Last modified: 2004-04-17 by bruce berry
Keywords: barotseland | litunga | lozi |
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![[Barotseland flag]](../images/z/zm_ba.gif)
by Dirk Schönberger, 7 Mar 2001 The flag of the Barotse, or
Lozi, who inhabit western Zambia is described in Minahan's "Nations Without
States" as being red with a broad
white diagonal stripe running from upper hoist to lower fly. The line drawing
shows the diagonal stripe as evenly centered, so that its mid-line intersects
the corners at both ends.
Ned Smith, 17 Feb 2001
Crampton's Grote Geïllustreerde
Vlaggengids, 1990, coments that the flag of the Chief of Barotseland is red with a white
elephant.
Jarig Bakker, 23 Dec 2001
It is interesting to see that Barotseland has a current flag, as well
as one dating back a century. I wonder if the Lotse realised that they
had adopted a device closely resembling the diver's flag! In the history
of Barotseland I thought I ought to correct one misspelling, and underline another point not fully brought out in your
chronology. The Sotho-speaking people who conquered them were the Kololo
or Bakololo ("ba-" is a plural-forming prefix). (This appears on your page
as Kalolo.) They were previously known by another name, but adopted the
name Kololo following a certain battle during the Difaqane (this is the
South Sotho name; in isiNguni it is called the Mfecane) - this was the
period of inter-tribal warfare in South Africa sparked off by the Zulu King Shaka's conquests,
which devastated the areas later occupied by the Afrikaner Voortrekkers. The name
Kololo appears to be the given name of a woman whose fate was closely tied
to the battle in question. Following the battle, the Kololo headed north,
eventually reaching the vicinity of the Victoria Falls. (The Falls were
not given their present name until the arrival of the Scottish missionary and
explorer, David Livingstone. The Kololo
called the Falls Mosi oa Tunya - the smoke that thunders! [The "oa" is pronounced 'wa", consistent with normal Sotho
spelling]). What is
unique about the Kololo conquest is that it is the only conquest north
of the present-day borders of South Africa that was carried out by a Sotho-speaking
group. Other Mfecane conquests were carried out in (to give the current
names of the countries) southern Mozambique, Zimbabwe, central and northern
Zambia, Tanzania and Malawi, but these were all the work of Nguni groupings.
Secondly, while the Lotse royal house regained control over the nation
following the death of the Kololo king, one major consequence of the conquest
that it could not undo was the adoption of a Sotho language (forced on
them under Kololo rule). To this day the Lotse people speak a form of Sesotho.
The tribal name is written in Zambia as Barotse, but the language was also recorded across the German border in Caprivi by German missionaries,
resulting in the spelling Lozi. (Since this is a German spelling, the Z
stands for the sound TS.). I do not know for certain why there is a distinction
between the letter R in the first spelling and L in the second, but I would imagine this
is one linguistic characteristic left over from the or