Introduction

Summary

Between two East African Highlands, the Ethiopian plateau to the north and Mt. Kenya to the south, there is a vast arid and semi-arid lowland, which, to the east, stretches into Somalia and down to the coast of the Indian Ocean. It comprises the larger part of Kenya and a substantial part of Ethiopia along its southern fringes. Most of this land is used by nomadic pastoralists, and only pockets of it are suitable for cattle. The rest is pasture for camels, sheep and goats.

Without wishing to revise political maps (there are many good reasons against such revisions) one can say that in many ways these lowlands belong to the Horn of Africa or North-East Africa rather than East Africa. Linguistically, Cushitic languages dominate the entire area from the eastern shore of Lake Turkana (formerly Lake Rudolph) down to the Ocean. The largest of them is the Oromo language, which is also the language with the widest distribution in neighbouring Ethiopia. Here it is represented mainly by the Boran dialect. To the same Lowland East Cushitic sub-branch of that language family belong various Somali dialects spoken in the region, as well as Rendille, a language which might be very similar to what the Somali language once was before the Somali became Muslims and their language incorporated a vast number of Arabic loanwords.