The Origins of "Mau Mau"

There is much disagreement as to the origin of the name of the Kenyan peasant uprising which came to be known as the Mau Mau. It has no literal meaning in Gikuyu, the language of the tribe which led the rebellion. When I lived in Kenya I heard many unconvincing acronyms like "Mzungu Arudi Uingereza, Mwafrika Apate Uhuru," Swahili for "White man return to England, African get freedom."

The historical literature is divided. The only complaint I have with Edgerton's Mau Mau: An African Crucible is his take on the origin of the name. He gives too much credence to the theory of a Gikuyu "pig latin" for "uma uma," meaning "get out, get out," supposedly heard as the police broke up an oathing ceremony. Edgerton also calls it "plausible" that the term came from a mispronunciation of "mumau," the Gikuyu word for oath.

Compounding the problem is the fact that the movement was intensely secretive, with no manifesto, written records or public relations effort. Edgerton maintains the supposed public head of the Kenyan independence movement, Jomo Kenyatta, was never a member of the Mau Mau and was in fact opposed by many members of the Mau Mau before and after independence. This would explain (for example) why no Mau Mau veterans ever regained their land or received any benefits (two widows did), and why former Mau Mau detainee J. M. Kariuki was abducted and murdered by the police under Kenyatta's dictatorship. Lucy's mother still maintains her silence 45 years after taking her oath.

The rebellion was a largely tribal undertaking, and serious business among Kikuyus is conducted in a sort of code, inscrutable to outsiders. But Karari Njama was a schoolteacher and therefore one of the educated (in the Western sense) members of the rebellion. In Mau Mau From Within, he writes, "To the best of my knowledge, the members of the Movement never used this term when talking amongst themselves about their Society.... It was simply never accepted by the Africans involved in the Movement as being anything more than the white man's name for their association."

So when and why did the white settlers come to use the term? Njama considers many origins, but traces it to a trial in Naivasha in May, 1950, of a group of Kenyans, mostly Kikuyu, who were accused of taking the oath. One of the accused identified the elders who administered the oath as the "Kiama kia Mau Mau."

Njama quotes another informant: "Mau mau was not a widely known word among Kikuyu. Its only meaning was 'greedy eating,' sometimes used by mothers to rebuke children who were eating too fast or too much. In my location..., however, it was also used occasionally when talking about certain elders who, when called to hear a case by the chief, were more interested in the few shillings or goats they would receive than in dispensing justice. These elders often magnified the seriousness of the case they were hearing in order to get from the guilty person a fine of a goat or lamb, which they would then slaughter, roast and eat... as if they were merely carrying out traditional Kikuyu legal practices. Earning a reputation for being greedy, these elders were sometimes called the 'Kiama kia Mau Mau,' or 'Council of Greedy Eaters.' It is my belief that the man who used the term 'Mau Mau' at the Naivasha Trial was referring to the men who administered the oath as bad elders, who wanted only his initiation fee and the feast of a goat...."

So the white people heard the oaths were administered by the "Mau Mau Council" and thought it was the name of the movement. By August, 1950, the rebellion was being referred to as Mau Mau in all the white press, so the timeline is accurate. The whites had a history of misinterpretations and mispronunciations in Kenya (including the name of the country itself), and Lucy considers this explanation plausible. For an interesting depiction of Kenya during "the Emergency," check out the movie "Kitchen Toto" if you can find it.