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Language code: ki

Technical information about ISO 639 language code ki

Documentation

The table below provides technical details for the Kikuyu language, designated by the ki code from the ISO 639-1 standard.

Code

ki

Name

Official

Kikuyu

Native

Gĩkũyũ

Family
Bantu
Text direction

Left-to-Right

Language varieties
KirinyagaMurang'aNyeriKiambu
Related languages
KambaEmbuMeruMbeereTharaka
Key facts
Uses the extra nasalised vowels ĩ and ũ in its alphabetEmploys a two-level tone system that encodes tense, aspect and case distinctionsHas around 17 noun classes expressed through prefixes, typical of Bantu languagesOral literature abounds in proverbs (methali), riddles and narrative poetryNovelist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o writes original fiction and drama in Kikuyu, boosting modern literature in the language.
Sample phrase

Wîhîî, wĩmwega?

Character encodings

UTF-8, UTF-16, UTF-32

Supported in Localizely

Kikuyu belongs to the Niger-Congo language family, specifically to the Bantu subgroup. It is predominantly spoken in Central Kenya. The language is written using the Latin alphabet. It is estimated that there are more than 8 million Kikuyu speakers worldwide, primarily in Kenya.

Language presence globally

Speakers

Kenya

8.2M

*The graph shows a rough estimate of Kikuyu speakers in countries where it is an official or minority language.

Related locale codes

ki-KE – Kikuyu (Kenya)

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