Kirundi

Rundi (commonly seen in its native form, Kirundi) is a Bantu leid (D62 in Guthrie's classification) spake bi some 8.7 million fowk in Burundi an adjacent pairts o Tanzanie an Congo-Kinshasa, as weel as in Ugandae. 84% o the spekers ur Hutu, 15% ur Tutsi an 1% ur Twa.

Rundi is closely relatit tae the Rwanda leid, the principal leid o neighbourin kintra Rwanda, an tae Ha, a leid spake in wastren Tanzanie. Rundi an Rwanda ur mutually intelligible.

The inhabitants o Rwanda an Burundi belang tae three different ethnic groups: Hutu, Tutsi, an Twa (a pygmy fowk). The fact that these ethnic groups share the same leid is assumed tae be the result o the Hutu ootnummering the latter twa groups (see Hutu for a mair complete historical perspective).

Rundi is frequently citit as a leid whaur Meeussen's rule, a rule describin a certain pattern o tonal chynge in Bantu lsid, is active.

Ensaumple owersets
Ego	Aye
Oya	Naw
Uravuga icongereza?	Dae ye speak Inglis?
Bite?	Whit lik?
Mwaramutse	Hi/Guid Mornin
Ikirundi n'ikinyarwanda bisa nk'igi czek n'igi slovak	Rundi an Rwanda ur closely relatit lik Czech an Slovak
Amata	Milk
Ejo	Yestreen
Eejo°	The morra
Nzoza ejo/Nzoz'ejo	A will come the morra
Ubu	Noo
Faransa/Ubufaransa	Fraunce
Ngereza/Ubwongereza	Ingland
Leta zunz'ubumwe z'amerika	Unitit States o Americae
Ubudagi	Germany
Ububirigi	Belgium
°N.B. eejo is pronoonced the same as ejo: the ither e is wrate fur differentiation.

References

Meeussen, A.E. (1959) Essai de grammaire Rundi Annales du Musée Royal du Congo Belge, Série Sciences Humaines - Linguistique, vol. 24. Tervuren

External links

Ethnologue on Rundi
Free English-Kirundi Dictionary Archived 2011-07-26 at the Wayback Machine
Free Kirundi-English Dictionary Archived 2011-07-26 at the Wayback Machine
PanAfrican L10n page on Kirundi... Archived 2007-03-21 at the Wayback Machine
Learning Kirundi Archived 2008-05-13 at the Wayback Machine (in Spanish)
Online Kirundi/English dictionary Archived 2008-08-01 at the Wayback Machine