The Achewa are found principally in the Kasungu, Dowa, and Lilongwe Districts of Nyasaland Protectorate, British Central Africa. Their territory extends eastward as far as Lake Nyasa and westward into North-Eastern Rhodesia. Ethnically, they are a division of the Nyanja group, which has its center in the Shire Valley and Highlands of the Southern Province and in the Central Province southwest of Lake Nyasa, extending as far north as the middle of the lake.

§1. General Remarks. In all its aspects except the behaviour of the pitch-accent, the phonetic system of the Chewa language is a fairly simple one. There are only five vowels, and the consonantal system is highly symmetrical.

§6. Introductory. In morphology, the Chewa language conforms quite rigidly to the general Bantu pattern. It illustrates the typically synthetic language of agglutinative technique; i. e., the word is fairly elaborate in structure, with affixed elements that are loosely united to its nucleus. With the exception of the two vocalic suffixes of the verb form,1 there is hardly a single element that may be regarded as fused. The system of noun classes and concordances serving as relational elements may be said to stamp the Bantu family as a ‘simple mixed relational’ type; i. e., the relational elements may be classified as 'concrete relational· elements.2 We shall see that certain of the noun classes are more formal than semantic in application—at least in Chichewa.3 Another feature (of Chichewa at least) is the identification, very much as in English, of the relation of actor and action with that of subject and predicate.4

§8. Noun Structure. With the exception of those of Class 10, nouns in Chichewa are composed of two formatives: stem and prefix, generally speaking, but in numerous cases only the stem is represented. However, in a number of instances the nouns which are used without prefixes in the singular require prefixation in the plural. For some, nouns of Class 5, e. g., it can be said definitely that the prefixes have disappeared or are ‘worn down’, since they can be easily recognized in cognate words of other Bantu languages.1 It requires more historical perspective to make a similar statement for many other nouns.

§25. Structure of the Verb. Except in certain forms of the imperative mood, the verb is composed of at least three formative elements : prefix, stem, and vowel suffix.

§38. The copula, ni, is employed as a link between subject and predicate. It is also, although rarely, used with the significance of the English auxiliary ‘to be able’.1 Morphologically, it is an invariable form, i. e., no affixes can be appended to it; but it undergoes considerable phonetic change. These phonetic changes may be summarized as follows: (1) It may be reduced to syllabic η (η), which in turn may become n or m, according to the initial consonant of the following word.2 (2) It combines with the initial i of the personal pronouns and demonstratives that have initial i, giving the forms :3

§39. The qualificative or adjectival construction (which includes the possessive) is distinguished primarily by two features: the qualificative concordance and word order. In general, it is the special concordance alone which stamps a word as a qualificative—and most words may be so employed. There are a few elements which may be regarded as specifically adjectival, since they are distinct forms—not mechanically determined—that are employed in the qualificative construction only. Most of these, however, are related to noun or verb forms somewhat as English ‘good’ corresponds to ‘good-ness’ or as the affinity shown in German ‘Ruh-e, ruh-ig, be-ruh-ig-en’. The second feature mentioned apropos of this construction is that the qualifying form always follows the word which is modified.

§40. The Chichewa numerals constitute a quinary-decimal system. The words k'ú·mi 'ten' (plural makú·mi) and dza·na ‘one hundred’ (plural maza·na) are nouns of Class 3, and the word tci·kwi ‘one thousand’ (plural vi·kwi) is a noun of Class 6. These forms are related to the objects which they enumerate by word order only; i. e., they follow the names of such objects, and when multiplied in compound numerals they govern the concordances affixed to the multiplying numerals, if such numerals require concordances for completion. All other numeral stems require concordances for completion and take, with one exception, the system of concordances employed as subjects with the verb. The one exception is in Class 1, singular, where m- occurs instead of a-.1 In abstract counting, i. e., when no particular objects are enumerated, the concordances of Class 5 are employed as expletive elements. These are given in the list of numerals.

§41. The Independent Personal Pronouns in Chichewa may be used instead of the corresponding nouns or may be employed with them, either for emphasis or in apposition. They may be used as either subjects or objects, but cannot take the place of the various concordances. There is a close etymological relationship between the pronouns, both independent and qualificative (possessive), concordances, demonstratives, and, to some extent, the noun prefixes. The plural forms of the second person and of the third person (Class 1) are also employed with singular subjects in references that are formal or polite, the referent being regarded as a person.1

§48. Demonstratives in Chichewa may be divided into four groups: (1) demonstratives of anaphoric reference, (2) those primarily of local reference, (3) those which combine local, anaphoric, and temporal references, and (4) those which combine local and anaphoric references.

§49. There are three distinct elements from which interrogatives are derived. These interrogatives are both pronominal and qualificative.

§50. The three morphemes pa, mu (m), and ku form the basis of the locative system. They symbolize respectively location or direction (to, from) on, location or direction (to, from) within or among, and direction to or from or location at.

§51. The following words are used in various temporal references.

§52. There are in Chichewa a few conjunctives, or elements which have the function of joining sentences or parts of sentences. They are also used as introductory words.

§53. The following words may be classified as Interjections. They are of various degrees of emotional character. Some of the forms listed as radical descriptives might very well have been placed here. There is no claim that the list is exhaustive, as there are many such forms which cannot be translated, such as expressions of extreme surprise, imitative sounds, expressions or cries peculiar to certain animals, etc.

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