Sepedi, formerly called Sesotho sa Lebowa as an official language for the Lebowa homeland during apartheid, is a Sotho-Tswana language group spoken in the northeastern provinces of South Africa. It is commonly referred to in its standardized form^[4] as Pedi or Sepedi and holds the status of an official language in South Africa.^{[5] [6]}

Quick Facts Sepedi, Native to ...

Sepedi
Native to	South Africa
Region	Gauteng, Limpopo, parts of Mpumalanga
Ethnicity	Pedi Lobedu Pulana Tlôkwa
Native speakers	4.7 million (2011 census)[1] 9.1 million L2 speakers (2002)[2]
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo Volta-Congo Benue–Congo Bantoid Southern Bantoid Bantu Southern Bantu Sotho–Tswana Sepedi
Early forms	Tswaniac Hurutshe Kgatla
Standard forms	Pedi
Writing system	Latin (Northern Sotho alphabet) Sotho Braille Ditema tsa Dinoko
Signed forms	Signed Northern Sotho
Official status
Official language in	South Africa
Regulated by	Pan South African Language Board
Language codes
ISO 639-2	nso
ISO 639-3	nso
Glottolog	pedi1238  Pedi
Guthrie code	S.32,301–304[3]
Linguasphere	99-AUT-ed
Geographical distribution of Northern Sotho in South Africa: proportion of the population that speaks a form of Northern Sotho at home.   0–20%   20–40%   40–60%   60–80%   80–100%
Geographical distribution of Northern Sotho in South Africa: density of Northern Sotho home-language speakers.   <1 /km²   1–3 /km²   3–10 /km²   10–30 /km²   30–100 /km²   100–300 /km²   300–1000 /km²   1000–3000 /km²   >3000 /km²
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According to the South African National Census of 2011, it is the first language of over 4.6 million (9.1%) people, making it the 5th most spoken language in South Africa. The Sepedi language is spoken most commonly in Mpumalanga, Gauteng and the Limpopo provinces.^[7]

This section needs additional citations for verification. (February 2023)

The Northern Sotho written language was based largely on the Sepedi dialect. Missionaries studied this dialect the most closely and first developed the orthography in 1860 by Alexander Merensky, Grutzner, and Gerlachshoop.^[11] This subsequently provided a common writing system for 20 or more varieties of the Sotho-Tswana languages spoken in the former Transvaal, and also helped lead to "Sepedi" being used as the umbrella term for the entire language family. However, there are objections to this synecdoche by other Northern Sotho dialect speakers, such as speakers of Modjadji's Lobedu dialect.^{[citation needed]}

Northern Sotho can be subdivided into Highveld-Sotho, which consists of comparatively recent immigrants mostly from the west and southwest parts of South Africa, and Lowveld-Sotho, which consists of a combination of immigrants from the north of South Africa and Sotho inhabitants of longer standing. Like other Sotho-Tswana people, their languages are named after totemic animals and, sometimes, by alternating or combining these with the names of famous chiefs.^{[original research?]}

Northern Sotho is one of the Sotho languages of the Bantu family. Although Northern Sotho shares the name Sotho with Southern Sotho, the two groups have less in common with each other than they do with Setswana.^{[citation needed][12]} Northern Sotho is also closely related to Setswana, sheKgalagari and siLozi. It is a standardized dialect, amalgamating several distinct varieties or dialects. Northern Sotho is also spoken by the Mohlala people.

Most Khelobedu speakers only learn to speak Sepedi at school, such that Sepedi is only their second or third language. Khelobedu is a written language. Lobedu is spoken by a majority of people in the Greater Tzaneen, Greater Letaba, and BaPhalaborwa municipalities, and a minority in Greater Giyani municipality, as well as in the Limpopo Province and Tembisa township in Gauteng. Its speakers are known as the Balobedu.

Sepulana (also sePulane) exists in unwritten form and forms part of the standard Northern Sotho. Sepulana is spoken in Bushbuckridge area by the MaPulana people.

Sepedi is written in the Latin alphabet. The letter š is used to represent the sound [ʃ] ("sh" is used in the trigraph "tsh" to represent an aspirated ts sound). The circumflex accent can be added to the letters e and o to distinguish their different sounds, but it is mostly used in language reference books. Some word prefixes, especially in verbs, are written separately from the stem.^[13]

Some examples of Sepedi words and phrases:

Universal Declaration of Human Rights^[16]

• Pedi people
• Lebowa
• Sekhukhuneland