40 Fun Facts About Swahili Language

Which character in Disney's The Lion King has a name that is simply the Swahili word for 'lion'?

Simba is the everyday Swahili word for the big cat, not a name Disney invented. The filmmakers collected Swahili words and phrases on a research trip to Kenya.

Hakuna matata, which Elton John and Tim Rice turned into a song for The Lion King, is a Swahili phrase meaning what?

No worries is the usual translation, word for word: hakuna means 'there are no'. Lyricist Tim Rice has said he found the phrase in a Swahili phrasebook.

Which popular game did designer Leslie Scott, raised in East Africa, name after a Swahili verb meaning 'to build'?

Jenga comes from kujenga, a verb Leslie Scott knew from a childhood spent speaking Swahili in Tanganyika. The game grew out of one played at home with wooden blocks bought from a sawmill in Ghana.

Which holiday, created by activist Maulana Karenga, takes its name from a Swahili phrase meaning 'first fruits'?

Kwanzaa borrows from matunda ya kwanza, Swahili for 'first fruits', a nod to African harvest festivals. An extra 'a' was added so the name would have seven letters.

Uhura of Star Trek was named after uhuru, the Swahili title of a novel Nichelle Nichols was carrying, meaning what?

Freedom is what uhuru means, and a 1962 novel of that name was in Nichelle Nichols's hands when she read for the part. Gene Roddenberry changed the last letter to make Uhura.

Safari, a word the explorer Richard Burton helped bring into English, has which plain meaning in Swahili?

Journey is all safari means in Swahili, so a bus ride from Nairobi to Mombasa counts as one. Swahili took the word from Arabic safar.

Baba Yetu, the Civilization IV theme that won video game music its first Grammy, is a Swahili version of which text?

The Lord's Prayer supplies the words, since Baba Yetu is Swahili for 'Our Father'. Christopher Tin composed it for the 2005 game, and the Grammy followed in 2011.

M-Pesa, the phone payment service launched in Kenya by Safaricom, pairs 'M' for mobile with the Swahili word for what?

Money is pesa in Swahili, a word borrowed from the Hindi paisa, a small Indian coin. By 2010 M-Pesa was the most successful phone-based financial service in the developing world.

Hatari!, the title of a John Wayne adventure about catching wild animals for zoos, is the Swahili word for what?

Danger is the meaning, and the shoot earned it: director Howard Hawks said the actors caught the animals themselves. A rhino that escaped during filming had to be recaptured on camera.

Punda milia, the Swahili name for the zebra, literally describes the animal as a striped version of which creature?

Donkey is punda in Swahili and milia means 'stripes', so a zebra is a striped donkey. The kinship is real: the two can interbreed, and the foal is called a zonkey.

Rafiki, the mandrill who lifts the newborn cub at Pride Rock in The Lion King, has a Swahili name meaning what?

Friend is the meaning of rafiki, a word Swahili borrowed from Arabic. In political speech it has also served as the Swahili for 'comrade'.

Asante, a Swahili word borrowed from Omani Arabic and usually followed by sana, expresses which everyday courtesy?

Thank you is what asante says, and adding sana, 'very much', makes it warmer. The Arabic original was a compliment meaning 'well done'.

Jambo, a Swahili noun that literally means 'matter' or 'affair', is taught to tourists as which everyday expression?

Hello is how visitors learn jambo. The fuller greeting is hujambo, and the reply, sijambo, literally says 'I don't have anything', meaning nothing is the matter.

Karibu, a Swahili word borrowed from the Arabic for 'nearby', is used on its own as which greeting?

Welcome is what karibu offers, in effect an invitation to come closer or come in. It is also the stock reply when someone shows gratitude, a use copied from English.

Pole pole, a Swahili phrase made by doubling a word for 'calm' or 'gentle', tells someone to act in which way?

Slowly is the meaning of pole pole, though it can also mean 'carefully'. Said once, pole is how Swahili speakers offer sympathy, much like 'sorry'.

Habari, the key word in the Swahili greeting 'habari gani?', is a noun borrowed from Arabic that means what?

News is what habari means, so the greeting that works as 'how are you?' literally asks 'what's the news?'. The Arabic source word is khabar.

The Maji Maji Rebellion in colonial East Africa was named after a 'war medicine' based on maji, the Swahili for what?

Water, mixed with castor oil and millet seeds, was handed out by the spirit medium Kinjikitile Ngwale. His followers believed it would turn the colonial army's bullets to liquid.

Tatu, the root of the name of Kenya's matatu minibuses, is the Swahili word for which number?

Three is tatu, and one account says the usual fare was once a trio of ten-cent coins. Many matatus are decorated with portraits of famous people and slogans.

Jumamosi, the Swahili day whose name contains the word for 'one', falls on which day in English?

Saturday is day one in Swahili, and the count runs on to Wednesday, day five. Thursday's name, borrowed from Arabic, also means 'the fifth', so Swahili has two fifth days.

