C&P
Introduction
I’m not sticking my neck out too much to say that the Meru
are certainly of mixed origin. Some claim roots from the north
or west, others from the coast, and some even from the
Arabian Peninsula, ancient Egypt or Israel.
The Meru have long been considered by Western ‘experts’ to
be Bantu, although there is much to show that this is an
exceedingly simplistic view which bears little resemblance to
reality. Some studies have recently shown that at least some
of the Meru are Cushitic in origin, although the only thing that
is really taught from these studies is a lesson warning against
attempting to apply simple sets of criteria to everyone. Both
the notions ‘Bantu’ and ‘Cushitic’ are essentially linguistic, and
although these classifications can often be of help in
determining the origins of different peoples, in the case of the
Meru, they really do become irrelevant, as you’re about to
discover…
Oral Myth: Mbwaa and the Red People
The predominant oral tradition concerning the Meru’s early
history is a fantastic fable that seems to combine elements of
both truth and fiction.
In brief, it recounts that the Meru were once enslaved by the
“Red People”. They eventually escaped, and in their exodus
came across a large body of water called Mbwaa or Mbwa,
which they crossed by magical means. The details of the
tradition are replete with parallels to the Old Testament, and
also contain references to events described in the New
Testament. This has led many to speculate that the Meru are
perhaps the descendants of one of the Lost Tribes of Israel,
or that they were once Jewish, or had been in profound
cultural contact with a people that certainly were (such as the
Falashim of Ethiopia).
I’ve based the following version of the tradition on that
recounted in Daniel Nyaga’s book, Customs and
Traditions of the Meru (1997: East African Educational
Publishers, PO Box 45314 Nairobi). Although there are many
variants, the basic outline is pretty much the same for all.
The Red People and the Exodus
According to tradition, the Meru once lived in a state
of slavery far away from their present homeland,
under a people called antu ba nguu ntuune (or
nhuuntune or nguo ntuni , meaning “Red People”
or “Red Clothes”). The king of the Red People was
powerful and often harsh upon his subjects, but no
one knows for sure who the Red people actually
were.
If we take ‘red’ to refer to skin colour, then these
people were most likely Arabs, for the Europeans had
not yet arrived in East Africa. If ‘red’ refers to
dress, however, then their identity if anyone’s guess,
especially as the Maasai, Samburu and other Nilotic
tribes - who are nowadays known for wearing red -
only adopted that tradition a century or so ago.
The place where the Meru were enslaved has also
not yet been convincingly located. Some say that it
was called Mbwa or Mbwaa (the same name given by
other versions of the myth for the body of water
the Meru later crossed); others suggest that it may
have been Mbwara Matanga on the western
peninsula of Manda Island in the Lamu archipelago,
off the northeast coast of Kenya; others still posit
that it may have been in Yemen or in some other
place on the other side of the Red Sea.
Whatever the exact location, this state of bondage
lasted until the leader of the Red People started killing
all the Meru’s male children immediately after birth.
But one child, apparently very handsome, escaped this
fate, having been kept hidden in the riverside in a
basket his mother had made. As a result, the prodigal
child became known as Mwithe, the Hidden One.
Mwithe, who also became known as Koomenjwe
(Koomenjoe) and Muthurui, grew up to become a very
great prophet, and was known as one who had
spoken to God. Assisted by another elder called
Kauro-Beechau, Mwithe organized a council of wise
elders to lead the Meru out of bondage. They went
to the leader of the Red People and asked to be set
free. The leader agreed, but on condition that an
impossible task be successfully performed by the Meru.
This task required them to produce a shoe that
had hair on both sides. As shoes were normally made
from leather, this took some thinking, until Koomenjwe
told the people to cut the dewlap of a bull. Before it
was completely severed, it was stitched on the side
that had been cut. By the time the bull recovered,
the lap had made the shoe that was required. But
when they took it to their masters, it was rejected
and the Meru were given a second task.
This was to provide a steer (or an ox) that
produced diatomite (a very fine chalk). Koomenjwe
advised them to feed a calf on milk, and eventually it
started passing out white dung. Some versions of the
myth have it the other way around: the steer was to
produce white dung, and so they fed it on chalk; yet
another version replaces the ox with an elephant.
