Eldoret is a city in A home of champions and it is ranked as the 5th most populated urban area in Kenya after Nairobi, Mombasa, Nakuruand Ruiru,
Eldoret was founded in 1910 when Willie Van Anrdt was granted land Block no.64 to practice farming but found it unsuitable to do farming. The Governor at time was Percy Girouard
The land was also exactly 64 miles from Kibigori railway Londiani, So it was land no. 64, hence the place was named Sixty-four. And locals due to pronunciation interference, They baptized it to Sisibo
The Post Master General Mr J. Gosling toured the area and determined that land as ssuitable for a post office and set about to construct one, which existed up to date. However, after Governor Sir Percy Girouard came to visit in 1912, the settlers suggested to him that the town be named after him. Some said it should be called ‘Girouardfontein’, maintaining the Afrikaner naming culture. Girouard declined saying that his French name would be difficult for the British and Afrikaner ssettlersto pronounce let alone the natives - the ‘d’ is silent. The fact that they wanted the town named after him shows that he was an instant celebrity among the Afrikaners many of whom had French Huguenot roots.
His wife, however, was the reason he was popular. She was Afrikaner by birth, while the name ‘64’ or Sisibo to the locals was quite popular, it was not considered because there was other suggested names -
_Farm 64,
_Bado Kidogo
_Sosiani.
_Sirikwa
Sirikwa was a name of an ancient tribe that once occupied the Plateau, but disappearedsome say into Southern Africa.
Finally, the town was named after the nearby Eldare River ,now, River Sosiani. ‘Eldare’ is a Maasai name that translates to Stony River. The settlers however added the letter ‘t’ after the name ‘Eldare’, so as to make it sound more like a Nandi name. Nearly every noun in Nandi language ends with the consonant ‘t’ – something the set.
Content created and supplied by: MissRova (via Opera News )
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