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Borrowed from Swahilisengi, probably from another Bantu language (compare Giryamasanje).[1][2] The word was first used in print in English by the British zoologist Jonathan Kingdon (born 1935) in The Kingdon Field Guide to African Mammals (1997): see the quotation.[1]
2007, Marian Armstrong, Wildlife and Plants, volume 9 (Horseshoe Crab – Ladybug), New York, N.Y.: Marshall Cavendish, →ISBN, page 540:
The order formerly known as Insectivora included solenodons; shrews; moles and desmans; hedgehogs and moonrats or gymnures; golden moles, tenrecs, and otter shrews; and sengis or elephant shrews.
2007, George A Feldhamer, Lee C Drickamer, Stephen H Vessey, Joseph F Merritt, Carey Krajewski, “Afrosoricida, Erinaceomorpha, Soricomorpha, Macroscelidea, Scandentia, and Dermoptera”, in Mammalogy: Adaptation, Diversity, Ecology, 3rd edition, Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, →ISBN, part 3 (Adaptive Radiation and Diversity), page 251, column 1:
Sengis feed on insects and other animal and plant material. […] Young sengis are highly precocial at birth—they will forage 1 day after birth[…].
2010, Joseph F Merritt, “Mating Systems and Reproductive Strategies”, in The Biology of Small Mammals, Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, →ISBN, part 3 (Reproduction), page 237:
Like small African antelopes, sengis spend their life exposed to the elements while relying on disruptive coloration to act as camouflage from the plethora of African predators.
The gray-faced sengi is good at hiding out. It was not until 2005 that scientists discovered this species of elephant shrew, a mammal found only in Tanzania. First captured in a camera trap image, the species was later named Rhynchocyon udzungwensis by tropical ecologist Francesco Rovero and his collaborators. The gray-faced sengi (sengi is a Swahili name) lives in the country's Eastern Arc Mountains in the protected areas of the Udzungwa Mountains National Park and the Kilombero Nature Reserve.
2017, Ceri Levy, “Golden-rumped Sengi: Rhynchocyon chrysopygus”, in Ralph Steadman’s Critical Critters, London; New York, N.Y.: Bloomsbury Natural History, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 96:
After various studies it has been decreed that the sengi, of which there are probably 19 species living in Africa, are not related to shrews at all but are in fact a distant relative of the – drum roll, please – yes, you guessed it, the elephant! […] The majority of the sengi species are considered of Least Concern, but two giant sengis (giant is a loose term when dealing with elephant-shrews) are at risk.
Usage notes
The British zoologist Jonathan Kingdon (born 1935) and the American zoologist Galen Rathbun (1944–2019) argue that sengi is preferable to elephant shrew since sengis have a very different evolutionary history from true shrews (order Eulipotyphla), and it is more appropriate for local names to be used for animals endemic to a particular region.[1]
R. J. Thomas, G. A. Bevan, P. J. Donovan, A. Hawke et al., editors (1950–present), “sengi”, in Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru Online (in Welsh), University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh & Celtic Studies
, Oxford: Oxford University Press, July 2023.
elephant shrew on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
Category:Macroscelididae on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons 
Macroscelididae on Wikispecies.Wikispecies 
