The Beauty Of Amboseli

Footprints learn that, ahead of him, Fischer had already had several brushes with the Maasai in which there had been bloodshed. How could he, with his reduced party, continue with this route, he asked himself, when Fischer, with a company of 300 men and 200 more in a second caravan had had to fight? His own first encounters with the Maasai had not been confidence-inspiring.

It was his second attempt northwards, in the caravan of the slave-trader Juma Kimameta (Thomson referred to him in his book Through Maasai Land as ‘Jumba’), which brought him to Amboseli. This time his route was via the east and north sides of Kilimanjaro, across the Lengurumani plain and what is now the park to Ol Doinyo Orok, then on to Ngongo Bagas, now called Ngong, and from there to Naivasha. The birth of Nairobi as a railhead and township was still years ahead.

Thomson travelled along an old caravan route that had long been closed, due to difficulties with two Maasai sections, the Loitaiok clan of the Kisongo section and the Matapatu. Neither cared much for the other, and each was more than ready to defend their territory against all intruders, whether foreign or indigenous. Moreover, their moran lived for the excitement of their raids and fights. When little was known of Maasai sociology (and their divisions into section, clan, sub-clan and family) other than grim stories brought back by slave hunters and missionaries, Thomson described the Maasai of the ‘dreaded Oloitokitok district’ as the ‘Oloitokitok’ and ‘Matumbato’ Maasai. They are better known now as the Loitaiok – who are of the Kisongo section – and the Matapatu, who are not.

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