The conquest of the abagusii 1900-1914
Abstract
This thesis proposes to describe the significant and
preliminary encounters between the Kisii and British in
the highlands of South Nyanza between 1900 and 19.1,4'.
It presents this time as a period when the indigenous
people and a foreign power struggled for control in that
little piece of Africa, each resisting the other as it was
best equipped to do, until one emerged sovereign.
The introductory chapter identifies the Kisii as a
Bantu-speaking people with little tribal superstructure.
Ravaged by war and pestilence they immigrated to the highlands
of South Nyanza which they claimed and defended as
their homeland before 1900. 1he British, led by military
forerunners, are treated as aggressors, the representatives
of an alien rule. They probed the African interior
for commercial gain, regardless of African opposition