Learn more on Famous maasai oloiboni sendeyo and lenana, Maasai Tribe History, Origin of Maasai Laibon, Lenana Death, Olonana ole Mbatian, Reasons for Lenana collaboration, and Laibon Meaning.


For about 200 years, spiritual leaders known as Iloibono or Laibons ruled the Maasai. Though little is known about the origins of their ritual power, it is thought to have been passed down through generations of the ole Supeet family dynasty.

An Oloiboni or Laibon held the highest position in the Maasai social hierarchy. A Laibon's position was not political, but he wielded tremendous influence and power as the people's chief medicine-man, diviner, and prophet.

Untold History; Sendeyo and Lenana

The Maasai were considered the Lords of East Africa by colonial settlers. Their land stretched from the shores of Lake Turkana in Kenya to Mount Meru near Arusha in Tanzania.

And this begs the question: Did Lenana (Olonana) collaborate with the British to exchange Maasai land for a pair of shorts trouser?

Who is Laibon in Maasai?

A Laibon is a very important person in a traditional Maasai community. They are endowed with the ability to see into the future. They are not a fortune teller, and they are not a witch doctor. They are more like seers, but some have the ability to heal illnesses.

Mbatian: The Story of the Great Maasai Laibon

The greatest of the Maasai Laibon was Mbatian, after whom Mount Kenya's summit is named (Batian).

Mbatian Ole Supeet was the greatest of them all. In 1866, he took over as leader from his father. Mbatian came from Matapato in Kajiado County. He ruled for 24 years, from 1866 to 1890.

During Mbatian's reign, the Maasai experienced peace, prosperity, expansion, and great unity.

Mbatian was not your average Maasai herder because he played an important role in the community's life. He was a Laibon, and the prosperity of the community was dependent on his accurate predictions.

Mbatian was a descendant of the famous Inkindongi, a man endowed with prophetic abilities who had stumbled into Maasai territory by chance. Inkindongi is thought to have wandered into Ngong in 1640, becoming lost and being rescued by a herdsman who handed him over to the Ilaiser clan. 

Prominent Inkindongi ancestors included Supet, Sitonik, Kerika, Kipepeti, Parinyombi, Mweiya, and Lesigereishi.

Traditions and customs permitted an Inkindongi (Laiboin) to marry without paying the bride price and amass vast wealth in the form of cattle. This explains the theatrics used by the reigning Laibon's sons to succeed their father when he became too old.

Mbatian foresaw white colonization and the arrival of an iron snake - a railway line - that would divide Maasai land in two, a prophecy that would be fulfilled before his death in 1890. He also warned his people not to leave their ancestral homelands.

Mt-kenya-Lenana. and batian -peak, (1)
Mt-kenya-Lenana. and batian -peak, (1)


He warned them that if they did, they would contract smallpox and their cattle would die. They would also have to fight a formidable foe who would easily defeat them. He stressed that he was about to die and that if they did not leave their lands, he would send them cattle from heaven.

Mbatian had two wives who bore him Olonana, Mpatiany, Senteu, and Neiliang'.

The story of these two brothers, Senteu and Olonana or Lenana, tells of the Maasai division caused by Olonana, who disinherited his older brother Senteu by tricking their father into handing over leadership to him.

Senteu was Eldest and of the favorite wife, whereas mother of Olonana was the least liked.

When on the point of death, Mbatian called the elders of Matapato, the sub-district in which he lived, and said to them: 

“Do not move from your country for I am about to die, and I will send you cattle from heaven. If you move, you will contract smallpox, your cattle will perish, you will have to fight a formidable foe, and you will be defeated. I want my heir to be the son I give the Laibon's insignia and Follow Him”. 

The elders said, “Very well," and walked away. 

Mbatian summoned his eldest son Senteu and told him, 

“Come tomorrow morning, for I wish to give you the Laibon's insignia.”

“Very well” Senteu replied.

While this was going on, Olonana's mother overheard Mbatian's instructions while milking the cows and told Lenana about it.

When he learned of Mbatian's announcement, he devised a strategy to take advantage of his father's senility and partial blindness and inherit the position of Oloiboni.

Rituals at Olonana’s Blessing Ceremony

Mbatian removed his right sandal and placed it on Olonana's right foot to demonstrate that he would follow in his footsteps.

He then unbuckled his sword and placed it in Olonana's right hand, indicating that his battles would be taken over by Olonana.

He also wrapped a strip of the skin garment he was wearing around Olonana's neck as a symbol that his possessions had been handed over to Olonana.

Finally, the royal medicine was handed over, bringing the ceremony to a conclusion.

Mbatian was now very old and only had partial blindness. As a result, he did not see which of his sons was in front of him and gave the Laibon insignia to Lenana while saying, 

“Thou shalt be great among thy brothers and among all the people.”

