Kikuyu

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Etymology

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Borrowed from Swahili mzinga.[1]

Hinde (1904) records mtshinga as an equivalent of English gun in “Jogowini dialect” of Kikuyu, listing also “Ulu dialect” (spoken then from Machakos to coastal area) of Kamba musinga as its equivalent.[2]

Pronunciation

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As for Tonal Class, Armstrong (1940) classifies this term into mote class which includes mũtĩ, gĩkwa (pl. ikwa), gĩthaka, kĩnya, kĩrũũmi, mũgate, mũhaka, mũrũthi, njagĩ, njohi, nyũmba, etc.[3] Benson (1964) classifies this term into Class 2 with a disyllabic stem, together with kĩgunyũ, njagĩ, kiugũ, and so on. Yukawa (1981) classifies this term into a group including gĩkwa (pl. ikwa), ithangũ (pl. mathangũ), kiugũ, kĩboko, kĩgunyũ, kĩnya, kĩroboto, kĩrũũmi, mbogo, mũgate, mũhaka, mũrangi, mũrũthi, ndaraca, ndirica, njohi, nyũmba, thĩ, and so on.[4]

Noun

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mũcinga class 3 (plural mĩcinga)

  1. gun[5]

References

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  1. ^ cinga” in Benson, T.G. (1964). Kikuyu-English dictionary, p. 60. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  2. ^ Hinde, Hildegarde (1904). Vocabularies of the Kamba and Kikuyu languages of East Africa, pp. 30–31. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  3. ^ Armstrong, Lilias E. (1940). The Phonetic and Tonal Structure of Kikuyu. Rep. 1967. (Also in 2018 by Routledge).
  4. ^ Yukawa, Yasutoshi (1981). "A Tentative Tonal Analysis of Kikuyu Nouns: A Study of Limuru Dialect." In Journal of Asian and African Studies, No. 22, 75–123.
  5. ^ Muiru, David N. (2007). Wĩrute Gĩgĩkũyũ: Marĩtwa Ma Gĩgĩkũyũ Mataũrĩtwo Na Gĩthũngũ, p. 18.