Botatwe is a Bantu linguistic grouping whose languages preserve a substantial body of stem innovations also found in narrow Mashariki and Kaskazi. Its settlement spread across parts of southern Zambia began late in the first millennium A.D., following earlier Kaskazi-associated population layers in the region.
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The Story
Botatwe is identified as a problematic grouping in the linguistic subclassification because its languages share many stem innovations with narrow Mashariki and, in some cases, with Kaskazi. The passage presents two possible explanations: extensive borrowing from Mashariki languages or inheritance from a common proto-Wide-Mashariki ancestor.
Phonologically demonstrable loanwords from an extinct narrow Mashariki language, apparently of Kaskazi affiliation, occur in Botatwe languages. This evidence indicates that Kaskazi-speaking peoples inhabited parts of the region before Botatwe settlement expanded across southern Zambia.
The spread of Botatwe settlement across parts of southern Zambia began late in the first millennium A.D. The linguistic evidence is placed within a broader history of repeated, cross-cutting layers of language shift in southeastern Central Africa.
Botatwe is a Bantu linguistic grouping whose languages preserve a substantial body of stem innovations also found in narrow Mashariki and Kaskazi. Its settlement spread across parts of southern Zambia began late in the first millennium A.D., following earlier Kaskazi-associated population layers in the region.
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The Story
Botatwe is identified as a problematic grouping in the linguistic subclassification because its languages share many stem innovations with narrow Mashariki and, in some cases, with Kaskazi. The passage presents two possible explanations: extensive borrowing from Mashariki languages or inheritance from a common proto-Wide-Mashariki ancestor.
The spread of Botatwe settlement across parts of southern Zambia began late in the first millennium A.D. The linguistic evidence is placed within a broader history of repeated, cross-cutting layers of language shift in southeastern Central Africa.
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