Mount Kenya (5,199 metres (17,057 ft)) is the second highest mountain in Africa and the highest mountain in Kenya,[1] after which the country is named.[2] It lies just south of the equator and currently has eleven small glaciers.[1][3] Various expeditions reached it in the following years.[4][5] It was first climbed in 1899 by Halford Mackinder.[6] The mountain became a national park in 1949,[7] played a key role in the Mau Mau events in the 1950s,[8] and became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997.[9] It is climbed and walked up by up to 15,000 tourists every year.[10]
Mount Kenya received its current name by European missionaries who, wrote the name as 'Kenya' from the Akamba word 'kiinyaa'. The first missionaries, Johann Ludwig Krapf, and Johannes Rebmann, were led into Kenyas interior by Akamba long-distance traders. So when they asked the name of the mountain, they were given the name 'kiima kya kenia'. 'kenia' in Kamba means to glitter, or to shine, hence the Akamba people referred to it as the mountain that glitters, or the shining mountain. So these missionaries recorded it as Mt. Kenya, a Kamba word, and the country was then later named after this mountain. Wangari Maathai tells the following story about the naming: Krapf and Johannes Rebmann asked their guide, a member of the Kamba community, who was carrying a gourd, what they called the mountain, and the guide, believing that the Germans were referring to the gourd, replied kĩĩ-nyaa, which became the name of the mountain and then the country.[12]Other ethnic groups living around the mountain such as the Agikuyu called this mountain 'Kirinyaga'; 'nyaga' in Kikuyu means white patches, hence it is also the Kikuyu word for Ostrich, and 'kiri' means with: so in essence they called it the mountain with ostriches. The Maasai call it Ol Donyo Keri, which mean "black & white mountain" or "the speckled mountain" respectively.[13][14][15]
Krapf was staying in a Wakamba village when he first saw the mountain.[16]Krapf, however, recorded the name as both Kenia and Kegnia.[16] According to some sources, this is a corruption of the Wakamba Kiinyaa.[17]Others however say that this was on the contrary a very precise notation of a native word pronounced ˈkenia.[18]Nevertheless, the name was usually pronounced /ˈkiːnjə/ in English.[19]
It is important to note that at the time this referred to the mountain without having to include mountain in the name. The current name Mount Kenya was used by some as early as 1894,[20] but this was not a regular occurrence until 1920 when Kenya Colony was established.[21] Before 1920 the area now known as Kenya was known as the British East Africa Protectorate and so there was no need to mention mount when referring to the mountain.[21] Mount Kenya was not the only English name for the mountain as shown in Dutton's 1929 bookKenya Mountain.[22] By the 1930s Kenya was becoming the dominant spelling, but Kenia was occasionally used.[2]At this time both were still pronounced ˈkiːnjə in English.[17]
Kenya achieved independence in 1963, and Jomo Kenyatta was elected as the first president.[23]He had previously assumed this name to reflect his commitment to freeing his country and his pronunciation of his name resulted in the pronunciation of Kenya in English changing back to an approximation of the original native pronunciation, the current ˈkɛnjə.[17] So the country was named after the colony, which in turn was named after the mountain as it is a very significant landmark.[21][24] To distinguish easily between the country and the mountain, the mountain became known as Mount Kenya with the current pronunciation ˈkɛnjə.[19] Mount Kenya is featured on the coat of arms of Kenya.