Kisii & Nyamira

Background

“Gusii” or “Abagusii” is the people’s name for themselves. A Gusii individual is an “Omogusii.” “Kisii” is the Swahili name that the British colonial administration used, and it is still the common name used by other inhabitants of Kenya. The Gusii are divided into seven clan clusters: Kitutu (Getutu), North Mugirango, South Mugirango, Majoge, Wanjare (Nchari), Bassi, and Nyaribari.

Gusiiland is located in western Kenya, 50 kilometers east of Lake Victoria. Since precolonial times, abundant rainfall and very fertile soils have made Gusiiland one of the most productive agricultural areas in Kenya. The proportion of cultivable land ranges between 70 and 80 percent. The region is demarcated by the coordinates 0°30′ and 1°00′ S and 34°30′ and 35°00′ E. In 1989 Kisii District was divided in two; one segment retained the old name, and the other was called Nyamira. The Gusii are still the sole ethnic group inhabiting these districts. The area is a rolling hilly landscape on a deeply dissected peneplain at elevations of 1,190 meters in the far northwestern corner of the territory and up to 2,130 meters in the central highlands. The mean maximum temperatures range from 28.4° C at the lowest elevations to 22.8° C at the highest. The mean minimum temperatures are 16.4° C and 9.8° C, respectively. Rain falls throughout the year; the annual average is between 150 and 200 centimeters. There are two peak seasons of rainfall: the major rainy season (March to May) and the minor rainy season (September to November). In the 19 century much of present-day Gusiiland was covered by moist montane forest. Today all forest has been cleared; scant indigenous vegetation remains, and no large mammals are found.

Demography. In 1989 the number of Gusii was 1.3 million, and population densities ranged from 200 to over 600 persons per square kilometer. This population, increasing by 3 to 4 percent per year, is among those exhibiting the most rapid growth in the world. The average woman bears close to nine children. Infant mortality is low by sub-Saharan African standards about 80 per 1,000 live births.

Linguistic Affiliation. Ekegusii is a Lacustrine Bantu language.

Origins of a name: Mogusii or Gwassi?

The name Gusii or Kisii has two possible origins. The more prosaic is that is comes from ‘Gwassi’, which was a place on the shores of Lake Victoria at which the Gusii are believed to have lived as fishermen before fleeing the Nilotes.

The more poetic explanation holds that a man called Mogusii was their founder, from whom the Gusii took their name (Abagusii means ‘the people of Mogusii’). Mogusii lived in the late sixteenth century, and was the great-great-great-grandson of a famous leader called Kintu. Also known as Muntu, Mundu and Wantu, Kintu is credited with having led the first Bantu migration from the semi-mythical place called Misri…

Misri – myth or reality?

Some oral histories tell the intriguing tale of a place called Misri, which was where the Gusii say they lived a long time ago. They don’t know exactly where this place was, but they do know that life there was very hard, full of disease, famine and drought.

Kintu, the great-great-great-grandfather of Mogusii, crops up in this story as a very powerful leader. The name Kintu, incidentally, is also common in West Africa, and was the name of a number of kings and leaders.

The Gusii say that Kintu ruled over the ancestors of not only the Gusii, but the Maragoli, the Ganda, Kikuyu, Embu, Meru and the Kuria. The story of Misri is intriguing as it exists among other people, too: not just among the Kuria (who are historically very close to the Gusii – click here for their version of the myth), but also among the much more distant Meru – for their version of the Misri myth, see the section on Meru history.

At one time, continues the story, a prolonged drought decimated their livestock, so they decided to leave Misri. The migration was led by Kintu, who made a new home for all his people around Mount Elgon, probably some time before the fifteenth century. There they lived as hunters and gatherers, but they also cultivated millet and rice, and kept herds of cattle, goats and sheep. The population rose, and with it came quarrelling over grazing and hunting rights. This led to the dispersal of the population, although an alternative version of the history says that it was the arrival of the Kipsigis that pushed them out.

The first people to move away from Mount Elgon were the Ganda (now in Uganda), followed by the Soga. Another tradition relates that the ancestors of the Kikuyu, Embu and Mbeere were also at Mount Elgon, and moved east into the Rift Valley and across into central Kenya. This is odd, because as far as I know Mount Elgon does not feature in any of those peoples’ oral histories.

Whatever, the Gusii stayed on at Mount Elgon for a few more decades until a very bad drought killed much of their livestock. The fruit trees withered and died, and the wild animals either perished or moved away.

When they left, they headed south under the leadership of a man named Osogo, until they reached the north-eastern shores of Lake Victoria. There, they wandered eastwards along the shore, until they arrived in the Kano Plains at the foot of Ramogi Hill (the mythical place of origin of the Nilotic-speaking Luo). Here they met a number of settled Bantu-speaking people, who were fishermen and cultivators of millet, bananas and root-crops. They also kept cattle, sheep and goats, and knew the art of working iron. The ancestors of the Gusii settled with these people, with whom one presumes they eventually merged.

