ABSTRACT
Oriental peoples have influenced many East African languages and cultures. A consequence of this has been linguistic and cultural borrowings. Oriental items have been entering for more than two millennia now, contributing to the material and social culture of the East Africans, which can be appreciated from the long lists of Arabic, Persian, Indic and Turkic elements in Swahili. Oriental influences on Swahili history, language, literature, dress, architecture, cuisine and music are shown by loanwords (Lodhi 2000b: Section 4.8) which are spreading deep into the heart of Africa, from the Indian Ocean to the Lakes with the spread of the Swahili language and its urban mode of life.
