The May 29, 2025 edition of the NYT Mini Crossword threw a few language-related curveballs, but none landed harder than the “Language family that includes Swahili” clue. I’ll be honest, I blanked. Swahili isn’t something I’ve brushed up on, so this one had me pacing for a bit. What bailed me out was tearing through the easier clues around it, one after another, until the grid nearly solved itself.
Once I saw what the answer was, I dug a little deeper out of curiosity. Turns out, there is more to it than I expected. Let’s get into that after the reveal of the answer to the “Language family that includes Swahili” clue.
Language Family That Includes Swahili NYT Mini Answer
BANTU is the answer to the “Language family that includes Swahili” clue.
Swahili belongs to the Bantu subgroup, which itself is part of the larger Benue–Congo branch of the Niger–Congo language family. Bantu languages include some 500 related tongues spoken across much of sub‑Saharan Africa, and Swahili stands out as perhaps the most prominent, both as a native and regional lingua franca.
