoke a Bantu language in common, with only subtle and gradual linguistic variations, distinct (and mostly mutually unintelligible) Bantu languages developed during the late 19th and early 20th centuries—e.g., Xhosa, Zulu, and Swati (Swazi). The Nguni languages are unique among Bantu languages in that they have imploded “clicking” phonemes. These sounds were absorbed into the language through the Ngunis’ intermarriage with the area’s earlier, Khoisan-speaking peoples, whose languages were characterized by such click sounds.
At the start of the 19th century, the Nguni were divided into a number of political entities. Each had its own chief, who was drawn from any of a number of recognized chiefly lineages that had both political and ritual powers. These groups included the Ndlambe, Gcaleka, Thembu, Mpondo, Mpondomise, Bhaca, Hlubi, Mtethwa, and Zulu. The people dwelling in these polities cultivated millet and kept a large number of cattle, which had both a subsistence role and a social role in Nguni society. There was a distinct division of labour: women were associated with hoe cultivation and men with cattle husbandry. The Nguni followed patterns of patrilineal descent and virilocal residence and practiced exogamous marriage, with wives obtained legally through the transfer of cattle as bridewealth (lobola).
The Nguni way of life changed greatly during the 19th century. One of the major factors was the Mfecane (“Crushing”), a period of wars and resettlement begun in the 1820s by Shaka, king of the Zulu. Shaka created an expansive Zulu state that waged war on neighbouring peoples, causing them to be incorporated into the Zulu state or to flee as refugees. These refugees, copying the new military discipline and the strategy developed by Shaka, were able to conquer other African peoples and to establish new states throughout southern and central Africa. These included the Ndebele state in southwestern Zimbabwe, under Mzilikazi; the Gaza state in southern Mozambique, under Soshangane; the Swazi state in Swaziland, under the Dlhamini family; and a cluster of Ngoni states in Tanzania, Zambia, and Malawi, under the successors of the Ngoni leader Zwangendaba.
" height="20" alt="HEW Logo">
Another major event, less cataclysmic yet more far-reaching in its impact, was the gradual undermining of Nguni society by expanding European power. A series of wars was fought between the southern Nguni peoples and the Europeans in the Cape of Good Hope. In piecemeal fashion the southern Nguni were conquered, their lands occupied, and their cattle seized, thus forcing large numbers of Nguni men to become migrant labourers throughout southern Africa. This process, gradual at first, accelerated sharply in the period after 1886, when large gold deposits were discovered in the Witwatersrand.
The process of industrialization sparked by the gold mines has continued throughout the 20th century, requiring large numbers of workers. In this capacity, the Nguni speakers have become one of the main underpinnings of the economy and are found as urban people throughout South Africa, rather than exclusively in the areas from which they had originally derived.
Despite the urbanization of the Nguni, the South African government, through much of the 20th century, attempted to maintain “traditional” Nguni cultural institutions and chiefs in rural areas under its system of apartheid and separate black states. Many contemporary Nguni-speaking peoples, however, were born in urban areas and have little connection with the rural areas of their ancestors. In consequence of this development, Nguni may best be considered as a linguistic term, with its cultural associations largely eroded.