media, which repeated verbatim what the aid agencies' increasingly began indicating in their reports as a new name for Somalia's ethnically Bantu minorities. Prior to the civil war, the Bantu were referred to in the literature as Bantu, Gosha, Mushunguli, Oggi and especially as Jareer, which they still, in fact, are within Somalia proper. History Origin Between 2500–3000 years ago, speakers of the original proto-Bantu language group began a millennia-long series of migrations eastward from their original homeland in the general Nigeria and Cameroon area of West Africa. This Bantu expansion first introduced Bantu peoples to central, southern and southeastern Africa, regions where they had previously been absent from. The Somali Bantu largely trace their origins from the Indian Ocean slave trade (sometimes also referred to as the Arab slave trade). This was a centuries long trade which brought Southeast African populations to Somalia and other parts of the Arab world. Marginalized Black African ethnic minorities with an ethnogenesis in slavery can be found in nearby countries such as the Al Akhdam ethnic minority in Yemen paralleling social dynamics in Somalia. Alternative theories suggest that some Somali Bantu tribes migrated to the riverine parts of the southern Horn of Africa as agriculturalists taking part in the millennia long ongoing Bantu expansion. However, no reliable historical documentation exists directly linking the present-day Somali Bantu to the premodern civilizations of Somalia. Medieval travellers visiting Southern Somalia at the time described its inhabitants as being mostly ethnically similar to the inhabitants of Northern Somalia and made no ethnic distinctions besides noting the presence of Arab, Persian, and Indian traders. The Mushunguli language is the sole surviving Somali Bantu language and is mutually intelligible with the Zigula language still spoken in Tanzania. Mushunguli's closest sister languages are Shambala, Bondei, and Ngulu which are languages originating from Tanzania and largely confined to it. Slave trade The Indian Ocean slave trade was multi-directional and changed over time. To meet the demand for menial labor, black Africans from southeastern Africa bought by Somali, Omani, Benadiri & Swahili slave traders & were sold in cumulatively large numbers over the centuries to customers in Morocco, Libya, Somalia, Egypt, Arabia, the Persian Gulf, India, the Far East and the Indian Ocean islands. From 1800 to 1890, between 25,000–50,000 black African slaves are thought to have been sold from the slave market of Zanzibar to the Somali coast. Most of the