Original Igbo Name For Melon Is “élìlì” or “énìnì”. Egwusi or Egusi Was Actually Borrowed, See Others

Original Igbo name for melon is “élìlì” or “énìnì”. Egwusi or egusi was actually borrowed. Thank you Kaycee Alozie for calling my attention to that.

Some call it “élìlé” or “énìné”— they are the same, only phonological factor is involved.

Nsụka part calls it “ekeke”. Mgbo part of Ebọnyị calls it “Ahụ”. Ọhaọzara calls it “énìnì” or “énìné”. Ọhafịa calls it “Ahụn”

Egwusi or egusi is Yoruba. I made a mistake yesterday when I said Yoruba borrowed egusi from Igbo, it is the other way round.

I remember my grandmother calling it énìnì. Even till date my mother calls it énìnì. If you stretch forward to every other parts of Igbo land, you will hear the same thing or a variant of it, or other names except egusi or egwusi.

Egwusi or egusi of course is Igbo language. For the sake of Igbo izugbe it is used.

Whatever was borrowed into a given language is part and parcel of such language. You are not wrong if you say egwusi or egusi. Just as we are preaching, we should know what we used to call things, the original names before dynamism through language contact came in<<Continue Reading>>>