ABSTRACT
These figures reflect the economic developments and labour situation in the Union. Most industries, including the Rand goldmines, are concentrated in the Transvaal. In Natal, where the next largest number of Swazi reside and which serves more as a labour “reserve”, the females again out-number the males:
1936 742,600 811,029 91.6% 1946 823,334 885,149 93.JJ6
In the Union, the majority of all Natives are on European-owned land with a small minority on Native-owned land and areas released for Native occupation. (4) The following figures for 1946 give the relative distribution in the Transvaal and Natal between Urban Location and Trust Land, Locations and Reserves: (5)
Urban Locations 422,904 23,243 Trust Land, Loca
tions and Reserves 311,052 777,106
Total 733,956 800,349
The Union offers the main employment to Swazi from the Territory; the heaviest exodus of temporary migrants takes place in winter time, which is also the time when taxes are collected and when agricultural work is slackest. The majority of Swazi leaving the Territory for work are employed in the mines, and the average period of absence of mine workers is 13 months.(6)
Swati (siSwati, siNgwane), commonly known in its Zulu-ised form as Swazi, falls within the south-eastern zone of Bantu languages. It is further classified with Zulu and Xhosa as distinct from the Sotho group of languages because of the large number of “relative” stems (mostly formed
from nouns to supplement the few true adjectives) and the more varied inflection in the form of predicates. The Nguni group has also the disyllabic noun prefixes with consequent vowel elision and coalescence, but in Swazi the disyllabic prefix is not as clear, the initial syllable being dropped in some cases, probably through Sotho influence.(1)
A few minor local variations of Swazi occur, and can be traced to specific c l a n s . (4) Doke also lists old Mfengu and Bhaca as Swazi dialects; (5) in the area round Namahasha people speak a third dialect, Sibahha, which appears to be influenced by the surrounding Tsonga.(6) The dialectal variations occur in vocabulary, rather than in grarrmatical structure.
