THE ORIGIN OF ABAGUSII

The oral tradition of the Abagusii holds that their ancestors migrated from a place
called Misiri, north of Mt. Elgon, possibly in present-day Egypt. These ancestors
were the founders of the six major Gusii clans: the Abagetutu, Abanyaribari,
Abagirango, Abanchari, Abamachoge, and Ababasi. The story points to the origin
of Languages as indicated in the Bible, the Book of Genesis 11:1-9.

The Tower of Babel

1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward, they
found a plain in Shinar and settled there. 3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake
them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.

4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that
we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”5 
But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The LORD said, “If
as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be
impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each
other.”8 So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.9 
That is why it was called Babel —because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world.
From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

The Tower of Babel

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From Misri, the Abagusii with their cousins moved downwards and
found some shelter in mount Elgon traditionally referred to as
Masaba

PHOTO MOUNT ELGON

Gusii migration from Mount Elgon region began around 1600 A.D. They moved
accompanied by their close cousins – the Suba, Kuria and Maragoli. They moved
to Goye in Yimbo-Kadimo and settled here for two generations. Their settlement
extended to Got Ramogi. After several decades of settlement, they decided to
move from here eastward towards Yala.

RIVER YALA

The Gusii are said to have crossed river Yala into Alego next to Lake Gangu where
the marauding Luo warriors who raided them for cattle soon invaded them again.
The Yala River is a river of western Kenya, a tributary of Lake Victoria. It
generally flows fast over a rocky bed through a wide valley before joining the
Nzoia River to form the Yala Swamp on the border of Lake Victoria.

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Photo RIVER YALA

Due to constant raids by the Luo, the Gusii decided to continue with eastward
movement and eventually settled in an area called Kisumo, along the shores of
Lake Victoria. Their close relatives, the Abaragoli, accompanied them.
“Nyakomogendi”, the mother of Mogusii is said to have died at Kisumo. Mogusii
also died here because the leaders who led the Gusii to Kano plains this time were
different. They are mentioned as Oibabe, Mochorwa, Mobasi and Mogusero

Lake Victoria (Kisumu)

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KANO PLAINS

The Gusii movement from Kisumu to Kano plains was caused by many factors,
which included famine, drought and diseases. The famine is said to have been so
severe leading to the death of many people and animals. There was neither food
nor crops. Water was also in short supply. The food shortage was so severe to the
extent that individuals or small groups just woke-up and moved with whatever they
were be able to carry, a clear sign of resilience and rationality in decision-making.
People knew that if they did not make the decision to vacate the region, they would
all die to a man. Moreover, the marauding Luo could still come and drive them
out when they had been weakened. This would have been a disaster for them.
Kisumo location, as is known in contemporary times, is an area, which is
famine-prone almost all the year round. People depend on charity or the
grains supplied by the neighboring Gusii, Luhyia and Kalenjin communities.
The name Kisumo is derived from the Luo word “Jokisumu” which when
translated literally means “people who depend on charity” (Ochieng 1974:
46).

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Photo of floods in Kano plains

The Gusii lived in the Kano plains extending to the Kipsigis hills in the North,
Nyakach in the West and Kabondo areas in the East. Their stay at Kano lasted
about 150 years (1600- 1750, Akama & Maxon 1995: 28). The Gusii were mixed
farmers who grew crops like millet, sorghum, finger millet, pumpkins, sweet
potatoes, and kept livestock. They had a symbiotic relationship with their Luo
neighbours with whom they exchanged their wares for iron tools, pots, mats and
fish. It is at the Kano plains that the distinct Gusii sub-tribes as we know them
today emerged. This had resulted from the way they migrated from the Kisumo
settlement as families or small groups under different leaders. Hither to the Kisumo
settlement, the Gusii had travelled together as a huge family or clan under a
common leader.

The migration from Kisumo was sudden and unceremonial where each
family or group left under recognized leaders and hurried forth by pangs of
hunger, the small units began to look to themselves as the people of Mobasi,
the people of Mosweta, the people of Mochorwa, the people of Omugusero,
among others. Thus the following were the clans that emerged at the Kano
plains: ABASWETA, ABABASI, ABAGIRANGO, ABAMACHOGE,
ABANCHARI AND ABAGUSERO.

SETTLEMENT AT MANGA CAVES

From the Kano plains, the Gusii moved eastwards and southwards into the Manga
Hills as well as the Kabianga region of the present Kericho County. Their
movements into these areas was caused by the depletion of resources, competition
with the Luo clans, attacks by the Luo and Maasai for Gusii cattle and the need for
self-preservation of the Gusii culture (Akama & Maxon, 1995: 32). Life at the
Kano plains where the Gusii‟s five to seven generations stayed was luxuriously
awash with plenty of food, fish, wildlife, cattle, yams and cereals. The Gusii
preferred plains to upland area. The Manga caves start from top of the cliffs on the
Nyamira side and end in Kisii county.

