Lingala dictionary · browse all
nioka
ni-O-ka
snake / serpent
French: serpent
Nioka aswi taba na elanga.
A snake bit the goat in the field.
Un serpent a mordu la chèvre dans le champ.
Nioka — the generic Lingala word for snake. The Congo Basin hosts hundreds of species including the Gaboon viper and green mamba. Nioka carries deep symbolic weight: in oral tradition, the python ancestor-spirit appears as a great serpent.
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