The source of prestige and therefore a measure of social status was number of wives and amount of land one owned, as well as the age set one belonged to.
The Gikuyu people used number of wives to show how rich they were. Land was and is still an emotive issue, among the Gikuyu people, and the amount of land one cultivated was a measure of well being. In addition, being initiated and joining a particular age -set qualified a Gikuyu person to either join the reigning leadership class or not.
