What is muti in South Africa? In South African English, the word muti is derived from the Zulu/Xhosa/Northern

Ndebele umuthi, meaning ‘tree’, whose root is -thi. In Southern Africa, muti and cognates of umuthi are in

widespread use in most indigenous African languages as well as in South African English and Afrikaans, which

sometimes use muti as a slang word for medicine in general.

This noun is of the umu/imi class so the singular (‘tree’) is umuthi and the plural (‘trees’) is imithi. Since the

pronunciation of the initial vowel of this class is unstressed, the singular is sometimes pronounced muthi. The word

is rendered as muti by the historical effects of the British colonial spelling.

What does the word muti mean?|Where does muti come from?|What is a inyanga?|muthi names and uses|Does muti work|Types of muthi|

Occasions of murder and mutilation associated with some traditional cultural practices in South Africa are also

termed muti killings. These are not human sacrifices per se but rather involve the murder of someone to

excise body parts for incorporation into medicine used in witchcraft.

African traditional medicine makes use of various natural products, many derived from trees and other plants.

Botanical medicine prescribed by an inyanga or herbal healer is generally known as “muthi”, but the term can apply

to other traditional medical formulations, including those that are zoological or mineral in composition

The people in the Eastern Cape of South Africa still strongly rely on traditional medicine and believe in its potency as

an alternative to Western medicine. What is muti in South Africa?. Various herbs fall under isicakathi , used for pre-natal.

natal medicine (although they can also be used for non-pregnancy-related health issues). The plants that fall under

the isicakathi category differ according to the districts in the Eastern Cape, hence it is a general term used when

referring to traditional medicine. Eleven species of plants fall under isicakathi