Nonetheless, the successful completion of the task
was also rejected by the Red People, and they were
given a third task to do.
This required them to remove a fruit from a very
deep pit, without piercing it or having anyone descend
into the pit to pick it up. Koomenjwe advised them to
fill the pit with water until it overflowed, and the
fruit floated out. Though it succeeded, this test was
also rejected.
The next test required them to kill all the elders
until their blood flowed like run-off during rains.
Koomenjwe advised that the elders be hidden and all
old livestock - cows, goats, sheep and donkeys - be
killed instead. When that was done their blood was
enough to flow as the enemies wanted. But the
success of this test was not accepted either.
The fifth test was truly impossible. It required the
Meru to forge a spear that could touch both the
earth and the sky. The Meru started making it
straight away, but it kept breaking. Koomenjwe and
the elders, failing to come up with a solution, simply
abandoned the whole task of making it, and instead
conceived the idea of organizing the people to escape
on foot. For this reason, the Meru later on called
this spear itumo ria mwito (the spear made for
the trek), for it was the impossibility of making it that
had given them the idea of the exodus.
In order to have an opportunity to make good their
escape, Koomenjwe went to ask the Red People to
give them eight days to complete the task. He said
the Meru were making charcoal from people’s hair
because it was the type of charcoal that was
required to make the spear. The enemies granted the
request.
Koomenjwe organized the first group of old people,
because they could not walk fast, and they were
grouped together with the older livestock that had
remained. The second group was made up of mothers
and children, and the third group consisted of young
people and young livestock. Keeping the rear were
the warriors, well armed and ready for battle. The
three groups were, according to some versions, the
ancestors of the three main Meru clans from which
all other clans descend.
The exodus took place at night. The warriors
collected a very big heap of dry dung and animal
droppings and set it on fire with all the houses.
Meanwhile, Koomenjwe had gone to explain to the
masters that the fire they were seeing was being
used for making the spear which would be ready by
noon the following day. After that, he returned. The
following day the enemies waited for the spear, but it
was never brought. The Meru had gone.
Mbwaa and the great sacrifice
During their exodus, the Meru reached a very large
body of water which they called Mbwaa (or Mbwa).
Here, they suffered a lot (presumably from their
pursuers, or possibly from malnourishment), so much
so that a sacrifice had to be made to seek answers,
as these could be read from entrails. There are two
main versions of this sacrifice.
The first has it that the Meru elders went to a
prophet called Mugwe for help (whose name later
became the word to describe all prophets and
leaders). Mugwe asked for three young men to
sacrifice themselves. The three who volunteered were
named Gaita, Kiuma and Muthetu, after whom the
three main Meru clans are named (all other clans
stem from these). When the sacrifice had been
concluded, Mugwe instructed the people on how to
escape successfully. He placed them under the
leadership of Koomenjwe to whom he gave a magic
stick or spear (gitumo ) about three feet long, with
which he was to strike the water to make it part.
The second main version of the sacrifice story says
that by then, Koomenjwe was called Muthurui, and it
was he who came up with a solution. He had carried
out his divination by examining the entrails of cows,
goats and other animals, but all without success. As
he wondered what to do, it dawned on him that the
situation could only be saved by examining the entrails
of a human being. He said: “Let someone be
examined.”
The elders asked: “Who is going to be examined?”
Muthurui begged to be given one person from each
family so that if a person from one family failed to
give an answer, the next one could be examined.
Muthurui’s brother offered himself and said: “I am
ready to be sacrificed.”
Muthurui asked: “Who is going to be his
mathinjiro ?” (slaughtering leaves or an altar).
Another person volunteered and said: “I will be the
one.”
Again, Muthurui asked: “In case the first person is
not accepted by God, who else will be offered?”
Another said: “I am ready.”
Then another person volunteered to provide milk
for washing the entrails, and another person
provided a string with which the volunteer had to be
stitched, and yet another person - having conceived
the idea that the first person might fear the
operation - went to cut sticks to flog him if he did so.