Lenana walked away with the Laibon-Insignia. 

Senteu then went to see his father, but he was informed that his brother had already been there and received the Laibon-Insignia.  

When he heard this, he became enraged and declared, 

“I will not be subject to my brother; I will fight him until I kill him.”

Mbatian died in 1890 and was buried at Oldonyo Orok, also known as Black Hill, in today's Namanga hills. His son Olonana was proclaimed the principal Laibon after his death, but his rivalry with his brother Senteu resulted in a protracted civil war that reduced the Maasai population by half.

Mbatian is the name given to the highest peak of Mount Kenya, the country's highest mountain.

When he died, some people declared Lenana to be the principal of Laibon, claiming that “Mbatian told us that he would give the insignia of his office to whichever of his sons he wished should succeed him.” As a result, they stayed with Lenana. 

However, others declared, “We will not acknowledge this man because he is a cheat,” and sided with Senteu.

Lenana had thus usurped his brother Senteu's birthright. This fueled animosity between the two brothers, which was exacerbated by the onset of a drought and the outbreak of livestock disease plagues. 

The frequent wars aimed at restocking livestock after droughts and disease became so severe that they spread into what is now Tanzania.

Sendeyo and Lenana: The Story of the Great Maasai Laibon

Senteu moved south of Kenya and north of Tanzania, and his people still live in the same area today, whereas Olonana remained in Kenya and was the one who signed treaties ceding vast tracts of land to colonialists, pushing the Maa community to Kenya's arid and semi-arid areas.

Senteu-ole-mbatiany,
Senteu-Ole-Mbatiany, Year 1900


Now disease struck Senteu's people, many of whom died, their cattle all perished, and they were defeated by the Germans; whereas those who remained with Lenana were not afflicted, and they obtained cattle, as Mbatian had predicted. 

For many years, the two rivals fought, and eventually Senteu was defeated. He came in 1902 to beg his brother to let him live with him, and the two parties reached an agreement.

Lenana Maasai Leader; The Story of the Great Maasai Laibon

In the 1870s, Lenana, the famous Maasai Oloiboni (spiritual leader), was born. His father, Mbatian, is said to be a descendant of the Inkindongi clan, also known as the Oloiboni clan.

Lenana's (corrupted from Olonana) fascinating life began in 1870, when one of Mbatian's 100 wives gave birth to a baby boy at Ngoshua, near Monduli, at the foothills of Mt Kilimanjaro, Africa's highest snow peaked mountain. Despite being born in a large family, Lenana was an only son to his mother in a community where sons were highly valued.

Oloiboni Olonana was born into a prophetic lineage of the Inkidong'i group and was the only son of Mbatian's marriage with his mother, who is said to be from the Ilkaputiei section.

Lenana was circumcised and initiated into the Il Talala age group in 1882, despite his father's delay due to the Iloikop wars, which raged between 1830 and 1880 between various Maasai factions. According to historian , Olonana Ole Mbatia was an apprenticed prophet because he, like his father's other sons, and inherited prophetic powers.

During Lenana's youth, the Ilkipiak war erupted between the Ilkipiak clan of Uasin Gishu and the Ilpurko clan of Naivasha and Nakuru, which was exacerbated by Mbatian's cousin Koikot, who challenged his leadership as the Laibon and was eventually defeated and driven to Loroki plateau in Samburu.

The defeat was so devastating that some of Koikoti's followers were stripped of their livestock and forced to work as hunters and gatherers, eventually becoming Iltorobo (Ndorobo). Although Lenana was too young to participate, he witnessed the effects at a time when everyone was living in constant fear of attack.

Paramount Maasai Chief Laibon Lenana.
Paramount Maasai Chief  Laibon Lenana.


Because the Maasai believed that prophetic powers were passed down through the Oloiboni clan, Lenana and all of his brothers apprenticed to become prophets.

He was at a disadvantage because his father preferred teaching Oloiboni duties to his elder brother Senteu. Lenana, on the other hand, outdid his brother and quickly perfected his Oloiboni skills by watching his father work whenever the opportunity arose.

Lenana was only four years into his reign when Senteu, who had migrated to Loita Hills, attacked the Ilmatapato, Ilkaptutiei, and other clans living around Nairobi and took large numbers of cattle. While he was defending himself against these attacks, the Kikuyu attacked Lenana, whose people had been weakened and impoverished by war and disease.

Maasai land was plagued by severe droughts known as emutai and enkidaaroto between 1884 and 1897. 

Thousands of livestock died as a result of the famine, with Lenana himself losing about 1,000 cattle to pleura-pneumonia in 1897.

