The Bantu expansion is a major series of migrations of the original proto-Bantu language speaking group, who spread from an original nucleus around West Africa-Central Africa across much of sub-Saharan Africa. In the process, the Proto-Bantu-speaking settlers displaced or absorbed pre-existing hunter-gatherer and pastoralist groups that they encountered.
The primary evidence for this expansion is linguistic – a great many of the languages spoken across Sub-Equatorial Africa
are remarkably similar to each other, suggesting the common cultural
origin of their original speakers. The linguistic core of the Bantu
languages, which comprise a branch of the Niger–Congo family, was located in the adjoining regions of Cameroon and Nigeria.
However, attempts to trace the exact route of the expansion, to
correlate it with archaeological evidence and genetic evidence, have not
been conclusive; thus although the expansion is widely accepted as
having taken place, many aspects of it remain in doubt or are highly
contested.
The expansion is believed to have taken place in at least two
waves, between about 3,000 and 2,000 years ago (approximately 1,000 BC to 1 AD).
Linguistic analysis suggests that the expansion proceeded in two
directions: the first went across the Congo forest region (towards East
Africa), and the second – and possibly others – went south along the African coast into Gabon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Angola, or inland along the many south-to-north flowing rivers of the Congo River system. The expansion reached South Africa, probably as early as 300 AD.
Theories on expansion
Bantuists believe that the Bantu expansion most probably began on the highlands between Cameroon and Nigeria, and the 60,000 km2
Mambilla region straddling the borderlands here has been identified as
containing remnants of "the Bantu who stayed home", as the bulk of
Bantu-speakers moved away from the region. Archaeological evidence from
the separate works of Jean Hurault (1979, 1986 & 1988) and Rigobert
Tueche (2000) in the region reveals that this region has been inhabited
by the same culture from 3000 B.C (5 millennia) to date.
The majority of the groups of the Bamenda highlands (occupied for 2
millennia to date), somewhat south and contiguous with the Mambilla
region, have an ancient history of descent from the north in the
direction of the Mambilla region.
Initially, archaeologists believed that they could find
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, Roland Oliver published an article presenting these correlations as a reasonable hypothesis.
The hypothesized Bantu expansion pushed out or assimilated the hunter-forager proto-Khoisan, who had 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 significant human migration.
Niger–Congo languages
The Niger–Congo family comprises a huge group of languages spread throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. The Benue–Congo branch includes the Bantu languages, which are found throughout Central, Southern, and Eastern Africa.
A characteristic feature of most Niger–Congo languages, including
the Bantu languages, is their use of tone. They generally lack case inflection, 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 infinitival is the auxiliary designating the future.
Pre-expansion-era demography
Before the expansion of Bantu-speaking farmers, Central, Southern, and Southeast Africa were populated by Pygmy foragers, Khoisan-speaking hunter-gatherers, Nilo-Saharan-speaking herders, and Cushitic-speaking pastoralists.
Central Africa
It is thought that Central African Pygmies and Bantus branched out from a common ancestral population c. 70,000 years ago. Many Batwa
groups speak Bantu languages; however, a considerable portion of their
vocabulary is not Bantu in origin. Much of this vocabulary is botanical,
deals with honey collecting, or is otherwise specialised for the forest
and is shared between western Batwa groups. It has been proposed that
this is the remnant of an independent western Batwa (Mbenga or "Baaka")
language.
Southern Africa
Before the Bantu expansion, Khoisan-speaking
peoples inhabited Southern Africa. Their descendants have largely mixed
with other peoples and adopted other languages. A few still live by
foraging often supplemented by working for neighbouring farmers in the
arid regions around the Kalahari desert, while a larger number of Nama continue their traditional subsistence by raising livestock in Namibia and adjacent South Africa.
Southeast Africa
Prior to the arrival of Bantus in Southeast Africa, Cushitic-speaking peoples had migrated into the region from the Ethiopian Highlands and other more northerly areas. The first waves consisted of Southern Cushitic speakers, who settled around Lake Turkana and parts of Tanzania
beginning around 5,000 years ago. Many centuries later, around 1,000
AD, some Eastern Cushitic speakers also settled in northern and coastal Kenya.
In addition, Khoisan-speaking hunter-gatherers also inhabited Southeast Africa before the Bantu expansion.
Nilo-Saharan-speaking herder populations comprised a third group of the area's pre-Bantu expansion inhabitants.
Expansion
San rock art
depicting a shield-carrying Bantu warrior. The movement of Bantu
settlers, who migrated southwards and settled in the summer rainfall
regions of Southern Africa within the last 2000 years, established a
range of relationships with the indigenous San people from bitter
conflict to ritual interaction and intermarriage.
c. 1000 BC to c. AD 500
It seems likely that the expansion of the Bantu-speaking people from their core region in West Africa began around 1000 BC.
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 BC, though they were agricultural. The western branch, not necessarily linguistically distinct, according to Christopher Ehret, followed the coast and the major rivers of the Congo system southward, reaching central Angola by around 500 BC.
It is clear that there were human populations in the region at the time of the expansion, and pygmies are their closest living relatives. However, mtDNA genetic research from Cabinda suggests that only haplogroups that originated in West Africa are found there today, and the distinctive L0
of the pre-Bantu population is missing, suggesting that there was a
complete population replacement. In South Africa, however, a more
complex intermixing could have taken place.
Further east, Bantu-speaking communities had reached the great Central African rainforest, and by 500 BC, pioneering groups had emerged into the savannas to the south, in what are now the Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola, and Zambia.
Another stream of migration, moving east by 3,000 years ago (1000 BC),
was creating a major new population center near the Great Lakes of East
Africa, where a rich environment supported a dense population.
Movements by small groups to the southeast from the Great Lakes region
were more rapid, with initial settlements widely dispersed near the
coast and near rivers, due to comparatively harsh farming conditions in
areas farther from water. Pioneering groups had reached modern
KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa by AD 300 along the coast, and the modern Limpopo Province (formerly Northern Transvaal) by AD 500.
From the 13th century to 17th century
Between the 13th and 15th centuries, the relatively powerful Bantu-speaking states on a scale larger than local 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 difficult.
Other factors were increased trade among African communities and with
European and Arab traders on the coasts, technological developments in
economic activity, and new techniques in the political-spiritual
ritualisation of royalty as the source of national strength and health. Towards the northern parts of South Africa emerged groups of Tsonga and Venda tribes around the 1500s and 1600s.
Rise of the Zulu Empire (18th–19th 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.
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,
and they came into contact with the Xhosa, the Southern Nguni. At the
same time, major events were taking place further north in modern-day KwaZulu-Natal. At that time, the area was populated by dozens of small clans, one of which was the Zulu, then a particularly small clan of no local distinction whatsoever. In 1816, Shaka acceded to the Zulu throne. Within a year, he had conquered the neighboring clans, and had made the Zulu into the most important ally of the large Mtetwa clan, which was in competition with the Ndwandwe clan for domination of the northern part of modern-day KwaZulu-Natal.
Criticism
Manfred
K. H. Eggert stated that "the current archaeological record in the
Central African rainforest is extremely spotty and consequently far from
convincing so as to be taken as a reflection of a steady influx of
Bantu speakers into the forest, let alone movement on a larger scale."