When everything was ready, Muthurui operated on his
brother, and got the answer he was looking for.
Surprisingly enough, Muthurui’s brother did not die. He
had only his intestines mounted and stitched, and
thereafter was called Murorua.
The crossing of the great water
Following the answer, Koomenjwe/Muthurui struck the
water with his magic spear, and it parted. Some
flowed to one side and the rest to the other side,
forming a wide corridor of dry land in the middle,
along which the people went across.
The crossing of the water lasted all night, and
took place in the form of several groups or
nchienu . Some versions say there were three
groups, who were either identified with those men
who had been sacrificed, or were identified with the
time of the crossing: the first to cross when it was
still dark were the Njiru (black); the second crossed
just after dawn and were called Ntune (pale or red);
and the last to cross at sunrise were the Njaru
(white). Other versions say that there were more
groups, either five or seven, who were to become the
ancestors of the various Meru clans that exist today;
still other versions say that these groups had nothing
to do with the clans, but that all the Meru were
members of one of these groups.
When the last group had crossed, Koomenjwe/
Muthurui struck the water again and it came again
into one mass, drowning the army of the Red People
who had followed them. So it is that the Meru now
say that they came from Mbwaa.
The problem for anthropologists and historians alike is
put places and dates to these events, which is no
easy task given the many variations, fictional elements
and elaborations of the myth.
In one version, one of the groups which crossed
was the Antu-banthanju. They got to the other side
of the water early in the morning, just before
sunrise, when the sky was reddish. When this group
saw the water they had crossed looking red, they
called it Iria Itune : the Red Sea.
Despite the initial excitement of European scholars
keen to find confirmation of the literal truth of the
Biblical Exodus, it is now generally accepted that the
Meru never actually crossed the Red Sea we know
now, but that the “Red Sea” mentioned in the myth
was most likely Lake Victoria (Nyanza), in the
southwest of Kenya. This hasn’t been proved beyond
doubt, though, and the Manda Island theory remains
attractive: according to this, the “Red People” were
probably East African coastal Arabs, who had
invaded Manda Island around 1700. As this was a
time of great expansion for the principalities of the
Lamu Archipelago, slaves were needed for cultivation
to feed the increasing commercial population, as well
as to assist in the menial aspects of the ivory trade.
The subsequent flight from enslavement could possibly
have been accomplished at low tide across the
narrow channel which separates Manda Island from
the mainland, whilst a rising tide could have
disorganised pursuit.
A third possibility is that the ‘Red Sea’ was the
Tana River in spate. As I’ve seen with my own eyes,
this is for most of the year a relatively small river,
but when it floods - as it did in the winter of 1997-98
- the effect is astonishing. Instead of a narrow river,
the Tana delta floods huge areas of land to either
side of it. As I saw in early 1999, the last floods had
left watermarks sometimes five metres up the trunks
of trees, below which all leaves and vegetation had
died. The colour of the river, too, is red, through
carrying so much eroded topsoil, ironically much of it
from the present land of the Meru.
Ancient Meroe
In yet another version of ancient Meru history, this one more
academically-inspired than the myth, it has been convincingly
argued by Alfred M. M’Imanyara, if not beyond doubt, that the
Meru came originally from the ancient Nilotic empire of Meroe
(circa 300BC - AD100), which is sometimes referred to as an
island, as it was bounded by both the White and Blue Niles,
and swamps in the south. The linguistic similarity between the
words ‘Meru’ and ‘Meroe’ is certainly tempting, as is other
linguistic evidence, which - although far from conclusive - does
suggest at least that the Meru were at some point in contact
with civilisations from further north. Indeed, some Meru elders
refer to their early origins as being a place called Misiri, which
is identical to the Arab and Berber name for Egypt still used
today. The idea that the Meru came from the north is in any
case common enough among Meru elders. Whether or not this
ties in with Meroe is mere speculation, but it does neatly lead
on to the next section, which describes the not-so-neat
migrations which followed the crossing of the “Red Sea”.