He lost more people to the rinderpest epidemic two years later, as people died from small pox (entindiae) in 1892, 1898, and 1899. The situation was so bad that the community's livestock population was cut in half.

This, combined with the ensuing power struggle between Lenana and his brother Senteu, triggered a series of Morijo wars aimed at restocking, which occasionally spilled over into Tanganyika.

Warfare between the brothers and frequent Agikuyu attacks weakened Lenana's stronghold. Lenana sought collaboration with the British at this time.

Lenana saw the British as an ally who could assist him in tracking down and defeating his brother Senteu, who was causing havoc in the region by raiding and stealing cattle from other Maasai clans.

Paramount Chief Lenana; The Story of the Great Maasai Laibon

The British appointed Lenana as Paramount Chief in 1898, and he was given resources to monitor and stop his brother Senteu. At the time, what is now Tanzania was under German control, and the British wanted to avoid a war between them and the Germans?

Reasons for Lenana Collaboration

In this context, Lenana begged for help from Francis Hall, an agent of the Imperial British East Africa Company (IBEA) who had already established a fort at Kabete.

At the time, Hall was also looking for allies to help him defeat the Kikuyu and other neighboring communities that were impeding IBEA's territorial expansion. This marked the two sides coming together to confront a common enemy and the establishment of ties that blossomed with trade and eventually saw Lenana enthroned as a chief by the British Government in December 1898.

Three years earlier, the IBEA had surrendered its East African territory to the British Government, though the majority of the company's agents continued to work as civil servants under the direct control of the colonial office in London.

When Senteu's warriors crossed over from Tanganyika, which was then under German control, and attacked Loita in 1898, the British Foreign Office in London had had enough and ordered that the fighting stop. Under these conditions, Lenana was promoted to chief so that he could be closely monitored and restrained from causing a diplomatic squabble by pursuing his brother into Tanganyika.

Paramount Maasai Chief Ole Sendeiyo. He was a brother to Laibon Lenana.
Paramount Maasai Chief Ole Sendeiyo. He was a brother to Laibon Lenana.


To provide friendly supervision, Sydney Langford Hinde was appointed Resident to the Maasai Chief and Political Agent for the Maasai Agency.

 In the years since, the British have used their control over the Maasai through Lenana to extract concessions that have deprived the community of much of its land through a series of bogus agreements, while pitting Lenana and Senteu against each other.

When Senteu was driven out of Tanganyika by a series of disasters in 1902 and into the arms of the authorities, the final phase of Maasai land takeover began. Lenana's usefulness as a chief and ally would outlive him.

Lenana Death

According to documents obtained from the National Archives, Olonana died on March 7th, 1911, at 3pm, and his body was later carried by a donkey to the foot of Ngong Hills, where he was buried.

In the years since, Lenana's powers as a Paramount Chief have been greatly diminished, and the British have appropriated his land and the land of other Maasai clans through a series of bogus agreements.

In real life, the British used every trick in the book to keep Lenana influence under control. They did nothing as a simple case of dysentery drained him, leaving him with the body of an elderly shaky man.

After all, because the paramount chief, Lenana son of Mbatian, did not qualify for the medical scheme, no vehicle could be provided to transport him from his home, which was only 16 kilometers from Kiserian to Nairobi. When Lenana died of the disease on March 7, 1911, senior government officials rushed to see his body, including Girouard Percy, the governor of the East African Protectorate at the time.

This was a man (Lenana) who had been the Government's most trusted ally for years, a man who provided reinforcements when necessary to subdue rebellious communities. They even paid him a salary and treated his illiterate signature as a valuable asset. However, as he lay dying, the government simply watched his condition deteriorate from afar, never providing transportation to a health facility or medication.

They were now paying glowing tribute to the fallen chief, a man who had prematurely aged as a result of hard living: at 40, he appeared weak and ancient. The British begged the bereaved community to honor Laibon's death wish.

Part of the Sendeu peaks outcrop from Mackinders Valley. mt kenya
Part of the Sendeu peaks outcrop from Mackinders Valley. Mt Kenya


Sendeu died in 1934, and his eldest son, Karambu ole Sendeu, speared to death. 

Olonana died before nominating his successor as Maasai Oloiboni because his son Seki was only 13 years old and could not take over because of his age.

Seki, the boy, would undoubtedly take over the Laibonship from his father.

Olonana proposed a shrine in the vicinity of Kona Baridi Kajiado West.

The elders proposed that Marmoroi, Lenana's half-brother, be appointed as his advisor until Seki was old enough to take over as chieftain.

According to government officials, Lenana's final wish was for the Maasai to leave Laikipia to make way for the establishment of the White Highlands, which would be occupied solely by white settlers.

Lenana's legacy lives on, and one of Mt. Kenya's peaks is named after him.

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