Maragoli hills is the latest dispersal point of vaSaniaga and other Maragoli speaking clans. The hills and its feet offer a serene habitat, the stone caves (zimbinga/zihangaywa/virombe/zingoma) shelter, little in-stones spaces for legumes farming, up hill springs and wild fruits like guavas continue to supplement the descendants of the hills so. Serenic view of Lake Victoria (Inyanza), vaNyore land, Kisa, Far North where vaRogori would spread must have spiced the evening sunset wonder by the old inhabitants unmatched with the modern scenery where the horizons are dotted with habitations. It is reported that the hills were grassy and the foothills swampy.
The hills are vast and would accommodate several families migrating that those who may have settled to the West where Mungoma caves are may not necessarily have been the ones to the East where Muguva and Inyanza is. To suggest that it may not have been Murogori alone who settled at the hills but others alike who took up the language.
Saniaga was reported to have come from Sakwa Bondo and settled at Seme. Some moved ahead to Kadongo. At Kadongo, a dispersal took place. Those that headed to Pap, those that headed to Ndede and those that headed to Tiagot (Tiagot means to the hills, maragoli hills now).
Who were these early Saniaga progenitors to the hills? Names are mentioned. Mahidi, Ingumba, Udiri, Risanza and Inyanza. Then there are others, suggestively of a different generation. Musumba, Adamba, Obong' and Muhumo. Then we have names of a latter generation, remembered as grandfathers now by my informants, Wellington Odongo 76, Japheth Okodi 75, Justus Omondi, 78. And the names to their grandfathers are - Ouko, Onyango, Otieno, Ngare, Ogisa and Owino. These are famously Luo names.
Two or more oral stories can link or delink the Saniaga from Maragoli.
A Luo man, Ouko, married a Maragoli girl, muMavi muRogovo. When there came a conflict between Maragoli and Luo, Ouko sided with vaRogori in that war, him and brothers to fight the Luo. And Maragoli girls loved these brothers who had accepted to circumcise. They intermarried and became vaRogori. Though Luos could not stop referring to them as JaMwa. And they, muVo /M'bo/ by the Maragoli.
The war that was fought from chavaVo and back up to the hills (Muguva and Ingurumutu points of the hill) and down to the present boundary was courtesy of people like Ouko. The Maragoli fought with slings (misandega) but the Luo had hard leather shields. And they would approach resistively till they speared vaRogori. It is said that Ouko went to Bandani (Kisumu) and collected reject metals from an Indian workshop. He also taught the Maragoli the art of shields. And he planned the war thus:- That as the Luo approached in war from the hills, key warriors took positions while a group of young fighters stupefied them. In their chase, they descended the hills. Leaving Ouko's band up. As the young running warriors turned against them, in their retreat a little up, they were met by a terrible force. That which now killed and pushed Luo people from the hills and back, past Inyanza.
In another guerilla fight, the Maragoli strategized at night. They stealthily went and buried themselves under harvest wastes in the farms. At morrow when the Luo rose to cultivate their lands, each sprouted from his hearth and attacked. Were it not for this, the Maragoli would have lost the hills.
Colonial Administration that had been established in Kisumu prevented further warring when it drew a Luo/Maragoli boundary, symbolized by a road at the foothills of Maragoli hills to the East. The boundary could have been further East had it not been by the entry of Obando and Robert Ouko into Kenyan administration and politics. Obando was a muFunami by clan and he wished for the boundary to have vaFunami in Nyanza region. Ouko alike. An idea that times resisted for as many circumcising JaMwas were in Nyang'ori too. Robert Ouko would be forced to migrate to enhance his Luo political power.
A radical custom that cropped between vaVo and vaRogori is witnessed as a person walks from Gilwatsi to Matiziru. Houses that face the hill on the right by their main doors belong to vaRogori while the ones facing the lake region to the left are of Luo. Much as a good number of vaRogori there can speak Luo, few of the Luos can speak Rurogori /L'logori/ in return, a possible explanation to resist influence.
Prior to that and as it happened, even to date, migrations from the hills towards North kicked up and many people left the hills to cultivate foods on new fields. The hills are on the furthest side at Matiziru occupied by vaFunami. VaSaniaga pick the space at Inyanza. Then vaMavi. VaGenge, vaGuga and vaTemburi pick up at Kigadahi, Chandugunyi and towards Idereri respectively.
On the hills, Idabwongo, Muguva and eRodenyi are zones that could host a village of a few households. Even as efforts to afforest the hills at present are underway, these zones are ungazetted but to access them by road is a hiking task. Visitors are common to the hills with Ingurumutu point serving as a prayer place for the religious. Little is there, on the hills, to speak about early settlement. But the rocks, silent to the inquiries.
-/With Thanks
saniaga.org
saniaga.blogspot.com
info.saniaga@gmail.com
facebook.com/saniaga.org
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