Boma (enclosure)
Encyclopedia
A boma is a livestock
enclosure, a stockade
or kind of fort, or a district government
office. The term is used in many parts of eastern, central and southern Africa
and is incorporated into many African languages as well as colonial varieties of English
, French
and German
.
As a livestock enclosure, boma is the equivalent of 'kraal
', and the former being used in areas influenced by Swahili and the latter in areas influenced by Afrikaans.
In the form of fortified villages or camps, bomas were commonplace in Central Africa
in the 18th and 19th century in areas affected by the slave trade, tribal wars and colonial conquest, and were built by both sides in such conflicts.
Note that apart from the neatly built stockade
s shown in illustrations of bomas, the term in practice more often resembled the structure shown in the cartoon accompanying this article. In that form they often were referred to by the likes of J. A. Hunter
. and Henry Morton Stanley
In British colonies
, especially in remote areas, boma came to be used to mean colonial government offices because in the late 19th century such offices usually included a fortified police station or military barracks, often in the form of a timber stockade, though some had stone walls. Many were called forts, as in 'Fort Jameson
' or 'Fort Rosebery
'. In the 20th century it came to mean the district or provincial government headquarters, even where fortifications were no longer required.
Boma is still commonly used in eastern and southern Africa with this meaning, as well as the meaning of a livestock enclosure. An example appeared in The Nation, an English-language newspaper published in Blantyre
, Malawi, on May 26, 2006: "In Chitipa, 24 Somalis
were arrested at the Boma."
states that BOMA stood for British Overseas Management Administration during the colonial era
in Africa. The myth holds that the term has since been adopted into Swahili
and several other vernacular
languages of former British
colonies in East Africa (for example, Chichewa and Chitumbuka in Malawi
) to mean government in general, or locations of governmental offices, such as district centers.
In fact, the word boma has much deeper roots in languages spoken in eastern Africa, whether as a word of Bantu
origin or a loan word from Persian
. The Oxford English Dictionary
ascribes the first use to the adventurer Henry Morton Stanley
, in his book Through the Dark Continent (1878): 'From the staked bomas..there rise to my hearing the bleating of young calves.' The term is also used throughout Stanley's earlier book How I found Livingstone(1871) '...we pitched our camp, built a boma of thorny acacia, and other tree branches, by stacking them round our camp...' Krapf’s A Dictionary of the Suahili Language (1882) defines boma as 'a palisade or stockade serving as a kind of fortification to towns and villages...may consist of stones or poles, or of an impenetrable thicket of thorns,' though he does not give an origin for the word. Boma also appears in Band's 'Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon
' (1920), which indicates the word was in use in Tanganyika
long before it fell under the control of the British. Johnson’s Standard Swahili-English Dictionary (1939) suggests boma comes from a Persian word, buum, which he says means 'garrison, place where one can dwell in safety.' In Swahili and Sabaki: A Linguistic History, Nurse and Hinnebusch (1993) give iboma, 'defended area,' as either an East African Bantu innovation or a borrowing from Persian (p. 295). At any rate, the word was in circulation before any British 'overseas management' of the coast, although the acronym is clever.
Moreover, no such entity as the 'British Overseas Management Administration' ever existed. The UK Government’s responsibility for the development of its colonies on a continuing basis was first recognised in 1929 by the Colonial Development Act. In 1961 a Department of Technical Co-operation was established to deal with the technical co-operation side of the aid programme. The Ministry of Overseas Development was first set up as a separate ministry in October 1964, headed by a Minister of Overseas Development. It brought together the functions of the former Department of Technical Co-operation and the overseas aid policy functions of the Foreign, Commonwealth Relations and Colonial Offices and of other government departments. Great Britain's bilateral aid agency was called the 'Overseas Development Administration' (ODA) from 1970 until it was renamed the Department for International Development
(DFID) in 1997.
