The Central Province districts are divided along the traditional boundaries of these dialects, which are Kĩrĩnyaga, Mũrang'a, Nyeri and Kiambu.
The Kikuyu from Kĩrĩnyaga are composed of two main sub-dialects – the Ndia and Gichugu who speak the dialects Kĩndia and Gĩgĩcũgũ.
To hear Ndia being spoken, one needs to be in Kerugoya, the largest town in Kirinyaga County.
Other home towns for the Ndia, where "purer" forms of the dialect are spoken, are located in the tea-growing areas of Kagumo, Baricho, Kagio, and the Kangaita hills.
Lower down the slopes is Kutus, which is a bustling town with so many influences from the other dialects that it is difficult to distinguish between them.
The unmistakable tonal patterns of the Gichũgũ dialect (which sounds like Meru or Embu, sister languages to Kikuyu) can be heard in the coffee-growing areas of Kianyaga, Gĩthũre, Kathũngũri, Marigiti.
Class 3 (prefix mũ-) comprises nature/landscape words and others that are not semantically related, and is singular.
Class 5 (prefix rĩ- if stem is vowel initial, i- if consonant-initial) comprises plant/landscape words and others that don't fix the pattern, and is singular.
Class 9 comprises most animals, most loanwords, a few body parts, and semantically unrelated others.
Class 11 (prefix rũ-) comprises long, thin, or string-like nouns, as well as others that don't fit the pattern.
Since person and noun class are marked on verbs, they are usually only used emphatically or in response to questions.
Relative pronouns are written identically to distal demonstratives, but are distinguished by vowel length - the first syllable of a relative pronoun is short, while the first syllable of a distal demonstrative is long.
[clarification needed] Tenses include past, present, or future; and remote, near, or current.
Sequential, a subtype of progressive, denotes events that occur in a sequence.
The Kikuyu alphabet is: Some sounds are represented by digraphs such as ng for the velar nasal /ŋ/.
[10] In the 1983 movie Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, the character Nien Nunb speaks in the Kikuyu language.
[11] The 2023 song, Mwaki, by the Brazilian DJ, Zerb, features the Kenyan artist, Sofiya Nzau, singing in Kikuyu.