Bantu expansion

The Bantu expansion is the name for a postulated

millennia-long series of migrations of speakers of the
original proto-Bantu language group.[1][2] The primary
evidence for this expansion has been linguistic, namely
that the languages spoken in Sub-Equatorial Africa are
remarkably similar to each other. Attempts to trace the
exact route of the expansion, to correlate it with archaeological evidence and genetic evidence, have not been
conclusive; thus many aspects of the expansion remain
in doubt or are highly contested.[3] The Bantu traveled in
two waves, the rst across the Congo forest region.[4]
The linguistic core of the Bantu family of languages, a
branch of the NigerCongo language family, was located
in the adjoining region of Cameroon and Nigeria. From
this core, expansion began about 3,000 years ago, with
one stream going into East Africa, and other streams going south along the African coast of Gabon, Democratic
Republic of the Congo, and Angola, or inland along the
many south-to-north owing rivers of the Congo River
system. The expansion eventually reached South Africa,
probably as early as AD 300.[5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]

Theories on expansion

Initially archaeologists believed that they could nd archaeological similarities in the ancient cultures of the region that the Bantu-speakers were held to have traversed;
while linguists, classifying the languages and creating a
genealogical table of relationships believed they could reconstruct material culture elements. They believed that
the expansion was caused by the development of agriculture, the making of ceramics, and the use of iron, which
permitted new ecological zones to be exploited. In 1966 1 = 20001500 BC origin
Roland Oliver published an article presenting these cor- 2 = ca.1500 BC rst migrations
2.a = Eastern African, 2.b = Western African
relations as a reasonable hypothesis.[16]

3 = 1000500 BC Urewe nucleus of Eastern African

47 = southward advance
9 = 500 BC0 Congo nucleus
10 = AD 01000 last phase[13][14][15]

The hypothesized Bantu expansion pushed out or assimilated the hunter-forager proto-Khoisan, who formerly inhabited Southern Africa. In Eastern and Southern Africa,
Bantu speakers may have adopted livestock husbandry
from other unrelated Cushitic- and Nilotic-speaking peoples they encountered. Herding practices reached the
far south several centuries before Bantu-speaking migrants did. Archaeological, linguistic, genetic, and
environmental evidence all support the conclusion that the
Bantu expansion was a signicant human migration.

2 NigerCongo languages
The NigerCongo family comprises a huge group of
languages spread throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. The
BenueCongo branch includes the Bantu languages,
1

4 EXPANSION

which are found throughout Central, Southern, and Eastern Africa.

4 Expansion

A characteristic feature of most NigerCongo languages,

including the Bantu languages, is their use of tone. They
generally lack case inection, but grammatical gender
is characteristic, with some languages having two dozen
genders (noun classes). The root of the verb tends to remain unchanged, with either particles or auxiliary verbs
expressing tenses and moods. For example, in a number
of languages the innitival is the auxiliary designating the
future.

4.1 c. 1000 BCE to c. CE 500

It seems likely that the expansion of the Bantu-speaking

people from their core region in West Africa began
around 1000 BCE. Although early models posited that
the early speakers were both iron-using and agricultural,
archaeology has shown that they did not use iron until as
late as 400 BCE, though they were agricultural.[24] The
western branch, not necessarily linguistically distinct, acA typical trait in the Niger-Kordofanian family as a group cording to Christopher Ehret, followed the coast and the
southward, reaching
is the division of nouns. This has been juxtaposed with major rivers of the Congo system [25]
central
Angola
by
around
500
BCE.
[17]
the gender system of the Indo-European languages.
It is clear that there were human populations in the region
at the time of the expansion, and pygmies are their purer
3 Pre-expansion-era demography descendants. However, mtDNA genetic research from
Cabinda suggests that only haplogroups that originated in
West Africa are found there today, and the distinctive L0
Before the expansion of farming and pastoralist African of the pre-Bantu population is missing, suggesting that
peoples, Southern Africa was populated by hunter- there was a complete population replacement. In South
gatherers and earlier pastoralists.
Africa, however, a more complex intermixing could have
taken place.[26]

