Fumo Liyongo or Liongo was a Swahili writer and chieftain on the northern part of the coast of East Africa sometime between the 9th and 13th centuries. He is celebrated as a hero, warrior, and poet in traditional poems, stories, and songs of the

Swahili people The Swahili people (, وَسوَحِيلِ) comprise mainly Bantu, Afro-Arab, and Comorian ethnic groups inhabiting the Swahili coast, an area encompassing the East African coast across southern Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania, and northern Mozambi ...

, many associated with

wedding A wedding is a ceremony in which two people are united in marriage. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnicity, ethnicities, Race (human categorization), races, religions, Religious denomination, denominations, Cou ...

ritual A ritual is a repeated, structured sequence of actions or behaviors that alters the internal or external state of an individual, group, or environment, regardless of conscious understanding, emotional context, or symbolic meaning. Traditionally ...

s and ''gungu'' dances. Liongo himself is credited with many such songs and poems.

Oral tradition Oral tradition, or oral lore, is a form of human communication in which knowledge, art, ideas and culture are received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another.Jan Vansina, Vansina, Jan: ''Oral Tradition as History'' (19 ...

is generally coherent in describing Liongo as a king or prince of

Pate Island Pate (Paté) Island () is located in the Indian Ocean close to the northern coast of Kenya, to which it belongs. It is the largest island in the Lamu Archipelago, which lie between the towns of Lamu and Kiunga in the former Coast Province. ...

. Several towns on the

Tanzania Tanzania, officially the United Republic of Tanzania, is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It is bordered by Uganda to the northwest; Kenya to the northeast; the Indian Ocean to the east; Mozambique and Malawi to t ...

n coast claim to be Liongo's birthplace. He is supposedly buried at Ozi.

Sources

Most of the literature on Liongo belongs to the

oral tradition Oral tradition, or oral lore, is a form of human communication in which knowledge, art, ideas and culture are received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another.Jan Vansina, Vansina, Jan: ''Oral Tradition as History'' (19 ...

but a few songs about Liongo, in an archaic form of Swahili transcribed into the

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

and

Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...

s, dating back to around the 13th century, provide valuable historical and

anthropological Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behaviour, wh ...

data. They describe ancient wedding rituals, the role of

palm wine Palm wine, known by several #Names, local names, is an alcoholic beverage created from the sap of various species of palm trees such as the Borassus, palmyra, date palms, and coconut palms. It is known by various names in different regions and ...

in ancient Swahili society, and gungu dances. Some narrate episodes from the hero's life, others are war hymns (for example, the ''Sifu Uta Wangu'' or "Song of the Warrior" in which Liongo celebrates the virtues of his bow). Liongo is often represented as a master of the art of

archery Archery is the sport, practice, or skill of using a Bow and arrow, bow to shooting, shoot arrows.Paterson ''Encyclopaedia of Archery'' p. 17 The word comes from the Latin ''arcus'', meaning bow. Historically, archery has been used for hunting ...

, sometimes in terms very close to the

Robin Hood Robin Hood is a legendary noble outlaw, heroic outlaw originally depicted in English folklore and subsequently featured in literature, theatre, and cinema. According to legend, he was a highly skilled archer and swordsman. In some versions o ...

tales. In one such story, a king organizes an archery tournament to lure Liongo into his court and seize him yet Liongo manages to win the tournament and escape. Some of the best known texts from the Liongo corpus are ''Liongo na Mmanga'', ''Hadithi ya Liongo'', and ''Sifu Uta Wangu''.

Historical basis

Many elements of the epics of Liongo appear to relate to the transition of the East African coastal society from

matrilinear Matrilineality, at times called matriliny, is the tracing of kinship through the female line. It may also correlate with a social system in which people identify with their matriline, their mother's lineage, and which can involve the inheritanc ...

Bantu Bantu may refer to: *Bantu languages, constitute the largest sub-branch of the Niger–Congo languages *Bantu peoples, over 400 peoples of Africa speaking a Bantu language * Bantu knots, a type of African hairstyle *Black Association for National ...

organization to a new

patrilinear Patrilineality, also known as the male line, the spear side or agnatic kinship, is a common kinship system in which an individual's family membership derives from and is recorded through their father's lineage. It generally involves the inheritanc ...

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

ic model. Liongo is sometimes described as a follower of traditional African beliefs and sometimes as a Muslim. This had led some scholars to suggest that he could have lived around the 13th century, when

Arabs Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world. Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of yea ...

and

Persians Persians ( ), or the Persian people (), are an Iranian ethnic group from West Asia that came from an earlier group called the Proto-Iranians, which likely split from the Indo-Iranians in 1800 BCE from either Afghanistan or Central Asia. They ...

began settling in East Africa and the Swahili culture began to take shape.

Character

Traditional stories of Liongo have many common traits with those of

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

an heroes such as

Achilles In Greek mythology, Achilles ( ) or Achilleus () was a hero of the Trojan War who was known as being the greatest of all the Greek warriors. The central character in Homer's ''Iliad'', he was the son of the Nereids, Nereid Thetis and Peleus, ...

Sigurd Sigurd ( ) or Siegfried (Middle High German: ''Sîvrit'') is a legendary hero of Germanic heroic legend, who killed a dragon — known in Nordic tradition as Fafnir () — and who was later murdered. In the Nordic countries, he is referred t ...

, and

. A strict prince and a mighty warrior, he was incredibly tall (almost a

giant In folklore, giants (from Ancient Greek: ''wiktionary:gigas, gigas'', cognate wiktionary:giga-, giga-) are beings of humanoid appearance, but are at times prodigious in size and strength or bear an otherwise notable appearance. The word ''gia ...

) and almost invulnerable. The best known part of his life is his fall from grace, either a consequence of the people's anger at his strictness or of a war of succession with his brother (or cousin), sometimes called Hemedi (Ahmad).{{Cite web , url=http://www.a-gallery.de/docs/mythology.htm , title=Myths, legends, beliefs and traditional stories from Africa , access-date=2010-10-22 , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081228024750/http://www.a-gallery.de/docs/mythology.htm , archive-date=2008-12-28 , url-status=dead As a consequence of his fall, Liongo was put in chains but began singing; his songs were also disguised messages to his mother. All the people began to dance (the ancestors of East African ''gungu'' dances) and, amid the confusion (and/or with the help of his mother), Liongo managed to escape. As is the case with Sigurd, Liongo was killed because of a betrayal. He was betrayed by his son, who had unveiled the secret of Liongo's invulnerability. The only thing that could kill him was a copper nail or pin piercing his

navel The navel (clinically known as the umbilicus; : umbilici or umbilicuses; also known as the belly button or tummy button) is a protruding, flat, or hollowed area on the abdomen at the attachment site of the umbilical cord. Structure The u ...

, a secret only known to Liongo himself and his mother Mbowe. Some sources report that when Liongo was killed by the copper pin he knelt, leaning against his bow, to die so that his death would not be seen.

Sources

Historical basis

Character

References

Further reading