KISIMI KAMARA

Kisimi Kamara (circa 1890-1962), a man of substance and influence in the Barri chiefdom in present-day Pujehun district, is famous for having invented the Mende script of syllabary, the KiKaKu, in about 1921.

He was born at Vaana about 1890. He was an Arabic scholar and is said by tradition to have received a vision of the script in a dream. The first part, KiKaku, proceeds in groups of three syllables and is clearly derived from Arabic. In all, there are 195 semantics, each character representing a specific sound, and it is written from right to left, another sign of Arabic influence.

Some traditions, however, cast doubt on the validity of ascribing the invention to Kisimi Kamara. They say that as a local chief and man of influence, he merely popularised the script, which was in reality invented by one of his subjects. In these accounts, he figures as an ambitious and clever man who, being the first to learn the script after it was invented, then used his position to publicise it. Be that as it may, Kisimi Kamara is generally recognised as the inventor of the script, which flourished during the 1920s and 1930s. The Mende script quickly became popular. Young men learned it eagerly and, as the few surviving people who still know it can recall, it became a fashionable way of communicating with friends on all kinds of subjects. Schools were opened to teach only the KiKaKu. Nostalgically, they remember how, after a short period of flowering, the script began to lose ground in the 1940s, for under the influence of the colonial Education Department, the Mende language began to be written in the Latin alphabet. In consequence, pupils at the missionary and colonial schools learned to write Mende using Latin script, and one of the greatest inventions of Mende history passed into oblivion.

Kisimi Kamara himself lived to about 1962. His achievement, though obliterated by colonialism, remains one of the greatest sources of pride for Sierra Leone.

ARTHUR ABRAHAM