Renaming the streets and surbubs is honoring our heritage

There has been much media debate on the spelling of some Zimbabwean street and suburbs' names going on, with some people strongly criticising former colonial administrators for deliberately distorting some of the names or leaving out some important people's titles.

Before we look at this relatively controversial issue, it is helpful to have a glance at our traditional practice with regard to the naming of our roads, rivers, hills, mountains, forests, wells, swamps, localities and sources of such resources as table salt (sodium chloride) and iron ore.

Cecil John Rhodes and his Pioneer Column invaded Mashonaland in 1890, some 52 years after King Mzilikazi's arrival and occupation of a region that had been under a Rozwi dynasty headed by successive monarchs whose title was "mambo".

That region lay roughly south of the Umniati River, now Munyati River, and stretched westwards up to the Mtotsi River (Macloutsi River) south of where Francistown now stands and from the Umniati stretched south – eastwards up to the Bembe River (Limpopo River).

The Rozwis had defeated a Kalanga kingdom headed by a monarch titled Tjibundule, but whose actual name was Madabhani, and whose place of abode was the Khami Hills, originally called Nkami Hills. The word "nkami" means the "milker".

We do not know the name or names of the people who ruled the region before the advent to and its occupation by BaKalanga, but we know for certain that the Khoisan roamed  the Savannah region, and lived in some of the caves on whose rocks they sketched scenes of some wild animals with human figures in hot pursuit.

The Khoisan were later called "Bushmen" by the white colonial settlers, a derogatory name that has now been replaced by the much more scientifically acceptable "Khoisan".

As we wade through the historical periods of all those people right up to the time of the Nguni king Mzilikazi, we do not come across anything named in either their memory or honour.

We have rivers such as Sanyati, a word that tells us that buffalo (nyati) herds used to drink from that waterway.

We have the "Gwilo" River, a word that means "place for fighting". In today's English we can translate that word as "battle field".

It was so-called because it was along that river that Tjibundule's warriors occasionally fought those of Munhumutapa.

We come southwards where we stop at the "Shangana" River, a TjiKalanga (Lilima dialect), word that means "little reeds."

Many other rivers in various parts of Zimbabwe have names that tell us what they did to some people who tried to cross them when they were in full spate.

Good examples of such names are Simukwe, a corruption of "Usimuke", which is TjiKalanga for "don't get up", and "Matole", a corruption of matola, or "ntoli" "the taker".

In the Hungwe area, some 90 km west of Plumtree, we come across two rivers with dramatically meaningful names, Mayitembwe and N'homola.

Mayitembe means "a mother of a loin-cloth," and N'homela means "the snatcher".

In the first case, a woman was swept away by the river, and when friends and relatives looked for her body, all they could find was her loin cloth.

The second name N'homela was given after the flooded river had snatched a baby from behind its mother back.

Other rivers have names whose origins and meanings are now obscure. However, some of them were later given meaningful names by the Ndebele people.

That was the case with the Netru River which the Ndebeles named Thekwane, and the Nata which they called Manzamnyama, a truncated form of "Manzi amnyama," which means "black water". Netru and Nata are probably Khoisan words.

We have, however, Intaba Zika Mambo. Here the title was used not a name. It would appear that mountains and rivers and similar geographical features were regarded as collective possessions of the whole nation and not of an individual, hence Matombo akaMasiye, (Intaba ZakoMasiye) or Matombo akaTjalelebgwa (Intaba ZakoTjalelebgwa).

Very, very rare do we come across a river or mountain bearing an individual's name in Zimbabwe.

So, naming streets or roads in memory of or in honour of personalities is really a European tradition.

Be that as it may, when the modern Bulawayo City was founded in 1894, the orthography of this country's indigenous languages was either non-existent or it was in its infancy.

Hills and mountains have names that tell us about their appearance or what one is likely to see should one climb them.

Titema is a name of a mountain at Dombodema, and so are Tjenyoka, Zwevumbe and Malilawanda.

Titema is a corruption of "miti mitema", so called because the mountain was originally covered by an umbrella of trees that gave it a black shadow.

Tjenyoka was given that name because people believed that a huge snake lived in one of the caves of that towering granite mountain. Malilawunda literally means "where owls hoot". Zwevumbe means where wildebeest abound.

It took a few decades for Christian missionaries to create a standard orthography for the country's various dialects such as SiNdebele (a Zulu dialect), Zezuru, Nambya, TjiKalanga, ChiVenda, SeSotho, ChiKaranga and several others.

The orthographies adopted, were heavily influenced by the indigenous language of each church denomination.

A typical example of this is the original spelling of the name of the famous king of the Zulus, Tjaka. It was later spelt, Chaka, and much later became Tshaka.

It is important to point out that a global look indicates that most nations would have settled for Chaka as is shown by such names and words as China, Chile, Choma, and such words as charm, chisel, choose and church.

We should hasten to point out that whereas, SiNdebele and Zulu, of course, are written phonetically, the English language is neither logical nor phonetical in the way many of its words are spelt and pronounced.

That is why the word "cough" is pronounced "kof" but its last four letters are the same as those of the word "though" which is pronounced "tho" and not "thof", nor is "cough" pronounced "ko-o"!

It is because of that strange orthographical characteristic of the English language that the toponymy "Matsheamhlope" is spelt "Matsheumhlope".

Why? Simply because the vowel "u" is pronounced with an "a" sound as in the words "umbrella, umpire, utmost, utterly" and so many others.

So, orthography was a strong factor in the writing of some of Bulawayo's street and suburban names, with "Kumalo" instead of "Khumalo" coming to one's mind.

The exclusion of the title "king" in the naming of some suburbs and institutions could have been deliberate simply because the British did not officially recognise "kings" of colonised people as "kings" but as chiefs.

The only kings in the British Empire were successive British kings in London.

However, that royal title could also have been left out in the naming of some places and some of the city's schools and suburbs for sheer convenience as was the case in the naming of the "Victoria Falls" instead of the Queen Victoria Falls.

Having said all this, the author of this article would like to draw Bulawayo City Council's attention to an additional aspect of this matter which is the need to remember and honour those who ruled this region before King Mzilikazi and his people came in 1838, a very recent date in historical terms.

Those people played an important part in the social, cultural, political and economic development of this region.

They too must be honoured by naming some institutions such as schools after them. All the mambos lived in and ruled this region.

It is strange that they are more honoured in the Midlands than in the region of their abode, a region in which Intaba Zika Mambo (Mambo's Mountains) are located.

Remembering and honouring them will give a much more realistic historical background of the entire region, just as the memorable Ndebele song: "Kudala kwakungenje,……..  kwakubusa uMambo loMzilikazi."

About the writer: Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu is a retired, Bulawayo – based journalist. He can be contacted on cell 0734 328 136 or email: sgwakuba@gmail.com