Bantu Migrations

Bantu Migrations

The Bantu migrations had a vast influence on the development of Africa. The Bantu peoples passed on many concepts to the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa. Originating from Nigeria in the Niger River Valley, the Bantu migrated south and then spread to both the east and west. The Bantu laid the foundation for Sub-Saharan African societies. They spread agriculture, animal domestication, iron metallurgy, and cultural development throughout southern Africa. Various forms of government have developed as a result of the Bantu migrations. They also contributed to the start of many societies, including the Swahili city states. The adaptations the Bantu people learned, especially the making of iron, helped them to expand and spread their discoveries. As the Bantu traveled throughout Southern Africa they spread various rituals and traditions. The Bantu also integrated many ideas into their culture from the Islamic and Christian religions. These new religions were brought by foreign merchants from different countries as they began to intermix in Africa. Many large trade industries were also started because of the Bantu peoples. The Bantu brought horses, cotton textiles, and salt into Southern Africa by trading enormous amounts of gold, ivory, and slaves to the merchants. Every aspect of Sub-Saharan African history was immeasurably impacted by the migrations of the Bantu peoples.

After about 500 BCE most Bantu were fashioning iron. This new skill, adapted from the Nok people, encouraged the making of axes, adzes, and hoes in which they used to clear land, expand, and cultivate. By about 500 CE bananas had made their way across the Indian ocean, settled on the island of Madagascar, and were picked up by the Bantu. Helping the Bantu expand, bananas were able to grow in thick forested regions where other crops could not. Bananas, a nutritious dietary staple, increased food surplus, which in end increased the population size of the Bantu. The skills of clearing and cultivating land spread with the Bantu peoples and greatly influenced the agriculture development of Sub-Saharan Africa. Along with iron, bananas helped the Bantu expand into areas not possible before, allowing for these amazing spreading of the Bantus' discoveries. Once iron and bananas were well established within Bantu tribes, about 1000 CE, their population sizes grew to about twenty two million!

The Bantu stopped migrating during the first century CE and started to form complex government for the settled villages they already had. Stateless societies are forms of government that are not run by a hierarchy, but rather through family or kinship groups. The start of these family based government systems influenced the development of villages, districts, city-states, and small and large kingdoms. The Swahili tribe originating off of the eastern cost of Sub-Saharan Africa was a prime example of Bantu government. Being Bantu themselves, the Swahili show how the Bantu spread not only government, but also societies as a whole. Just as the Bantus' influence on developing Africa, kinship groups, or family based governing systems, started out small and eventually grew into massive kingdoms ruling and influencing entire regions. As in many other