History of Kisii

About Kisii Way Back When

Brief History of Kisii County

The Gusii, interchangeably referred to as the Abagusii or Kisii, are home and culturally interlinked with their homeland in Kenya, Gusiiland, as their foundation of purpose. Today’s Gusiiland, in the south-western part of Kenya, the nucleus of which is in present-day Kisii and Nyamira counties, also spreads out to parts of Kericho and Bomet counties. The Gusii, as recounted in ethnographical accounts, trace their origins to a place called ‘Misiri’, a location marred with obscurity. This place does not seem to be the Biblical Egypt, but a location north of Mount Elgon.

Ethnographers and historians, who have studied Bantu societies, both agree that traditionally and linguistically, the Abagusii are related to the people they claim as their people, the Bantu. According to Gusii oral traditions, their related kindred folk are the Kikuyu, Akamba and the Bukusu, among other Bantu communities residing originally in “Misiri”. The place-name Gusii or Kisii has two possible origins. The first, more prosaic, comes from ‘Gwassi’, a place on the shores of Lake Victoria at which the Gusii are believed to have lived as fishermen before fleeing the Nilotes.

It is within this untamed woodlands that the Abagusii are believed to have been together with the Ganda and Soga of Uganda, the Agikuyu, the Kamba, Meru, Abasuba, Avaragoli, the Bukusu and the Abakuria who also live in Kenya. Even today, the Abagusii refer to all these people as abanto baito (our people). The Gusii, together with the Kuria and Luhya, are among the earliest Bantu groups in Kenya, with at least part of their fore ancestors having arrived in the southwest of Kenya near Lake Victoria (Nyanza) at the beginning of the first millennium AD.

At the end of the 1700s, the Bantu-speaking people were dispersed in small pockets on the northern, southern, and eastern margins of the Kisii highlands and in the Lake Victoria Basin. Around 1800, the highlands above 1,515 meters were probably uninhabited from the northern part of the Manga escarpment southward to the Kuja River. At this time, the lowland savannas were being settled by large numbers of agropastoralist tribes, ancestral to the present-day Luo and Kipsigis, dislodging the smaller Bantu groups from their territories, down to the savanna.

Among the Abagusii, a clan is an autonomous socio-political and economic entity made of various homesteads that share common ancestry. As an entity, it accords its members social identity and status that in turn determines their accessibility to community resources. In political discourse, this means that a clan that has its members in leadership positions has advantage over other clans in accessing community resources. This perception therefore makes the clan a unit for political mobilization and action. This core system based on clan system still exists today.

Leading up to their settlement in their present homeland, the Gusii were happy pastoralists, who also practiced small scale mixed-subsistence agriculture and fishing. The British colonial administration arrived in Gusiiland circa 1907, and in short order Gusiiland was wholly under British rule. Kisii town was originally established by British soldiers who were being forced to retreat from Lake Victoria by heavy gunfire from German soldiers and gun boats during the Great Wars of the early 20th Century. Later, Kisii was chosen as the District Headquarters for the larger South Nyanza and Kisii territories, giving it the impetus to grow rapidly.

Kisii County is a vibrant region with a strong agrarian base, rich cultural heritage, and a growing economy. Continued development in infrastructure, with smooth blacktop connecting major towns and rural areas, has made it accessible from all directions. Kisii County’s scenic hills, waterfalls, cottage industries and modern hotels offer opportunities for visiting a region erstwhile relegated as agrarian.