Sokoto.

June 5, 2026 by 3 Comments

I was looking at the Wikipedia article for Sokoto when I noticed the “Name and etymology” section, which begins: “The name Sokoto (which is the modern/anglicised version of the local name, Sakkwato) is of Arabic origin, representing sooq, ‘market’ in English.” Is this true? If so, how is it derived? Sounds like folk etymology to me, but others will know more.

Comments

  1. David Eddyshaw says
    June 5, 2026 at 6:21 pm

    Looks quite impossible to me. (Sakkwato is correct for the Hausa name, though.)

    But then, kasuwa “market” really is derived from Arabic su:q (via Kanuri), so who knows?

    Folk etymology isn’t much of a thing with toponyms in Western-Oti-Volta-speaking country*, as most toponyms are actually fairly transparent. (Ethnonyms are another matter, doubtless because hardly any of those are transparent. I have been confidently informed that “Kusaasi” comes from the Hausa kusa “near”, for example; which probably seems less far-fetched if you’re close to some Kusaasi people at the time …)

    But I think the names of the various Hausa states are another matter. None of them seem to mean anything other than themselves.

    * Having said that, “Ouagadougou” gets some spectacular ones sometimes. I like the current WP suggestion that it may be from Soninke: it doesn’t seem analysable in Mooré, anyhow.

  2. languagehat says
    June 5, 2026 at 6:24 pm

    Looks quite impossible to me.

    I’m glad I’m not the only one.

  3. David Eddyshaw says
    June 5, 2026 at 6:48 pm

    “Market” tout court actually doesn’t strike me as all that likely as a place name. “New Market”, sure, (like the famous Sanjak), “So-and-so’s Market”, or whatever, but not just “Market.”

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