The Southern Transvaal Ndebelepeople's history has been traced back to King Ndebele, King Ndebele fathered King Mkhalangana, King Mkhalangana fathered King Mntungwa, King Mntungwa fathered King Jonono, King Jonono fathered King Nanasi, King Nanasi fathered King Mafana, king Mafana fathered King Mhlanga and Chief Libhoko, King Mhlanga fathered King Musi and Chief Skhube. Ndebele – Some of his sons were left behind with the Hlubi tribe
Mkhalangana – Some of his sons branched north and formed the Kalanga tribe
Mntungwa – Founder of the amaNtungwa clan
Njonono – He died in Jononoskop near Ladysmith – Surname Jonono is in the Hlubi tribe
Nanasi – He died in Jononoskop near Ladysmith – Surname Nanasi is in the Hlubi tribe
Mafana – He died in Randfontein
Mhlanga – He died in Randfontein
Musi – He died in kwaMnyamana King Musi's kraal was based at eMhlangeni a place named after his father Mhlanga, the name of the place is currently known as Randfontein and later moved to KwaMnyamana which is now called Emarula or Bon Accord in Pretoria. King Musi was a polygamist and fathered the following sons, Skhosana, Manala, Ndzundza, Thombeni, Sibasa, Mhwaduba and Mphafuli and others. Southern Transvaal Ndebele is one of the eleven official languages in the Republic of South Africa. The language is a Nguni or Zunda classification spoken mostly in the Mpumalanga Province, Gauteng, Limpopo and the Northwest. The expression "isikhethu" can be loosely translated to mean 'the Southern Ndebele way of doing or saying'. Isikhethu means Southern Ndebele the same way that sikitsi will mean Swazi and se harona will mean Sotho. The language has been severely marginalised over the years. Until the formation of the apartheid Southern Ndebele homeland, speakingthe language publicly was discouraged. Most Southern Transvaal Ndebele speakers preferred Zulu especially because the latter was learned at school. Today the Southern Ndebele speakers, mostly those who are educated still prefer to use Southern Ndebele as home language for their children and will use Southern Ndebele as a language to communicate with other Southern Ndebele speakers.
Phonology
Vowels
Consonants
Consonant sounds nt, nd, k, mf, and mv often result in allophones of.
Click consonants
Grammar
Nouns
The Southern Ndebele noun consists of two essential parts, the prefix and the stem. Using the prefixes, nouns can be grouped into noun classes, which are numbered consecutively, to ease comparison with other Bantu languages. The following table gives an overview of Southern Ndebele noun classes, arranged according to singular-plural pairs.
Class
Singular
Plural
1/2
um-1
aba-, abe-
1a/2a
u-
abo-
3/4
um-1
imi-
5/6
i-, ili-, ilu-
ama-
7/8
is-
iz-, iiN-
9/10
iN-
iiN-
14
ubu-, ub-, utj-
15
uku-
17
uku-
1umu- replaces um- before monosyllabic stems, e. g. umuntu.
Verbs
Verbs use the following affixes for the subject and the object:
