Some Notes on the Ngoni by James Stewart

Excerpts From: Lake Nyassa, and the Water Route to the Lake Region of Africa
Author: James Stewart
Source: Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and Monthly Record of Geography,New Monthly Series, Vol. 3, No. 5 (May, 1881), pp. 257-277
Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute ofBritish Geographers)
(Read at the Evening Meeting, March 14th, 1881.) Map, p. 320.

The Language of West and North of Lake Nyassa (now Lake Malawi)

The language which is now most widely disseminated through the country to the west and north of the lake is the Kafir language (i.e. ngoni language). It is not, however, the most generally spoken. The Kafir or Mangone invaders have wandered over the whole of the district, and wherever they have been, they have left a knowledge of their language among the residents of the country, many of whom they had subjugated and enslaved during the period of their occupancy. Such men were frequently my interpreters in the highlands of Mambwe and Maliwandu. This language has for years past been reduced to writing. The Scriptures and other books have been translated into it, and newspapers are now published in it, at the Missionary Institution at Lovedale. This fact facilitates our work among them very greatly. None of the other languages,

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