The Datooga, (''Wamang'ati'' in
Swahili), are a pastoralist
Nilotic people of based in
Manyara Region, south west
Arusha Region, and northern
Singida Region
Singida Region (''Mkoa wa Singida'' in Swahili) is one of the regions of Tanzania. The regional capital is the municipality of Singida. The region is bordered to the north by Shinyanga Region, Simiyu Region and Arusha Region, to the northeast ...
of
Tanzania
Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands ...
. In 2000 the Datooga population was estimated to number 87,978.
History
Origins
Linguistic evidence points to the eastern
Middle Nile Basin south of the
Abbai River, as the nursery of the
Nilotic languages. That is to say south-east of present-day
Khartoum
Khartoum or Khartum ( ; ar, الخرطوم, Al-Khurṭūm, din, Kaartuɔ̈m) is the capital of Sudan. With a population of 5,274,321, its metropolitan area is the largest in Sudan. It is located at the confluence of the White Nile, flowing n ...
.
[Ehret, Christopher. An African Classical Age: Eastern & Southern Africa in World History 1000 B.C. to A.D.400. University of Virginia, 1998, p.7]
It is thought that beginning in the
second millennium B.C., particular Nilotic speaking communities began to move southward into present-day South Sudan where most settled and that the societies today referred to as the
Southern Nilotes pushed further on, reaching what is present-day north-eastern Uganda by 1000 B.C.
Linguist Christopher Ehret proposes that between 1000 and 700 BC, the
Southern Nilotic
The Southern Nilotic languages are spoken mainly in western Kenya and northern Tanzania (with one of them, Kupsabiny or Sapiny, being spoken on the Ugandan side of Mount Elgon). They form a division of the larger Nilotic language family, along ...
speaking communities, who kept domestic stock and possibly cultivated sorghum and finger millet,
[Clark, J., & Brandt, St]
From Hunters to Farmers: The Causes and Consequences of Food Production in Africa
University of California Press, 1984, p.234
lived next to an Eastern Cushitic speaking community with whom they had significant cultural interaction. The general location of this point of cultural exchange being somewhere near the common border between Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, and Ethiopia.
He suggests that the cultural exchange perceived in borrowed loan words, adoption of the practice of circumcision and the
cyclical system of age-set organisation dates to this period.
Linguist Christopher Ehret suggests that around the fifth and sixth centuries BC, the speakers of the Southern Nilotic languages split into two major divisions - the proto-Kalenjin and the proto-Datooga. The former took shape among those residing to the north of the Mau range while the latter took shape among sections that moved into the Mara and Loita plains south of the western highlands.
[Ehret, C., History and the Testimony of Language, p.118]
Recent History
There are at least seven Datooga tribes:
* Bajuta
* Gisamjanga (Kisamajeng, Gisamjang)
*
Barabayiiga (Barabaig, Barabayga, Barabaik, Barbaig)
* Asimjeeg (Tsimajeega, Isimijeega)
* Rootigaanga (Rotigenga, Rotigeenga)
* Buraadiiga (Buradiga, Bureadiga)
* Bianjiida (Biyanjiida, Utatu)
The dialects of the
Datooga language are often divergent enough to make comprehension difficult, though Barabayiiga and Gisamjanga are very close. The Datooga have interacted with neighboring ethnic groups since at least the 19th century, and the Datooga leader
Saigilo
Saigilo ( fl. 1890) was a Datooga King and medicine man known for his skill in thaumaturgy and divination, which has led to his establishment as a folk figure within Iraqw and Datooga society in present day Karatu District in Arusha Region, n ...
is widely known throughout region.
See Also
*
Sukuma people
References
{{authority control
Ethnic groups in Tanzania
Indigenous peoples of East Africa