Migrations
Alas, things do not become any easier for historians following
the crossing of the “Red Sea”, as it seems that the Meru
migrated far and wide in Kenya (and possibly also in Ethiopia,
Somalia and maybe Tanzania) before settling in their present
location northeast of Mount Kenya, the sacred mountain
which the Meru call Keremara (meaning, Mountain of the
Splendour).
There are two main versions of their migratory history,
each depending on whether one considers the Meru to be
originally Bantu or Cushitic (in other words, it’s likely the reality
was a combination of both these ideas).
‘Bantu’ migrations
If one follows the Bantu idea, it is generally assumed
that the first Bantu entered Kenya from the
southwest, from where they began fanning east and
north across Kenya. Their northward expansion was
considerable, possibly bringing them as far north as
Ethiopia and Somalia. There, the Oromo-speaking
peoples’ military expansion from around 1300-1500
onwards (there’s no consensus on exact dates or
even centuries) pushed the Meru back into Kenya,
where they eventually settled near Mount Kenya
(they are still the northernmost of Kenya’s Bantu-
speaking groups). The route they followed back down
into Kenya may well have brought them to the Indian
Ocean coast, where their enslavement by the “Red
People” may have taken place. From there, they
moved west and inland to their present location.
Alternatively, the “Red People” myth may have
taken place much earlier in their history, shortly after
the first Bantu immigrants arrived in Kenya, next to
Lake Victoria.
‘Cushitic’ migrations
This theory is inherently more complex, as no one
knows for sure where the Meru actually came from.
In any case, ‘Cushitic’ is a misnomer, as most of these
theories have the Meru coming from the region of
the Nile, making them Nilotes like the Maasai and
Turkana.
Most of these theories posit that the Meru have -
for the most part of their history - been moving
south, most recently from Ethiopia or Somalia, and
before then from the Nile (Sudan) or elsewhere,
whether as a remnant of the ancient Meroe
civilisation, or from much further north - Egypt,
North Africa, or even ancient Israel.
An ex-chief quoted by M’Imanyara says that they
came from a place called ruteere rwa Urio, which he
equated with Misiri (the Arab and Berber term for
Egypt).
Later migrations
Whichever of these two theories you subscribe to, it’s
generally accepted that a substantial proportion of
the Meru were certainly on the coast at some time in
their migrations, and that they were pushed south by
the Oromo-speaking peoples’ expansion. Here’s where
things differ yet again. Some say the Meru just
veered inland, ending up at their present location.
Others, however, say that they continued down the
entire Kenyan coastline as far as Tanzania, where
they turned inland. There, they split with the
Tanzanian Meru west of Mount Kilimanjaro, and
slowly made their way back up into Kenya from the
south, eventually ending up near Mount Kenya.
Yet another theory more reasonably takes both
possibilities into account, and refers to the Oromo
having invaded the coast of Kenya in the form of a
wedge, thereby splitting the Meru in two.
Conclusion
Sounds simple? The last thing I’ll confuse you with is a short
digression about timing: the Oromo expansion occurred from
around 1300-1500 onwards, at the same time during which
the first movements of the central highlands Bantu
southwards from the Nyambene Hills began (including the
ancestors of the Kikuyu, Embu, Mbeere, Chuka and Kamba).
The Arab/Swahili coastal slave and ivory trade began peaking
around the 1700s, and sometime between those two dates,
the Mijikenda and Pokomo, whose histories and cultures are
not dissimilar to Meru, also began moving south and west out
of Somalia.
In conclusion, I’d hazard the guess that the Meru are an
amalgam of several different groups, who after many
centuries of being hounded all over the place, and once even
enslaved, at some point between 1500 and 1800 found
themselves together in the same place, and became one people - the Meru.
Some came from the east, others from the north, and
some may already have been there when the other groups
arrived. As the “Red People” story sounds so similar to the Old
Testament, I’d say that the dominant group of the Meru were
at some time in close contact with a Jewish people, such as
the Falashim of Ethiopia, where the legend was adapted to fit
actual Meru history of enslavement and exodus.
Not satisfied? Answers on a postcard, but don’t expect an
answer!