The Kamuku language belongs to the Kainji family and is related to C'lela, Duka, and Kambari.
One historian speculates that Kankuma may have been the precursor to the Hausa state of Zaria.
[4] The Gazetteers of the Northern Provinces of Nigeria: The Central Kingdoms, published in the early 1920s, described the Kamuku people as industrious agriculturalists who keep livestock, are of a somewhat timid and retiring nature and are thoroughly amenable to authority.
[5] They did not seem to recognize a central authority above the level of a village head.
[6] The Kamuku share some customs with the neighboring Gwari people, such as shaking peas in a tortoise shell and drawing marks according to the result so as to divine the future.