Pure Swahili

Swahili actually means ‘edge’ or ‘coast’. The influence of the Arab speakers is significant. As lingua franca it is the link of a multicoloured and polyphonic mixed culture of traders and sailors that put into port and has been doing this with their traditional dhows since a thousand years travelling between Lamu, Mombasa, Malindi, Zanzibar, Mogadiscio and Dar es-Salaam. Driven by the seasonal monsoons, they sailed further south to Mozambique and Madagaskar, and even north-east as far as Arabia and India.