[1][2][3] For these communities, a delicate balance existed between the amount of pasture land required for successful pastoralism and the number of men and animals available to exploit it effectively.
Von Höhnel (1894) and Lamphear (1988) recorded narratives concerning conflict between the Turkana and Burkineji or at least the section recalled as Sampur that appear to have been caused by even earlier demographic pressures.
Therefore Turkana cattle camps began to push further down the Tarash, which ran northwards below the foothills of the Moru Assiger massif on their right and the escarpment on their left.
Pelekee which loomed up in the distance directly before them... Lamphear notes that Tukana traditions aver that a dreamer among them saw strange animals living with the people up in the hills.
[7] According to Von Höhnel (1894) "a few decades" prior, the Burkineji occupied districts on the west of the lake and that they were later driven eastwards into present day Samburu.
[8] According to Maasai traditions recorded by MacDonald (1899), the expansion of early Eloegop (Loikop) communities into a society occurred from a base east of Lake Turkana on three fronts.
[9] Pushing southward from the country east of Lake Turkana the Loikop conquered a number of communities to occupy the plateaus adjacent to the Rift Valley.
The Guash Ngishu occupied the grass plateaus of the Uasin Gishu and Mau while the Maasai territory extended from Naivasha to Kilimanjaro.
[9] The mythological rendition of this account as recorded by Straight et al. (2016) states that "three Maa clan clusters – Loiborkineji, Maasai, and Laikipiak – came out together...from the (baobab) Tree of Tangasa".
One of these, whom he referred to as Wakuafi (Kwavi) had territory that lay on the "broad, level, pasture land, which stretches to the south-east of the White Mountain".
[11] Krapf states in a different account that "regarding Oldoinio eibor it is necessary to remark that by this term is meant the Kirénia or Endurkenia, or simply Kenia, as the Wakamba call it..."[12] Contemporary understanding of the wars indicates that the Enkangelema sections of the Maasai occupied the steppes today known as the Nyika plateau.
Krapf notes that Engobore resolved to reside at a place called Muasuni which was situated on the upper course of the Pangani river in the vicinity of the kingdom of Usambara when he returned from the interior.
Thompson states that, "The original home of the (Wa-kwafi) was the large district lying between Kilimanjaro, Ugono and Parè on the west, and Teita and U-sambara on the east.
[3] Krapf notes that the Engánglima; ...first received a mortal blow from their brethren the Masai, and afterwards from the united forces of the Wakamba, Wanika, Wasuahili and Wateita (and) in consequence of this disastrous catastrophe either disappeared, or retreated to the territory of other Wakuafi in order to escape utter destruction...
A cloud of locusts settled on the land, and left not a blade of grass or other green thing, so that the cattle died in enormous numbers through starvation.
While the Wa-kwafi were in this unhappy plight, the Masai of the plains to the west fell upon them and smote them hip and thigh, and thus broke up and revenged themselves upon the most powerful division of the tribe...
In the course of time, the Masai, emerging from the west, swept over the open plains, smote the Wakwavi and scattered them to the winds, leaving however the Wataveta in the forest fastness in perfect security.
Ever since, the two peoples have lived together, assimilating more and more to each other's habits and modes of life... A number of traditions agree that the Kwavi were ejected from their homes, leading to the scattering of this community.
In 1857, after having depopulated the "Wakuafi wilderness" in what is now southeastern Kenya, Maasai warriors are reported to have threatened Mombasa on the Kenyan coast.
According to Thompson's narrative, the Kwavi were not entirely annihilated 'for a large division of the clan kept together, and contrived to cut their way through Kikuyu and to reach Lyikipia where they settled.
So collecting all available men from far and wide, and many horses, they managed to drive them back out of their countryThompson (1883) noted that the 'Wa-kwafi' of Guas'Ngishu and those of Lykipia, having increased in numbers and grown bold, allied together to make war on the Maasai.
He states that "somewhere about the same period - at the time an old man can remember according to the native expression - the Masai dwelling on the Uasin Gishu plateau attacked those of Naivasha".
[19] Berntsen (1979) notes that elders of the Purko-Kisongo Maasai relate that it was warriors of the Il Aimer age-set (c. 1870–1875) who blunted the attack of their northern neighbours the Ilaikipiak and then destroyed them as a social unit.
...they decided to attack and completely overwhelm the southern Masai...With this in view, they started down the Rift Valley, and as they feared being raided by their adversaries of the north whilst they were away, they brought the whole of their stock, women, children and belongings, with them.
We camped shortly thereafter in a dense grove of Junipers, in which we found a deserted village of Andorobo - the hunting tribe of the Masai country.
The district is called Dondolè, which I am informed, means "everybody's (that is to say - no man's land) from the incessant quarrels for possession that have taken place between the Maasai of Kinangop and the Masai (Wa-kwafi) of Lykipia.