Introduction

This volume contains the linguistic evidence for the classification of the languages encountered by the western team of the Northern Bantu Borderland Survey. To appreciate fully its implications it should be read in close conjunction with the appropriate sections of Volume I of the Survey, dealing with the demography of this area. Guthrie's Bantu Languages of Western Equatorial Africa, which the present volume is intended to supplement, should also be consulted. The introductions of these two books and the chapter by Guthrie on the method of describing linguistic features cover many points which would otherwise have needed to be clarified in this work.