Nguni languages

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Nguni is a group of languages spoken in southern Africa including isiZulu, isiXhosa, Swati, and Ndebele.

This group of Bantu languages has the common characteristic that the root -ntu means a man.

Nguni is really an artificial term, suggesting an ethnic unity, which is not true. Another division, also artificial, divides the Nguni languages into Northern Nguni, including Zulu and Swazi, and Southern Nguni, which would include Xhosa, Thembu, Mfengu, Mpondo, and Mpondomise.

Lexical comparison

The numerals for different Nguni languages are:

GLOSA	Swazi	Xhosa	Zulu	Ndebele	PROTO- NGUNI
'1'	ɛ interfere.	ɛ	dwa	-	*nwe
'2'	- Yilí	mbìní	ivolvli	- -ili	*(m-))ili
'3'	- -'tfu	ntáthù	tha memoriathu	- Thathu	*(n-)tathu
'4'	-	nŭ	ne	-	*n
'5'	Yeah.	ntʼ	e	- -anu	*(n-)t)anu
'6'	-siphóŋo. sitf ' ûpha	ntáthù	isithu devoted	isithupha	*sithupha(?)
'7'	Sikhombisa	yeshh-engineŋ,	isikhombi ordersa	isikhombisa	*sikhombisa
'8'	yes, yes, yes.	yesb́ź	10-2	10-2
'9'	lifiÿa	lítháá	10-1	10-1
'10'	liumi	I am sorry.	i concerning	*it implied	*li-gilumi

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