Ikoma Nominal Tone

Ikoma is a Lacustrine Bantu language spoken in the Serengeti District, Mara Region (Western Tanzania), and classified a E(J) 45 in the updated Guthrie’s list. Ikoma has both lexical and grammatical tone, but lexical tonal contrasts are found only in nominal constructions. These constructions and the relevant tonal rules are discussed in this article, and it will be shown that the tone system of Ikoma nouns is more complex than the typical reduced tonal systems of other Lacustrine Bantu languages.