The title of this short working paper is called 'THE BANTU ROSETTA STONES' and its main purpose is to draw attention and awareness in the field of Afro-linguistic Egyptology. It offers a bench mark for future study and research in sound/meaning relationships between words of common origin shared in the Ancient Egyptian and Bantu languages of Africa.

This paper provides the latest independent linguistic evidence which classifies the Ancient Egyptian language as belonging to the Bantu languages of Africa, more specifically to the wider group of languages known as the Niger-Congo group of languages.

It has long been assumed by scholars that the Ancient Egyptian language belongs to the Afro-Asiatic group of languages.  The overwhelming evidence provided in this short paper disputes this assumption.

From our latest independent research, we have established beyond doubt that the Ancient Egyptian language contains substantial amounts of vocabulary derived from the Proto-Bantu group of languages. The Ancient Egyptian language also contains many word forms and phrases that are similar to the current Bantu languages of Central, Southern and Eastern Africa and in particular to the Kiswahili-Bantu language.

Only a few sample of words will be examined here. This finding has never been achieved before and the linguistic evidence provided here must be seen as being supportive to the study of present day Egyptology. The investigation of the Proto-Bantu roots of the Ancient Egyptian language and its new classification into the Niger-Congo group of languages has been achieved independently by our team of researchers over a period of ten years.

Latest research by linguistics have shown that the root or ancestral language of modern human beings may be more than 10,000 years and possibly nearer 15,000 years old. Merrit Ruhlen has even proposed that a common language once spanned the entire world. He calls this language Proto-Global. Furthermore, mitochondrial DNA evidence carried out by Bryan Sykes has shown that modern human beings originated in Central/Southern Africa and spread across the rest of Africa and along the Arabian peninsula carrying and diffusing language.

It was only at a later stage that modern human beings spread north into Egypt and the process of carrying and spreading language was repeated. It is from this body of evidence that such a vast vocabulary of words of common origin between Ancient Egyptian and Proto-Bantu have been compiled. From this, one can make the assumption that Bantu vocabulary spread northwards and not the other way round.

The five criteria outlined below have been used as a bench mark for classifying the linguistic similarities between the Ancient Egyptian and Proto-Bantu languages of Africa. These are only a few indicators:

• Substantial resemblances in fundamental vocabulary

• Organization of parts of speech, the sentence

• Morphological analysis

• Etymology of common vocabulary

• Ranking of Gender

However only the first criteria, namely substantial resemblances in fundamental vocabulary will be considered in this investigation.

The methodology of approach is to examine only those words which have similar consonants and give an exact match in sound and meaning in Bantu by inserting the correct vowels lacking in the Ancient Egyptian language.

 The main breakthrough into understanding the Ancient Egyptian language was achieved by using the Kiswahili-Bantu language as an anchor of linguistic support. Other current Bantu languages have also been used to give further support to this research.

Unfortunately, on-line dictionaries on the internet do not always provide in-depth meanings of words and may in some

cases be a hindrance to fully understanding the implication of derived vocabulary. 

NTOA HESABU, giver of accounts, dedicated to accounts

BAITI, house

BARAKA, gift, a favour,

TIMU, TIMIA, to be complete/completed, come to an end

TEMA, to cut, cut up

Duplication of words is a common feature used in Bantu languages to
intensify meanings of a given action.

JAMA, a chap, a young man, a relation

It would appear that the Ancient Egyptians considered hair to be a root similar to the roots of a tree. Thus they used the word SHINA to mean hair.

UGUMU, strength, hardness, obstinacy

JEURI, arrogant, insulting, argumentative, boastful, putting on airs

JEURIJEURI, to boast, put on airs

ZUIO is derived from ZUIA, restrain, cause to stop.

SEFU, large knife, sword

HENQA, to seize, to catch

HESABIWA, be counted, be numbered, assessments

The Kiswahili-Bantu word for a loaf of bread is derived from the verb KATA, to cut. Thus a cutting or something cut into a loaf of bread or a piece of cake is called M-KATE, something cut. It would appear that the Ancient Egyptians dropped the consonant M and shortened the word to KATE instead of M-KATE.

MASKANI, abode, dwelling place

The Kiswahili-Bantu words PATUA or PASUA are both listed as being identical words in the Dictionary of the Kiswahili Language by the Reverend  Dr. L. Krapf.

The Ancient Egyptian word is derived from the Kiswahili-Bantu verb SHUKA, to descend, alight. The form SHUKENI is derived by agglutinating the following words SHUKA + NINYI. The shortened form becomes SHUK-ENI meaning, you all alight at a given destination.  The Ancient Egyptians used the word to denote a resting place as may be seen from the hieroglyphics below.

CHATU or JATU, python, snake

KATITI, tiny, small

KETE + KETE, quiet, quiet, silence

PAA, rise, ascend, soar, fly

If we consider the Southern Soto-Bantu word BESA and attach the prefix MO-, the one who, we obtain the word MO- BESI, the one who lights a fire, who roasts. This would be equivalent to using the Ancient Egyptian consonants BSI, to give the word BESI, without the prefix MO- The intended meaning without the prefix MO- would still describe a person who lights up a fire.

The word Ancient Egyptian word given by the consonants NTCHM is the Kiswahili-Bantu word NJEMA. NJEMA is derived from the adjective -EMA which means good and, includes goodness of all kinds pertaining to feeling, taste, or conscience.

WAO, they, them, their. WAO is the Kiswahili-Bantu pronoun.

WOTO or UOTO is derived from the verb OTA, grow, sprout, usually applied to vegetable life.

UCHAO, sunrise, dawning, dawn

MUMO, inside, among

MATO, MACHO, eyes 

an acquaintance, a person with the same surname

The word SOMO is derived from the verb SOMA, to read. The noun SOMO means a lesson, a reading or a class subject devised by a teacher. Thus SOMO is something read, and may also mean a teacher who instructs a person in an initiation ceremony. SOMO also means knowledge, education, learning, science.

KAZA, bind, tie, tighten, fasten

KINENE, that which is, big, fat, stout, plump

The interchange between the consonants N and M is quite usual in Bantu languages. It does appear that this is also the case between the Ancient Egyptian language and Bantu languages. Thus MKOTA and NKOTA are similar words which give the identical meaning of a strong man.

WENIEJI-WOTE, WENIEJIWOTE, subjects, citizens

AMA  hold tightly, grasp, cling, clasp

USEMI, speech, conversation, language, talk

SOKOTA, twist, twine, plait, weave

This investigation demonstrates some words which are common between the Ancient Egyptian language and the Bantu languages of Eastern, Central, and Southern Africa.

The sample of words exhibit strong resemblances in sound/meaning relationships and demonstrate clearly that there is a strong linguistic link between the languages. These cannot be ignored from the volume of evidence supported by this investigation.

Thus it may be said that the Ancient Egyptian language is related to the wider group of languages of Africa, in particular to the corridor of languages described as the Niger-Congo group of languages.

The sample of words investigated constitute only a small proportion of words which have been researched. Many more words representing common sound/meaning relationships have been investigated and will be published later. This investigation has been carried out primarily by using the Kiswahili-Bantu language as a tool for exploring common words. Other Bantu languages have also been included in this research. The Ancient Egyptian consonants used may vary in sound but these are closely related. Examples of this are given below: