{UAH} Kilifi, Kenya. What in a name..!

I came across a video documenting a coastal tour of Kenya. For each settlement, town and city of Mombasa there were clear name origins - all except Kilifi.Will return to Mombasa in a bit.

Kilifi is no native name but two name origins shroud its name - the latter which I have subscribed to as its true name origin is most hilarious as well.

Natives of mixed Shirazi ancestry say Kilifi's name originates from the Arab word Kilifi which means "keepsake". And that is it. As for whose keepsake is unknown.

Africans Safi or Natives Proper will fast counter and debunk Kilifi's Arab connection saying not a single place along Kenya's has an Arab or convoluted Arab name including Kilifi.

For them Kilifi is, matter of fact, an English name. A name pidginzed from a landmark Baboons never took seriously 

The Mzungu noticed something spectacular around the area thereby choosing to refer to it by the features. And guess what ithey are..

Cliffs

Navies called it Vuma - just some steep rocks into the sea but to theMzungu who are known for classifying everything they were not just some rocks jutting into the sea but are called Cliffs

Henceforth - to satisfy the colonists - the word Cliff was Afrricanized by its long version to Kilifi - a case of African goofing with phonetics.

I will be wrong to say no other place along the EA coast has a foreign name. Mombasa is one such.

Mombasa's original African name would send shivers down a warrior's spine were it not tamed by Shirazi Arabic description. The original Arabic name is Manbasa; in Swahili it is called Kisiwa Cha Mvita, which means "Island of War", due to the many changes in its ownership. Mvita is derived from Mombasa's violent history over the centuries. Manbasa in Arabic means ``scattered" - probably referring to people constantly being scattered by wars.

Stick to Kilifi's English name origin. Now you know.

Vuma Cliffs, Kilifi, Kenya

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