Nguni languages
- For the cattle breed see Nguni cattle.
Nguni commonly refers both to a group of clans and nations living in south-east Africa, and to a group of Bantu languages spoken in southern Africa including Zulu, Xhosa, Swati, and Ndebele.
Nguni is an artificial term, used by white linguists and ethnologists since the 1930s. A further, similarly artificial partitioning differentiates between the northern Nguni, consisting of Zulu and Swazi and the southern Nguni, among which are the Xhosa, Thembu, Mfengu, Mpondo and the Mpondomise.
Social organization
Within the Nguni nations, the clan - based on male ancestry - formed the highest social unit. Each clan was led by a chieftain. Influential men tried to achieve independence by creating their own clan. The power of a chieftain often depended on how well he could hold his clan together. From about 1800, the rise of the Zulu clan of the Nguni and the consequent mfecane that accompanied the expansion of the Zulus under Shaka, helped to drive a process of alliance between and consolidation among many of the smaller clans. For example, the kingdom of Swaziland was formed in the early nineteenth century by different Nguni groups allying with the Dlamini clan against the threat of external attack. Today the kingdom encompasses many dfferent clans who speak an Nguni language called Swati and are loyal to the king of Swaziland, who is also the head of the Dlamini clan.
Language
The Nguni languages are closely related, and in many instances mutually intelligable.