Sesotho

Story

Sesotho, also called Southern Sotho, is a Bantu language of the Sotho-Tswana branch and the national language of Lesotho, where it is spoken by roughly 85 percent of the population. The language was first written down in the 1830s by French Protestant missionaries who developed a Latin-based orthography, and it produced one of the earliest printed books in any southern African language. Sesotho also has a small set of click consonants borrowed from neighbouring Khoisan languages, though far fewer than its Nguni neighbours Zulu and Xhosa. King Moshoeshoe I used the language as a tool of political unification when he consolidated disparate Sotho clans into the Basotho nation during the early nineteenth century.

At a glance

• Also known as: Sesotho
• Family: Niger-Congo
• Region: Southern Africa
• Speakers: 8M (total speakers (l1 plus l2): approximately 6 to 7 million l1 plus further l2 speakers; conservative combined estimate of 8 million)
• Writing system: Latin
• Greeting: Dumela (good day, hello)

Spoken in

Lesotho, South Africa, Zimbabwe

Common questions