Reconstruction:Proto-Bantu/ngàdí

Evidently a Bantu innovation, as no cognates outside of Narrow Bantu are known.

*ngàdí class 9 (plural *ngàdí class 10) [1]

1. palm nut or palm oil (exact referent uncertain)

The sense "blood" (likely in class 6) may be an innovation in Proto-Eastern Bantu; the proposed semantic motivation is the reddish colour of palm oil, which would be an ideal target for taboo replacement of an earlier word for "blood".

• *ìbídà
• *ìbá
• *mʊ̀téndé

• Dengese: bongaji (“palm pit”)
• Kerewe: igazi (“oil palm”)
• Kimbundu: ngaji (“palm nut”)
• Kwanyama: omaadi (“oil, fat, grease”)
• Lewo Eleng: ngáji (“palm nut”)
• Luba-Kasai: dikadi (“raphia palm”)
• Lungu Mambwe-Lungu: chazi (“oil palm”)
• Mbukushu: maghadhi (“oil”)
• Ndumu: mari (“oil, fat, grease”)
• Ntandu Kongo: maási (“palm oil”)
• Rwanda-Rundi: umugázi (“oil palm”) (Giha), ingazí (“Senegal date palm”) (Kinyarwanda)
• Simba: gékadi (“black-fruited oil palm”)
• Songe: kyají (“clump of palm nuts”)
• Tetela: dikadí (“raphia palm”)
• Tongwe: sigasi (“oil palm”)
• Yansi: meay (“oil, fat”)

From an Eastern Bantu sense "blood":

• Chichewa: mwazi (“blood”)
• Lungu Mambwe-Lungu: uwazi (“blood”)
• Makonde: myadi (“blood”)
• Southern Bantu:
  • Sotho-Tswana:
    • Northern Sotho: madi (“blood”)
    • Sotho: madi (“blood”)
      • → Phuthi: emalî (“blood”)
    • Tswana: madi (“blood”)
  • Nguni:
    • Northern Ndebele: igazi (“blood”)
    • Swazi: ingati (“blood”)
    • Xhosa: igazi (“blood”)
    • Zulu: igazi (“blood”)
    • → Chichewa: magazi (“blood”)
    • → Shona: gazi (“blood”)

Possibly related, although the sound change to the initial consonant of the stem would be highly irregular:

• Nyakyusa: unnasi (“coconut palm”)
• Luhya: munazi (“oil palm”)
• Saamia: omunazi (“oil palm”)
• Sabaki:
  • Maore Comorian: nadzi (“coconut”), munadzi (“coconut palm”)
  • Ngazidja Comorian: nazi (“coconut”), mnazi (“coconut palm”)
  • Swahili: nazi (“coconut”), mnazi (“coconut palm”)
• Sangu: mnasi (“oil palm”)
• Tooro: omunazi (“date palm”)
• Yao: naasi (“coconut”)

• Bostoen, Koen (2005), "A diachronic onomasiological approach to early Bantu oil palm vocabulary." Studies in African Linguistics 34 (2): 143–188.