3.1

Central Africa

Further east, Bantu-speaking communities had reached

the great Central African rainforest, and by 500 BCE,
It is thought that Central African Pygmies and Bantus pioneering groups had emerged into the savannas to the
branched out from a common ancestral population c. south, in what are now the Democratic Republic of
70,000 years ago.[18] Many Batwa groups speak Bantu Congo, Angola, and Zambia.
languages; however, a considerable portion of their vo- Another stream of migration, moving east by 3,000 years
cabulary is not Bantu in origin. Much of this vocabu- ago (1000 BCE), was creating a major new population
lary is botanical, deals with honey collecting, or is oth- center near the Great Lakes of East Africa, where a
erwise specialised for the forest and is shared between rich environment supported a dense population. Movewestern Batwa groups. It has been proposed that this is ments by small groups to the southeast from the Great
the remnant of an independent western Batwa (Mbenga Lakes region were more rapid, with initial settlements
or Baaka) language.[19]
widely dispersed near the coast and near rivers, due
to comparatively harsh farming conditions in areas further from water. Pioneering groups had reached mod3.2 Southern Africa
ern KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa by CE 300 along
the coast, and the modern Limpopo Province (formerly
Proto-Khoisan-speaking peoples, whose descendants
Northern Transvaal) by CE 500.[27][28][29]
have largely mixed with other peoples and taken up other
languages; a few still live by foraging (often supplemented
by working for neighbouring farmers) in the arid regions 4.2 From the 13th century to 17th century
around the Kalahari desert, while a larger number of
Nama continue their traditional subsistence by raising Between the 13th and 15th centuries, the relatively powlivestock in Namibia and adjacent South Africa.
erful Bantu-speaking states on a scale larger than local

3.3

Eastern Africa

The Hadza and Sandawe-speaking populations in Tanzania comprise the other modern hunter-forager remnant in
Africa.
Parts of what now is present-day Kenya and Tanzania
were also primarily inhabited by agropastoralist AfroAsiatic speakers from the Horn of Africa followed by a
later wave of Nilo-Saharan herders.[20][21][22][23]

chiefdoms began to emerge, in the Great Lakes region, in

the savanna south of the Central African rainforest, and
on the Zambezi river where the Monomatapa kings built
the famous Great Zimbabwe complex. Such processes of
state-formation occurred with increasing frequency from
the 16th century onward. They were probably due to
denser population, which led to more specialised divisions of labour, including military power, while making
outmigration more dicult. Other factors were increased
trade among African communities and with European,
and Arab traders on the coasts; technological develop-

3
ments in economic activity, and new techniques in the
political-spiritual ritualisation of royalty as the source of
national strength and health.[30]

4.3

Rise of the Zulu Empire (18th19th

centuries)

By the time Great Zimbabwe had ceased being the capital

of a large trading empire, speakers of Bantu languages
were present throughout much of southern Africa. Two
main groups developed, the Nguni (Xhosa, Zulu, Swazi),
who occupied the eastern coastal plains, and the Sotho
Tswana who lived on the interior plateau.

[6] Tishko, S. A.; Reed, F. A.; Friedlaender, F. R.; et al.

(2009). The Genetic Structure and History of Africans
and African Americans. Science 324 (5930): 103544.
doi:10.1126/science.1172257. PMC 2947357. PMID
19407144.
[7] Plaza, S; Salas, A; Calafell, F; Corte-Real, F; Bertranpetit, J; Carracedo, A; Comas, D (2004). Insights
into the western Bantu dispersal: MtDNA lineage analysis in Angola. Human Genetics 115 (5): 43947.
doi:10.1007/s00439-004-1164-0. PMID 15340834.
[8] Coelho, M; Sequeira, F; Luiselli, D; Beleza, S; Rocha, J
(2009). On the edge of Bantu expansions: MtDNA, Y
chromosome and lactase persistence genetic variation in
southwestern Angola. BMC Evolutionary Biology 9: 80.
doi:10.1186/1471-2148-9-80. PMC 2682489. PMID
19383166.

In the late 18th and early 19th century, two major events
occurred. The Trekboers were colonizing new areas of
southern Africa, moving northeast from the Cape Colony, [9] De Filippo, C; Barbieri, C; Whitten, M; et al.
and they came into contact with the Xhosa, the Southern
(2011).
Y-chromosomal variation in sub-Saharan
Africa: Insights into the history of NigerCongo groups.
Nguni. At the same time major events were taking place
Molecular Biology and Evolution 28 (3): 125569.
further north in modern-day KwaZulu-Natal. At that time
doi:10.1093/molbev/msq312. PMC 3561512. PMID
the area was populated by dozens of small clans, one of
21109585.
which was the Zulu, then a particularly small clan of no local distinction whatsoever. In 1816 Shaka acceded to the [10] Alves, I; Coelho, M; Gignoux, C; et al. (2011). Genetic
Zulu throne. Within a year he had conquered the neighhomogeneity across Bantu-speaking groups from Mozamboring clans, and had made the Zulu into the most imbique and Angola challenges early split scenarios between
East and West Bantu populations. Human Biology 83 (1):
portant ally of the large Mtetwa clan, which was in com1338. doi:10.3378/027.083.0102. PMID 21453002.
petition with the Ndwandwe clan for domination of the
northern part of modern-day KwaZulu-Natal.
[11] Castr, L; Tofanelli, S; Garagnani, P; et al. (2009).