Livestock
Livestock refers to one or more domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to produce commodities such as food, fiber and labor. The term "livestock" as used in this article does not include poultry or farmed fish; however the inclusion of these, especially poultry, within the meaning...
enclosure, a stockade
Stockade
A stockade is an enclosure of palisades and tall walls made of logs placed side by side vertically with the tops sharpened to provide security.-Stockade as a security fence:...
or kind of fort, or a district government
Government
Government refers to the legislators, administrators, and arbitrators in the administrative bureaucracy who control a state at a given time, and to the system of government by which they are organized...
office. The term is used in many parts of eastern, central and southern Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
and is incorporated into many African languages as well as colonial varieties of English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
and German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
.
As a livestock enclosure, boma is the equivalent of 'kraal
Kraal
Kraal is an Afrikaans and Dutch word for an enclosure for cattle or other livestock, located within an African settlement or village surrounded by a palisade, mud wall, or other fencing, roughly circular in form.In the Dutch language a kraal is a term derived from the Portuguese word , cognate...
', and the former being used in areas influenced by Swahili and the latter in areas influenced by Afrikaans.
In the form of fortified villages or camps, bomas were commonplace in Central Africa
Central Africa
Central Africa is a core region of the African continent which includes Burundi, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Rwanda....
in the 18th and 19th century in areas affected by the slave trade, tribal wars and colonial conquest, and were built by both sides in such conflicts.
Note that apart from the neatly built stockade
Stockade
A stockade is an enclosure of palisades and tall walls made of logs placed side by side vertically with the tops sharpened to provide security.-Stockade as a security fence:...
s shown in illustrations of bomas, the term in practice more often resembled the structure shown in the cartoon accompanying this article. In that form they often were referred to by the likes of J. A. Hunter
J. A. Hunter
John Alexander Hunter , born near Shearington, Dumfries-shire, Scotland, also known as J. A. Hunter was a white hunter in Africa from the early 1900s through the 1950s who led many notable safaris...
. and Henry Morton Stanley
Henry Morton Stanley
Sir Henry Morton Stanley, GCB, born John Rowlands , was a Welsh journalist and explorer famous for his exploration of Africa and his search for David Livingstone. Upon finding Livingstone, Stanley allegedly uttered the now-famous greeting, "Dr...
In British colonies
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
, especially in remote areas, boma came to be used to mean colonial government offices because in the late 19th century such offices usually included a fortified police station or military barracks, often in the form of a timber stockade, though some had stone walls. Many were called forts, as in 'Fort Jameson
Chipata
Chipata, population 98,416, is the capital of the Eastern Province of Zambia. The two languages spoken are Nyanja and English, though you might find some Indian languages, as there is a large number of Zambian Indians located in the town...
' or 'Fort Rosebery
Mansa, Zambia
Mansa is the capital of the Luapula Province of Zambia, and headquarters of Mansa District. It takes its name from the local Chief Mansa and the small Mansa River which flows west to the Luapula River...
'. In the 20th century it came to mean the district or provincial government headquarters, even where fortifications were no longer required.
Boma is still commonly used in eastern and southern Africa with this meaning, as well as the meaning of a livestock enclosure. An example appeared in The Nation, an English-language newspaper published in Blantyre
Blantyre, Malawi
Blantyre or Mandala is Malawi's centre of finance and commerce, the largest city with an estimated 732,518 inhabitants . It is sometimes referred to as the commercial capital of Malawi as opposed to the political capital, Lilongwe...
, Malawi, on May 26, 2006: "In Chitipa, 24 Somalis
Somalia
Somalia , officially the Somali Republic and formerly known as the Somali Democratic Republic under Socialist rule, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. Since the outbreak of the Somali Civil War in 1991 there has been no central government control over most of the country's territory...
were arrested at the Boma."
Acronym debunking
A popular myth told to tourists in East AfricaEast Africa
East Africa or Eastern Africa is the easterly region of the African continent, variably defined by geography or geopolitics. In the UN scheme of geographic regions, 19 territories constitute Eastern Africa:...
states that BOMA stood for British Overseas Management Administration during the colonial era
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
in Africa. The myth holds that the term has since been adopted into Swahili
Swahili language
Swahili or Kiswahili is a Bantu language spoken by various ethnic groups that inhabit several large stretches of the Mozambique Channel coastline from northern Kenya to northern Mozambique, including the Comoro Islands. It is also spoken by ethnic minority groups in Somalia...
and several other vernacular
Vernacular
A vernacular is the native language or native dialect of a specific population, as opposed to a language of wider communication that is not native to the population, such as a national language or lingua franca.- Etymology :The term is not a recent one...
languages of former British
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
colonies in East Africa (for example, Chichewa and Chitumbuka in Malawi
Malawi
The Republic of Malawi is a landlocked country in southeast Africa that was formerly known as Nyasaland. It is bordered by Zambia to the northwest, Tanzania to the northeast, and Mozambique on the east, south and west. The country is separated from Tanzania and Mozambique by Lake Malawi. Its size...
