The Story of Kenya's name.

Not far from where I live is a large market called Kongowea. The market is known for selling almost anything. It opens at some ungodly hour of the morning when the trucks arrive from upcountry or what we call ‘barra.’ The lorries are loaded with, bananas, sweet potatoes, and all manner of other vegetables. Hand carts, called mkokotainies, with their team of three men, mostly bare footed, one man puts himself between two long shafts protruding from the front of the hand-cart and the other two wait as the vegetables are loaded. The signal for them to start pushing is when the man in the front is lifted off the ground! They line the dark streets, hoping for a day’s work, waiting for the traders to appear with their sacks of produce to be delivered to the surrounding shops and villages. There is a bell that I have written about before, outside Kongowea Market, it is call the freedom bell. The story goes that John Ludwig Kraft, one of the first missionaries to arrive in Kenya, hung the bell there. If any slave could swim across the crocodile-infested creek, make it up the bank, and through the jungle to the bell, then ring it, Kraft would come running and take him along Kengeleni track out to his homestead Ribai.

Kraft arrived in Mombasa in 1844, soon after he arrived his young wife and daughter died from malaria. He found the oppressive weather on the coast very disagreeable and so moved to higher ground about twenty miles from Mombasa, called Rabai, where he set up his homestead. Kraft was a genius with languages and learned the local Giriama language very quickly. As soon as his church was built, he opened a school and started not only preaching Christianity to the local people but also conducted lessons on rudimentary maths and German. It is worth noting that the Rabai people are well known for their above-average level of education. It seems Kraft was a better teacher than a missionary though, as when he left Kenya, he felt it had been a complete waste of time with only a few cripples as his converts!

Kraft loved to explore, and when another missionary arrived called Johannes Rebmann, they decided they wanted to visit the interior. This is where Chief Kivoi Mwendwa comes in. Kivoi was from the Kamba tribe and had spent most of his youth on the move. The Kambas were known as long-distance traders and had built a route from Mombasa to Southern Sudan. Kivoi traded mostly in ivory and some gems, but he also sold a lot of slaves to the Arabs. This trade is not as well-known as the transatlantic trade route, but it was equally horrific with an estimated 90% death rate on the journey alone. According to the locals, Kivoi had a large homestead at a stopover point that is now a major town on the Mombasa Nairobi Road called Voi.

Kivoi agreed to take Kraft and Rebmann on the long trek into the interior, he traveled with them to Ukambi where on the 3rd of December 1849 they became the first muzungus to see the mountain of mystery which was then known as Kere-Nyaga. Kraft asked Kivoi the name of the mountain and he responded in his broad Kamba accent, Kiima Ki nyaa. Kraft then tried to translate the words into his German and replied with Kiinya and then promptly named the mountain ‘Kenya’ which caught on and became the name of the country! When this find was reported to the experts in Europe, Kraft was ridiculed to have suggested that there was a snowcapped mountain on the equator.

After wandering around for several months the caravan decided to head back to Rabai. In a diary entry, Kraft says,

“When within a mile or two of Dana, the party was suddenly attacked by a gang of robbers. The greater part of the caravan was instantly dispersed, Kivoi’s people flying in all directions: Kivoi himself was killed with his immediate followers; I fired my gun twice, but into the air, as I could not bring myself to shed the blood of another man; I then found myself in the bash, separated from both friend and foe, and flying in what I suppose to be the best direction.”

After the raid the Kambas’ blamed Kraft for the death of their leader and condemned him to death. He managed to escape once again and fled in the direction of Yatta. He was in great danger now as he was trying to travel with a very small party through hostile territory. He decided to travel only during the night where he constantly lost his way. He states, “My compass was of little use in the dense forests of the region.”

He did however manage to get back to Mombasa, but his deteriorating health forced him to return to Germany in 1853. He carried with him several Swahili manuscripts, including a copy of the Book of the Battle of Tambuka, one of the earliest Kiswahili manuscripts. The German Embassy in Nairobi is still called Ludwig-Krapf-House. Kraft’s house in Rabai is now part of the Rabai Museum.

Kivoi is a national hero in Kenya as the man with the city of Voi named after him and for naming our great nation. On an aside, when I was researching this article, I spoke to my wife. She told me that in school when she was taught about Kivoi she was told he sold a lot more slaves to the Arabs than I can find any evidence for. She also said he sold all the tall Kambas to the Arabs which is why we do not see many six-foot tall Kambas today! I could not find any documented evidence for this, but it is an interesting story that could carry some truth as the Kambas are not known for being tall.

I hope you enjoyed this odd article about two very different men that shaped Kenya, its name, religion, education, and even its population.

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