They are home to four hidden cultural sites that remain untapped and which are
awaiting the new county government to place on the tourist trail.

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1. The Manga chain of hills which divides Kisii and Nyamira has the centuries old
caves, Ngurumuaga.

2.Waterfall at Ensoko,
which has been turned into a spring to serve the local people. This has the
potential to become a commercial mineral water that can be packaged and
branded .
3. Then, the third big attraction is Lake Okari, The myth around the small lake
goes around that there was once a house belonging to the family of Okari. A flood
came and it was swallowed beneath earth but the family had left for safety.

4. The fourth is natural a group of holes in the rock surface with which locals play
the game ajua.

Top of the cliffs

Then, men would follow with amarua (traditional alcohol) to drink, while
leaving others for the spirits of the ancestors and thanking God for the good
harvest.
The young initiates would also go to the caves to discard beddings they used
while healing after circumcision.
The initiates would be made to go round the caves as a sign of graduating to
adulthood.

At the Kabianga region where some Gusii moved to, life was not comfortable. The
area was cooler than the Kano plains. Both animals and human beings were
attacked by diseases such as pneumonia, and respiratory complications. Many
people died here. Even their livestock died. Crops could not do well either. The
word “Kabianga” is a Kisii name meaning/ or literally translated to mean, “Things
have refused”. Because of all these challenges and attacks by the Maasai and

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Kipsigis who stole their cattle and sheep, the Gusii decided to move in a south-
easterly direction. The only rational thing in the face of adversity and vulnerability
was to move out of the risk area. They moved through Sotik, Ngelegele and as far
as the Ngorongoro areas bordering the Maasai. The Gusii settled at Nyaigarora,
present Trans- Mara subcounty. Due to ferocious Maasai raids, the Gusii moved
northwards to Manga-Nyagoe- Isecha-Rangenyo triangle.

There were those who moved to Gusii Highlands through Nyakach by crossing
River Miriu (sondu) and entered North Mugirango. These became the Abagirango
of North Mugirango. Some clans also remained at the Kano plains as well as at
Kabianga areas and were absorbed by

THE GREAT WAR OF 1896

Once in the highlands, the Gusii consolidated themselves and got more united than
ever before. They got ready to defend themselves against their enemies – the
Kipsigis and Maasai. This they did in 1896 when the Osaosao battle took place and
where all the Kipsigisi warriors were vanquished. The Gusii warriors followed the
remnants of the Kipsigis warriors to the borders of Belgut and Sotik-Kabianga
areas. It became a defining moment for the Gusii as a community. After the Gusii
had defeated the enemy, the Gusii people began a systematic movement and
settlement in frontier territories in north and west Mugirango, approaching the
Sondu-Sotik region. It can thus be said that by 1900, Gusiiland had been settled by
its present inhabitants. This was due to the determination of the people and the
resolve to be independent, dignified and resilient as a community.

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GUSII HOMESTEADS

GUSII FAMILY
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.

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Identification and Location. “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.

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. Iron hoes and
ox-drawn plows are still used in cultivation. SOME OF THE FOOD CROPS

EQUIPMENTS. 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.

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SMITHS AND FIRE LIGHTING IN ACTION

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.

Livestock were formerly more numerous, but farmers still raise cattle (both of local
zebu and of European stock), goats, sheep, and chickens.

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

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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.

Kinship
Kin Groups and Descent. During the precolonial period, the exogamous,
patrilineal clan (eamaate) was the largest cooperative unit. Clans were part of clan
clusters, which had birds or animals as totems but lacked any common
organization. At the lineage (riiga) level, patrilineal descent and marriage defined
commonly recognized access to land and provided the rationale for corporate
action. During the colonial period, indigenous political and social organization
became conceptualized as a segmentary lineage system in which units from the
clan cluster, clans, and clan segments became defined according to a genealogical
grid with an eponymous ancestor at the top.

Kinship Terminology. Gusii kinship terminology is classificatory, merging lineals

with collaterals. Specific lineal terms are used to denote the immediate family: tata
(own father), baba (own mother), momura one (own son), and mosubati ominto

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(young woman of our house). All other women and men of Ego's generation,
however, including “real” brothers, are called mamura ominto. In the mother's
family, the reciprocal term mame is applied to mother's brothers, their wives, and
to sister's children. In any clan in which Ego has kinship connections, individuals
of Ego's parents' generation are called tatamoke (small father) or makomoke (small
mother). All members of the descending generation are omwana one (my child),
those of the grandchildren's generation are omochokoro, and those of the
grandparents' generation are sokoro (grandfather) and magokoro (grandmother).
Gusii terminology also distinguishes links that have been established by a transfer
of marriage cattle.