) to mean government in general, or locations of governmental offices, such as district centers.
In fact, the word boma has much deeper roots in languages spoken in eastern Africa, whether as a word of Bantu
Bantu languages
The Bantu languages constitute a traditional sub-branch of the Niger–Congo languages. There are about 250 Bantu languages by the criterion of mutual intelligibility, though the distinction between language and dialect is often unclear, and Ethnologue counts 535 languages...
origin or a loan word from Persian
Persian language
Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is primarily spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and countries which historically came under Persian influence...
. The Oxford English Dictionary
Oxford English Dictionary
The Oxford English Dictionary , published by the Oxford University Press, is the self-styled premier dictionary of the English language. Two fully bound print editions of the OED have been published under its current name, in 1928 and 1989. The first edition was published in twelve volumes , and...
ascribes the first use to the adventurer Henry Morton Stanley
Henry Morton Stanley
Sir Henry Morton Stanley, GCB, born John Rowlands , was a Welsh journalist and explorer famous for his exploration of Africa and his search for David Livingstone. Upon finding Livingstone, Stanley allegedly uttered the now-famous greeting, "Dr...
, in his book Through the Dark Continent (1878): 'From the staked bomas..there rise to my hearing the bleating of young calves.' The term is also used throughout Stanley's earlier book How I found Livingstone(1871) '...we pitched our camp, built a boma of thorny acacia, and other tree branches, by stacking them round our camp...' Krapf’s A Dictionary of the Suahili Language (1882) defines boma as 'a palisade or stockade serving as a kind of fortification to towns and villages...may consist of stones or poles, or of an impenetrable thicket of thorns,' though he does not give an origin for the word. Boma also appears in Band's 'Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon
Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon
"Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon" is the German title for the "Encyclopedia of German colonies" which was published in 1920. The text had been finished by 1914 before World War I but was not printed due to the war...
' (1920), which indicates the word was in use in Tanganyika
Tanganyika
Tanganyika , later formally the Republic of Tanganyika, was a sovereign state in East Africa from 1961 to 1964. It was situated between the Indian Ocean and the African Great Lakes of Lake Victoria, Lake Malawi and Lake Tanganyika...
long before it fell under the control of the British. Johnson’s Standard Swahili-English Dictionary (1939) suggests boma comes from a Persian word, buum, which he says means 'garrison, place where one can dwell in safety.' In Swahili and Sabaki: A Linguistic History, Nurse and Hinnebusch (1993) give iboma, 'defended area,' as either an East African Bantu innovation or a borrowing from Persian (p. 295). At any rate, the word was in circulation before any British 'overseas management' of the coast, although the acronym is clever.
Moreover, no such entity as the 'British Overseas Management Administration' ever existed. The UK Government’s responsibility for the development of its colonies on a continuing basis was first recognised in 1929 by the Colonial Development Act. In 1961 a Department of Technical Co-operation was established to deal with the technical co-operation side of the aid programme. The Ministry of Overseas Development was first set up as a separate ministry in October 1964, headed by a Minister of Overseas Development. It brought together the functions of the former Department of Technical Co-operation and the overseas aid policy functions of the Foreign, Commonwealth Relations and Colonial Offices and of other government departments. Great Britain's bilateral aid agency was called the 'Overseas Development Administration' (ODA) from 1970 until it was renamed the Department for International Development
Department for International Development
The Department For International Development is a United Kingdom government department with a Cabinet Minister in charge. It was separated from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1997. The goal of the department is "to promote sustainable development and eliminate world poverty". The current...
(DFID) in 1997.