See also
Bantu peoples

References

[1] Clark, John Desmond; Brandt, Steven A. (1984). From

Hunters to Farmers: The Causes and Consequences of
Food Production in Africa. University of California Press.
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[2] Adler, Philip J.; Pouwels, Randall L. (2007). World Civilizations: Since 1500. Cengage Learning. p. 169. ISBN
0-495-50262-6.
[3] Berniell-Lee, Gemma; Calafell, Francesc; Bosch, Elena;
et al. (2006). Genetic and Demographic Implications of
the Bantu Expansion: Insights from Human Paternal Lineages. Molecular Biology and Evolution 26 (7): 1581
1589. doi:10.1093/molbev/msp069. PMID 19369595.
[4] Pollard, Elizabeth; Rosenberg, Cliord; Tignor, Robert
(2011). Worlds Together, Worlds Apart: A History of the
World: From the Beginnings of Humankind to the Present.
New York: Norton. p. 289. ISBN 978-0-3939-1847-2.
[5] Vansina, J. (1995). New Linguistic Evidence and The
Bantu Expansion". Journal of African History 36 (2):
173195. doi:10.1017/S0021853700034101. JSTOR
182309.

MtDNA variability in two Bantu-speaking populations

(Shona and Hutu) from Eastern Africa: Implications for
peopling and migration patterns in sub-Saharan Africa.
American Journal of Physical Anthropology 140 (2): 302
11. doi:10.1002/ajpa.21070. PMID 19425093.
[12] Carte Blanche > M-Net. Beta.mnet.co.za. Retrieved
2011-12-31.
[13] Bousman, C. Britt (June 1998). The Chronological Evidence for the Introduction of Domestic Stock into Southern Africa. The African Archaeological Review 15 (2):
133150. JSTOR 25130649.
[14] A Brief History of Botswana. Thuto.org. 2000-09-19.
Retrieved 2011-12-31.
[15] Andrej, Isabella (1998). Historischer berblick [Historical overview]. Matrilineal Societies: A study from an anthropological and historical perspective (Thesis) (in German) (Vienna, Austria: University of Vienna). Retrieved
2011-12-31.
[16] Oliver, Roland (1966). The Problem of the Bantu Expansion. The Journal of African History 7 (3): 361.
doi:10.1017/S0021853700006472. JSTOR 180108.
[17] Campbell-Dunn, G.J.K. (2004). Comparative Linguistics Indo-European and Niger-Congo (PDF) (Report).
Christchurch, New Zealand: Penny Farthing Press. Retrieved 27 November 2014.
[18] Awad, Elias. Common Origins of Pygmies and Bantus. CNRS International Magazine. Centre National de
la Recherche Scientique. Retrieved 27 November 2014.

[19] Bahuchet, Serge (1993). Hladik, C.M., ed. History of

the Inhabitants of the Central African Rain Forest: Perspectives from Comparative Linguistics. Tropical Forests,
People, and Food: Biocultural Interactions and Applications to Development (Paris: Unesco/Parthenon). ISBN
978-9-2310-2879-3.
[20] Ehret, Christopher (1980). The Historical Reconstruction
of Southern Cushitic Phonology and Vocabulary. Volume
5 of Klner Beitrge zur Afrikanistik. Berlin: Reimer. p.
407.
[21] Ehret, Christopher (1983). Mack, John; Robertshaw, Peter, eds. Culture History in the Southern Sudan. Nairobi,
Kenya: British Institute in Eastern Africa. pp. 1948.
ISBN 9781872566047.
[22] Ambrose, Stanley H. (1982). Ehert, Christopher; Posnansky, Merrick, eds. Archaeological and Linguistic Reconstructions of History in East Africa. The Archaeological
and Linguistic Reconstruction of African History (University of California Press). ISBN 978-0-5200-4593-4.
[23] Ambrose, S.H. (1986). Hunter-gatherer adaptations to
non-marginal environments: an ecological and archaeological assessment of the Dorobo model. Sprache und
Geschichte in Afrika (SUGIA) 7 (2): 11.
[24] Vansina, Jan (1990). Paths in the Rainforest: Toward a
History of Political Tradition in Equatorial Africa. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 978-0-29912573-8.
[25] Ehret, C. (2001). Bantu Expansions: Re-Envisioning a
Central Problem of Early African History. The International Journal of African Historical Studies 34 (1): 541.
doi:10.2307/3097285. JSTOR 3097285.
[26] Beleza, Sandra; Gusmao, Leonor; Amorim, Antonio;
Caracedo, Angel; Salas, Antonio (August 2005). The
Genetic Legacy of Western Bantu Migrations. Human
Genetics 117 (4): pp 366375. doi:10.1007/s00439-0051290-3.
[27] Ehret, Christopher (1998). An African Classical Age:
Eastern and Southern Africa in World History, 1000 B.C.
to A.D. 400. London: James Currey.
[28] Newman, James L. (1995). The Peopling of Africa: A
Geographic Interpretation. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale
University Press. ISBN 0-300-07280-5.
[29] Shillington, Kevin (2005). History of Africa (3rd ed.).
New York: St. Martins Press.
[30] Shillington (2005).

External links
Genetic and Demographic
Bantu Expansion and Hunter-gatherers

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