Masaba (''Lumasaaba''), sometimes known as Gisu (''Lugisu'') after one of its dialects, is a

Bantu language The Bantu languages (English: , Proto-Bantu language, Proto-Bantu: *bantʊ̀), or Ntu languages are a language family of about 600 languages of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern, East Africa, Eastern and Southeast Africa, South ...

spoken by more than two million people in East Africa. The Gisu dialect in eastern Uganda is mutually intelligible with

Bukusu The Bukusu people ( Bukusu: ''Babukusu'') are one of the 17 Kenyan tribes of the Luhya Bantu people of East Africa residing mainly in the counties of Bungoma and Trans Nzoia. They are the largest tribe of the Luhya nation, with 1,188,963 id ...

, spoken by ethnic

Luhya Luhya or Abaluyia may refer to: * Luhya people * Luhya language {{disambig Language and nationality disambiguation pages ...

in western Kenya. ''Masaba'' is the local name of Mount Elgon and the name of the son of the ancestor of the Gisu tribe. Like other Bantu languages, Lumasaba nouns are divided into several sets of noun classes. These are similar to the genders in Germanic and

Romance languages The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...

, except that instead of the usual two or three, there are around eighteen different noun classes. The language has a quite complex

verb A verb is a word that generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual description of English, the basic f ...

morphology.

Varieties

Varieties of Masaba are as follows:Maho (2009) *Gisu (''Lugisu'') *Kisu *

(''Lubukusu''; ethnic Luhya) *Syan *Tachoni (''Lutachoni''; ethnic Luhya) *Dadiri (''Ludadiri'') *Buya (''Lubuya'') Dadiri is spoken in the north, Gisu in the center, and Buya in the center and south of Masaba territory in Uganda. Bukusu is spoken in Kenya, separated from ethnic Masaba by Nilotic languages on the border.

Phonology

See Bukusu dialect for details of one variety of Masaba.

Consonants

* Sounds /k, ɡ, ŋ/ when before front vowels /i, e/ are heard as palatal , ɟ, ɲ * Sounds /i, u/ may be heard as glides

, j The comma is a punctuation mark that appears in several variants in different languages. Some typefaces render it as a small line, slightly curved or straight, but inclined from the vertical; others give it the appearance of a miniature fille ...

within initial vowel sequences.

Vowels

Masaba has a basic 5-vowel system consisting of /i, e, a, o, u/.

References

Bibliography

*Brown, Gillian (1972) ''Phonological Rules and Dialectal Variation: A study of the phonology of Lumasaaba''

External links

Kulomba Kwikumutikinyi
Portions of the

Book of Common Prayer The ''Book of Common Prayer'' (BCP) is the title given to a number of related prayer books used in the Anglican Communion and by other Christianity, Christian churches historically related to Anglicanism. The Book of Common Prayer (1549), fi ...

in Masaba (1907) digitized by Richard Mammana and Charles Wohlers *http://open-chapel.com/scripture/language-preservation/lumasaaba-language-study/ Learning Lumasaaba by Catherine Mabongor {{Authority control Languages of Uganda Great Lakes Bantu languages