Domestic Unit. Traditional Gusii households are based on nuclear or polygynous

families. Each wife maintains her own household, and, in polygynous families,
there is little cooperation between co-wives. With the decline in polygyny, a
domestic unit typically has come to consist of a wife, a husband, and their
unmarried children. It may also include the husband's mother and, for shorter
periods, younger siblings of the wife. Until the birth of the first or second child, a
wife and her mother-in-law may cook together and cooperate in farming. Married
sons and their wives and children usually maintain their own households and
resources.

Inheritance. According to customary law, which is still the effective rule for the
majority, only men can inherit. Sons inherit only the cattle, land, and other assets
that belong to their own house (enyomba). All the resources that are owned by the
father, such as personal cattle or business establishments, should be divided
equally between houses, irrespective of the number of sons in each. Although
national law recognizes the equal inheritance rights of daughters, customary law
has seldom been challenged (see “Land Tenure”).

Socialization. Mothers have the ultimate responsibility for the care and
socialization of their children, but they delegate a great deal of caretaking and
training to other children in the homestead. Mothers seldom show physical or
verbal affection for children, and fathers take very little part in child rearing. Gusii
infants are raised to understand how to behave according to the codes of shame and
respect that apply to their relationships to persons in adjacent generations. The
grandparents play a supportive role and are supposed to inform grandchildren
about proper behavior and sexual matters.

Children cease sleeping in their mother's house when they are still very young.
After the age of 8, boys gradually start to sleep in a special house for unmarried

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sons. After initiation, at the age of 10 or 11, a son cannot sleep in his mother's
house at all. At the age of 6, a girl starts to sleep either in the house of one of her
mother's co-wives or that of her grandmother. Initiated girls must sleep in the
house of a postmenopausal woman, usually the paternal grandmother.

Political Organization.

Precolonial political power and authority were vested in local male elders' councils
and in the big-men who dominated their neighborhoods. In the absence of
crosscutting forms of social organization, political life was factionalized into
descent-based groups of varying ramifications. Only the Kitutu clan cluster
developed a rudimentary political office of chief, omogambi (lit., “giver of
verdicts”). Women were alienated, and geographically separated, from their natal
clans and were thus in a position of little influence and power during the first years
of marriage; however, older women, who had gained power by dint of the number
of their sons and daughters-in-law, were often in charge of negotiations between
fighting parties. Men continue to dominate political life, and leadership is
nowadays based on elected office in local government bodies and in administration
as chiefs and assistant chiefs.

Social Control. During the precolonial period, disputes over cattle and land,
crimes, and other misdeeds were handled by local male elders' councils and by big-
men. Today local disputes are handled by a meeting of local male elders and the
assistant chief (baraza). Crimes and disputes can also be taken to the court system.

TRADITIONAL RELIGION AND CHRISTIANITY

Religious Beliefs. Before the advent of Christianity in the region, the Gusii
believed in the existence of one God, who was the originator of the world but did
not directly interfere in human affairs. It was the concept of an ancestor cult that,
together with their ideas about witchcraft, sorcery, and impersonal forces, provided
a complex of beliefs in suprahuman agencies. The ancestor spirits (ebirecha)
existed both as a collective and as individual ancestors and ancestresses of the
living members of a lineage. They were not propitiated until there was tangible
evidence of their displeasure, such as disease or death of people and livestock or
the destruction of crops.

Most Gusii today are adherents of some Christian church. There are four major
denominations in Gusiiland: the Catholic, Seventh Day Adventist, Swedish
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Lutheran, and Pentecostal Assemblies of God. Active Seventh Day Adventists are
oriented toward European family ideals, and they practice a form of Protestant
ethic. Although the churches are very active, certain aspects of non-Christian
beliefs still permeate the lives of most Gusii. Afflicted by misfortune, many Gusii
visit a diviner (omorgori; pl. abaragori), who may point to displeased spirits of the
dead and prescribe sacrifice to placate them.

