Dictionary

boma en · NOUN

Etymology

Borrowed from Swahili boma (“enclosure, fortified outpost”).

Meanings

1. (Africa, East, countable, uncountable) An enclosure usually made of thorn bushes, and latterly of steel fencing, for protection from marauders.
   • Orders had been given for the entrance to the boma to be blocked up, and accordingly we listened in the expectation of hearing the lion force his way through the bushes with his prey. As a matter of fact the doorway had not been closed and while we were wondering what the lion could be doing inside the boma for so long, he was outside reconnoitering our position. 2004, J H Patterson, The Man Eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures, Kessinger Publishing, page 17:
   • It was after midnight when Tarzan, with his slow-moving caravan, approached the spot where the elephants lay. Long before they reached it they had been guided by the huge fire the natives had built in the center of a hastily improvised boma, partially for warmth and partially to keep off chance lions. 1913, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Return of Tarzan, New York: Ballantine Books, published 1963, page 137:
   • Carrying the hot water kettle, Mark follows the footpath through the dark camp to the boma. Surrounded by tall grass the boma is a three-sided structure of sticks and reeds standing at the edge of Marula Puku. 1993, Cordelia Dykes Owens, The Eye of the Elephant, Houghton Mifflin Books, →ISBN, page 91:
   • 2003, Rosie Woodroffe, Simon Thirgood, Alan and Rabinowitz, People and Wildlife, Conflict Or Co-existence?, Cambridge University Press, page 298, Recent replacement of rolled mesh with bomas made of portable, flexible reinforced mesh panels have nearly eliminated predation.
2. (Africa, East, countable, uncountable) A stockade made of bushes and thorns.
   • the area has three main groups. The Wamasi and Waarushaare still settled on the boma system where the clan settle in one cluster called a boma comprised of several houses enclosed in a fence leaving the centre open for keeping livestock. 2003, Harold Brookfield, Helen Parsons, Muriel Brookfield, Agrodiversity, United Nations University Press, page 108:
3. (Africa, East, countable, uncountable) A hide.
   • 1922, Mary Hastings Bradley, On the Gorilla trail, quoted in Mary Zeiss Strange (editor), Heart Shots: Women write about hunting, Stackpole Books, page 182, You try to arrange the scene so the moonlight will be on the bait with a clear background against which the lion will show up. You pile as much fresh brush as you can on your thicket or boma, as the hiding place is called, for the lion can see as well by day as by night.
4. (Africa, East, countable, uncountable) A hut.
   • The exotic beauty of our Masaailand is a marvel to our creator, she thought as she stepped back into her boma, a typical Masaai hut built with grass, dry sticks and twigs and covered with cow dung for insulation. 2004, Jacyee Aniagolu-Johnson, Mikela, iUniverse, page 3:
5. (Africa, East, countable, uncountable) A military or police post or magistracy.
   • GWEMBE district police officer-in-charge Adams Gondwe has appealed to Government to put up a police post in Muyumbwe boma to replace one that was washed away by floods last year. 5 February 2004, Zambia: Muyumbwe Boma Needs Police Post (allAfrica.com)
6. (Africa, East, countable, uncountable) A type of fertilizer rich in animal dung.
   • The cattle are usually corralled overnight which enables farmers to collect farmyard or boma manure. Soil fertility regeneration in Kenya (PDF)
7. (Africa, East, attributive, uncountable) A method of composting in which animals are bedded on the material before it is used, allowing it to gather urine and dung.
   • The Boma method is used on farms where there are animals (cows, sheep, goats, rabbits, chickens), which are kept in enclosures where droppings are concentrated. 2001, HDRA - the organic organisation, Composting in the Tropics II, page 16 (PDF)

Forms

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