Ndege, the everyday Swahili word for an airplane, is also the ordinary name for which flying creature?

Bird and airplane share the word ndege, so the Swahili for airport, uwanja wa ndege, can be read as 'field of birds'.

Swahili belongs to which large group of African languages, named after a shared word meaning 'people'?

Bantu languages number about 600 across central, eastern and southern Africa. Unlike most of its relatives, Swahili does not use tone to tell words apart.

The name Swahili comes from sawahili, an Arabic word that originally described people or things of what?

The coast is where the language began, among the Swahili people of East Africa's Indian Ocean shore and its islands. Arabic also supplied a large share of the vocabulary.

Standard Swahili is based on the dialect of which island, chosen as the model at a 1928 conference in Mombasa?

Zanzibar's town dialect, Kiunguja, became the model, even though host city Mombasa has a major dialect of its own, Kimvita. One standard spelling was adopted at the same meeting.

Swahili nouns form plurals by swapping prefixes, so which word is the plural of kitabu, meaning 'book'?

Vitabu follows the ki-/vi- pattern shared by many objects, such as kiti and viti for chair and chairs. Kitabu came from Arabic kitab, whose first syllable Swahili treated as a prefix.

Which UN agency proclaimed World Kiswahili Language Day, held each July and a first for any African language?

UNESCO picked the anniversary of the day in 1954 when the independence party TANU adopted Swahili as its unifying language in Tanganyika.

Which African independence leader translated Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice into Swahili?

Julius Nyerere, Tanzania's founding president, also put Shakespeare's Julius Caesar into Swahili. Tanzanians knew him as Mwalimu, 'teacher'.

Shule, the Swahili word for 'school', was borrowed from which European language during colonial rule in Tanganyika?

German Schule became shule, a souvenir of the years before the First World War when Tanganyika belonged to German East Africa. The colony ran its schools in Swahili.

Which Central African country, home to Goma and Lubumbashi, counts Swahili among its four national languages?

DR Congo gives national status to Swahili, Lingala, Kituba and Tshiluba, while French is the official language. Its main local variety, Kingwana, differs considerably from the standard.

Which street slang, born among young people in Nairobi's Eastlands, is named for its blend of Swahili and English?

Sheng is now heard among matatu crews and across Kenya's popular media. It has no official status and is not taught in schools.

Swahili speakers count hours from sunrise, so 'saa moja', the first hour of the morning, is which Western clock time?

7 a.m. is hour one because the Swahili day starts at sunrise, not midnight. That leaves a six-hour gap between the time people say and the time on a Western clock.

Which Swahili call meaning 'all pull together', adopted by Jomo Kenyatta, is the motto on Kenya's coat of arms?

Harambee is thought to have begun as a chant of Swahili porters lifting heavy loads. Kenyans also use it for community self-help events such as fundraisers.

Ujamaa, the socialism set out in Tanzania's Arusha Declaration, is built on jamaa, the Swahili word for what?

Family is the root of ujamaa, which is often translated as 'familyhood'. From 1973 the policy moved rural Tanzanians into planned villages, at times by force.

Malaika, the title of a Swahili love song made famous worldwide by Miriam Makeba, means what in English?

Angel is what the singer calls the girl he cannot afford to marry, because the bride price is beyond him. Kenyan musician Fadhili William made the first recording.

The kanga, an East African printed wrap that carries a Swahili saying, shares its name with which speckled bird?

Guineafowl have spotted plumage, and the earliest wraps were printed with small dots that looked like it. The proverbs and slogans were added in the early 1900s.

Sukuma wiki, the Swahili name for an East African dish of collard greens, literally means to push what?

The week is what the dish pushes along, wiki being a loan from English. The greens are affordable and sold all year, so they help a household stretch its food.

Bongo Flava, the Swahili-language pop and hip-hop of Tanzania, takes 'bongo' from a Swahili word for which body part?

The brain, ubongo in Swahili, gave Dar es Salaam its nickname Bongo, because surviving in the city was said to take wits. The music that grew up there kept the name.

Which novelist, raised speaking Swahili but writing in English, won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature?

Abdulrazak Gurnah reached England as an 18-year-old refugee and made his career there. He threads Swahili through his novels, despite publishers who wanted the words italicised or anglicised.

Which Kenyan island town is on the World Heritage List as East Africa's oldest and best-preserved Swahili settlement?

Lamu is believed to date from 1370, making it Kenya's oldest continually inhabited town. The poet Mwana Kupona wrote one of the best-known early Swahili poems there in 1858.

Which Tanzanian poet and essayist, born near Tanga, is honoured as the 'Father of Swahili' and national poet?

Shaaban Robert worked for years in government offices in Tanga while writing the poems, essays and prose now set in Tanzanian schools. Britain made him an MBE.

Mamba, a word English uses for a deadly African snake, is the everyday Swahili name for which other reptile?

Crocodile is the first meaning of mamba in a Swahili dictionary, with the snake listed second. English took its snake name from a Zulu word instead.