Religious Practitioners. Abaragori, who are usually women, determine the cause
of various misfortunes. Diverse healers also exist, such as the abanyamoriogi
(herbalists), who use various mixtures of plants for medicines. Ababari
(indigenous surgeons), set fractures and treat backaches and headaches through
trephination. Abanyamosira (professional sorcerers) are normally hired to protect
against witchcraft and to retaliate against witches. An omoriori (witch smeller)
ferrets out witchcraft articles (e.g., hair or feces of the victim, dead birds, bones of
exhumed corpses) that may be buried in a house. A witch (omorogi) can be a man
or a woman but is usually the latter. Witches are believed to operate in groups;
they dig up recently buried corpses in order to use the body parts as magical
paraphernalia and to eat the inner organs. Witches usually kill their victims through
the use of poisons, parts of corpses, and people's exuviae. Witchcraft among the
Gusii is believed to be an acquired art that is handed down from parent to child.

CEREMONIES

BIRTH In the Abagusii community, it is common for children to be named

after their ancestors. Members of the community also name children after
animals and birds. The emphasis here is usually the character of the
animals or could be seasons in which the animals were dominant.
Abagusii also names newborns after animals. If a mother keeps losing her
newborns, it is believed that human spirits have denied their existence and
will therefore opt to become part of the animal kingdom. Some are named
after elephants, buffalos, leopards, and hyenas, and birds. "Someone is
called Nyang’au which means hyena, Nyanjoku was named after an
elephant, and Ongera after buffalo. Kebaki is a Kisii name of an eagle

CIRCUMCISION.

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Circumcision The most elaborate and socially important ceremonies are
associated with initiation and marriage. Initiation involves clitoridectomy for girls
and circumcision for boys. The ceremony prepares the children as social beings
who know rules of shame (chinsoni) and respect (ogosika). The girls are initiated
at the age of 10 and the boys12. Initiations are gender segregated, and the
operations are performed by female and male specialists. Afterward there is a
period of seclusion for both genders. The traditional wedding is no longer
performed. It was an extremely elaborate ritual that lasted several days. The rituals
emphasized the incorporation of the bride into the groom's lineage and the primacy
of male fertility. Among wealthier people, it has been replaced by a wedding in
church or before an administrative official.

Marriage and Family. Marriage can be established only through the

payment of bride-wealth, in the form of livestock and money, by the husband to
the wife's family. This act establishes a socially sanctioned marriage, through
which a woman and a man become socially defined mothers and fathers. Residence
is at the husband's home. Divorce was and still is rare; it entails the return of the
bride-wealth. At the death of a husband, the widow chooses a leviratic husband
among the deceased's brothers. Until the 1960s, everyone got married as soon as
possible after puberty; by the end of the 1960s, elopements had started to
increase in number because of a decline in the demand for wives.

On the wedding day, the groomsmen will perform a ceremony in honor of his wife,
giving her credit for all beauty. This is usually characterized by recitals, dance, and
prayers.

The period between the inception of a cohabiting union and the payment of bride-
wealth has become progressively more and more extended. In 1985 at least 75
percent of all new unions between women and men were established without the

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payment of bride-wealth. Without this payment, the union is without social and
legal sanction; consequently, there now exists a socially and economically
marginalized stratum of single mothers who have no access to land. A related
development has been the decline in the value of bride-wealth payments for
peasant women, from about thirteen adult zebu cows in the first half of the 1950s
to about three by 1985. Employed women—such as nurses and lawyers—fetch
higher bride-wealth payments, around the value of fifteen to forty-five zebu cows
(although their bride-wealth is frequently paid in cash and European cows).

Arts. The Gusii soapstone carvings have received international distribution and
fame. The stone is mined and carved in Tabaka, South Mugirango, where several
families specialize in this art. The craft is bringing in a sizable income to the area
through the tourist trade.

Medicine. Kisii Town has a government hospital and several private clinics, as
well as private practitioners. There are also a number of clinics and health-care
stations throughout Gusiiland. (For traditional medicine and health care, see
“Religious Practitioners.”)

Death and Afterlife. Funerals take place at the deceased's homestead; a large
gathering is a sign of prestige. Women are buried beyond the yard, on the left side
of the house, whereas men are buried beyond the cattle pen, on the right side of the
house. Christian elements, such as catechism, reading out loud from the Bible, and
singing hymns, are combined with the traditional practices of wailing, head
shaving, and animal sacrifices to the dead. The preferred person to dig the grave is
the deceased's son's son. Before burial, the corpse is dissected in order to ascertain
whether death was caused by witchcraft. After burial, the widow/widower is in a
liminal state and cannot move far from the homestead until after a period of a few
weeks to two months, when ritual activities, including a sacrifice, are performed.
One basic theme of the funeral is the fear of the dead person's spirit. The deceased,
enraged at having died, may blame the survivors and must therefore be placated
with sacrifices.

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