Gusii People and their Culture

At the end of the 1700s, Bantu-speaking populations were dispersed in small pockets at the northern, southern, and eastern margins of the Kisii highlands and in the Lake Victoria Basin. Around 1800, the highlands above 1,515 meters were probably uninhabited from the northern part of the Manga escarpment southward to the Kuja River. At that time, the lowland savanna was being settled by large numbers of agropastoralist peoples ancestral to the present-day Luo and Kipsigis, dislodging the smaller Bantu groups from their territories on the savanna. The Gusii settled in the Kisii highlands, whereas other culturally and linguistically related groups remained along the Lake Victoria Basin or settled in the lower savanna region at the Kenya-Tanzania border (as did the Kuria, for example). The establishment of the British colonial administration in 1907 was initially met by armed resistance, but it ceased after World War I. Unlike other highland peoples in Kenya, the Gusii were not subjected to land alienation. The seven subdivisions of Gusiiland were converted into administrative units under government-appointed chiefs. The first missions were established by the Catholics in 1911 and the Seventh Day Adventists in 1913. Mission activity was initially not very successful; several stations were looted. Since Kenyan independence in 1963, schools have been built throughout the area; roads have been improved, and electricity, piped water, and telephones have been extended into many areas. By the 1970s, a shortage of land had begun to make farming unprofitable, and the education of children for off-farm employment became more important.

Settlements

Before the colonial period, the extended polygynous family was spatially divided into two components: the homestead (omochie), where the married men and women and their unmarried daughters and uncircumcised sons lived, and the cattle camps (ebisarate), located in the grazing areas, where most of the cattle were protected by resident male warriors. The British abolished the cattle camps in 1913. In the late nineteenth century most Gusii were settled in dispersed farmsteads, although the North Mugirango built fortified villages for protection against Kipsigis raids. A homestead consisted of the wives’ houses. The compound had several elevated granaries for finger millet. The traditional Gusii house (enyomba) was a round, windowless structure with a framework of thin branches, walls of dried mull, and a conical, thatched roof. Today the Gusii continue to live in dispersed homesteads sited in the middle of the farm holdings. Modern houses are rectangular, with thatched or corrugated-iron roofs, and cooking has been moved from the house to a separate kitchen structure.

Economy

Subsistence. The precolonial staple crop was finger millet, which was grown together with sorghum, beans, and sweet potatoes. Cultivated-plant food was complemented by meat and milk from livestock and by wild vegetables. At the end of the nineteenth century, the cultivation period was two years, with a fallow of three to six years. By the 1920s, maize had overtaken finger millet as both a staple-food crop and a cash crop. Other important contemporary crops include cassava, pigeon peas, green grams, onions, bananas, potatoes, and tomatoes. Coffee was already being grown on a limited basis in the 1930s, and, by the 1950s, Gusiiland had become established as a producer of coffee and tea. Iron hoes and ox-drawn plows are still used in cultivation. Livestock were formerly more numerous, but farmers still raise cattle (both of local zebu and of European stock), goats, sheep, and chickens. The high population density has forced the Gusii to utilize every available space for agriculture, and most families today are unable to produce enough food for their subsistence needs. In addition to farming, many Gusii engage in employment or business, either locally or in the large urban centers.

Industrial. In precolonial Gusiiland, iron tools, weapons, decorations, wooden implements, small baskets for porridge, and poisons were all produced locally. Pottery making was limited; most pottery and basketry was obtained through trade with Luoland. The most notable—in terms of technical complexity and product value—of the Gusii industries were the smelting of locally obtained ore and the manufacture of iron implements. Blacksmiths did not form a special caste, as is often the case in African societies. Smithing was a remunerative industry, reserved for men, and blacksmiths became wealthy and influential.

Trade. Precolonial Gusii exchange took place within the homesteads. Tools, weapons, crafts, livestock, and agricultural products were exchanged, and goats and cows were often used as the media of exchange. During the nineteenth century, regular barter between the Luo and the Gusii, conducted by women, took place at periodic border markets. In addition, there was a regular and voluminous trade of Gusii grain for Luo livestock that took place at Gusii farms. Luo traders still arrive in Gusiiland on donkeys loaded with salt and pots. The network of markets, shops, and cash-crop purchasing centers that connects Gusiiland with the rest of Kenya has continued to grow. In 1985 the major urban center was Kisii Town, which features numerous marketing facilities, shops, and wholesalers.

Division of Labor. In the late nineteenth century women were primarily responsible for food cultivation and processing, cooking, brewing, fetching water and fuel, and cleaning house, whereas men were concerned with waging war, building houses and fences, clearing new fields, and herding. Although women performed most of the cultivation, men participated to a much higher degree than is the case today. Herding was undertaken by boys and young unmarried men in the cattle villages; initiated unmarried daughters assisted in cultivation. Since the early colonial period, the division of labor has gradually changed, to the disadvantage of women: men have withdrawn from cultivation, but women are obliged to perform most of the same tasks that they undertook during the precolonial era, in addition to cultivating the men’s cash crops.

Land Tenure. Until the 1940s, land was held corporately by lineages and clans. Grazing was communal, and arable land was divided into plots with strict use rights that pertained to each household of the polygynous family. Local populations also included families belonging to other clans—“dwellers” (abamenyi), who had limited tenure. Land was not inherited or alienated through transactions. Today all land is registered in individual men’s names, but the land market is still limited, and sales are uncommon. Through inheritance, men have ultimate rights to the management and use of land. Women still have no birthright to their parents’ land. The vast majority of women can obtain access to land only through marriage; however, a few employed women are able to buy land in other districts. Since the initial registration, land has not been surveyed, and much of it is still registered in the name of a dead father or grandfather. A man usually transfers land to his wife and sons when the eldest son marries. Ideally, land is divided equally between wives, under the supervision of and witnessed by local male elders. After division, the husband often retains a small plot (emonga) for personal use.

Read More: http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/anthro/faculty/fiske/135b/gusii.htm

1. Manga Hills

In 1907, Mr. Warrior Otenyo who was the among those that resisted the British was buried without his head on the hills. This is after he attacked an army administrator known as Gas Northcott with a spear. The administrator never died and organized for revenge that saw Mr. Otenyo arrested. He was later tried in a public court and then killed by the British army at Kisii stadium. His head was cut and transported to London as proof of his death. Otenyo’s body was then left on a public bridge as a warning to others who opposed the colonials. In accordance with the culture, the Gusii elders carried his headless body and buried it at the top of Manga escarpment (hills). However, up to date, the specific grave where the warrior’s body was laid has never been identified.

2. Emanga Ridge

 

The Abagusii community associate themselves with Emanga ridge which is located at the top of Manga hills in the region. The ridge, which is about 100 acres, divides both Kisii and Nyamira counties marking their boundaries whereby Nyamira county takes the top of the cliff while Kisii takes the lower part. The area has been earmarked as a historical feature and carries special significance for the Abagusii community. According to 94-year-old Samson Obae, who dwells at the foot of the cliff, Emanga was the first place the Abagusii settled before they spread to other parts of Gusii region.

3. Keera Caves

Four Kilometers from Nyamira Town is a site whose rich history continues to draw visitors in by their numbers. A few meters from the Keera waterfalls is a cave where rainmakers once gathered to make their sacrifices. Visitors gather to watch the waters cascade, even after all these years it is still fascinating, and the myths surrounding Keera falls only serve to pique their interest further. In the past residents of Nyamira often brought bundles of firewood here to appease a creature they had heard of in stories told by their grandparents. Under the waterfall is a site where traditional rites were performed. Whenever there was drought, old men would perform a traditional dance at the site and carry bundles of firewood into the cave. This, they believed, would lead to rain.

4. River Kuja

Also referred to as the Gucha River, River Kuja is located in Nyamira County. It originates in the highlands of Kiabonyoru in Nyamira County, passing through the heart of Gucha District and runs west through Migori country where it joins the Migori River and flows as the Kuja-Migori River into Lake Victoria.

1. Visit Tabaka Soapstone Mining & Carvings

Tabaka is definitely one place you need to visit while touring Kisii County. It is located about 24 kilometres from Kisii town. You can visit the place to have a glimpse of how soapstone is mined and the various beautiful carvings made from soapstone. Tabaka is actually the main source of soapstone in Kenya. You can purchase the numerous soapstone carvings at affordable prices.

2. Visit Manga Hills

The picturesque hills provide ideal opportunities for hiking and sightseeing adventures. The hills also serve as a boundary between Kisii and Nyamira counties.

3. Visit Nyakwana Falls

It is a breathtaking waterfall located in River Gucha which originates in the highlands of Kiabonyoru. This is one of the best places to visit in Kisii County for sightseeing adventures.

4. Visit Sameta Hills

The scenic hills also provide exceptional opportunities for hiking adventures and sightseeing of other beautiful sceneries in Kisii County and beyond.

5. Kisii Golf Club ( Erera)

It is an exceptional golfing club in Kisii County, with a 9 hole golf course. It also prides in other recreational facilities such as a modern gym, a state of the art swimming pool and an onsite restaurant that offers various delicacies