The Bantu

The Bantu (translated as “the people”) spread from the borderlands of today’s Nigeria and Cameroon about 2,000 years ago. In the process they replaced early farmer and hunter gatherer cultures (like the Batwa) in grassland savannah environments and rainforests. They brought their language, new crops and 
iron technology to the Gorilla Highlands region and cleared the forests for farmland.

The Bantu Expansion Timeline

5000BC: Agriculture develops in Africa.

1000BC: The Bantu and their cattle arrive to our region.

By 500BC: Early mixed farming is established by northern migrants who settle in Uganda and further south.

400–200BC: Start of Early Iron Age, new crop varieties and iron smelting are introduced.

683–754AD: A further surge of settlement and deforestation takes place.

1,000AD: Late Iron Age begins.

1236–76AD and 1322–98AD: Forest clearance and population expansion peaks.

1600AD: The Bwindi, Echuya and Virunga forests are split and continue to be cleared.

The Present of Our Region’s Bantu

The Bantus of Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo are nowadays divided by language and identity — even when they share clans and origins.

In historic times each clan was ruled by elders who were often rainmakers. Today’s Kisoro District in Uganda was conquered by the Rwandan Kingdom by 1880, and ruled by the king’s chiefs. Elsewhere in southwestern Uganda there was never any kingdoms, just clan alliances. Several kingdoms formed in eastern Congo.

The Bakiga, the most populous groups of southwestern Uganda, had no real sense of common belonging before the English colonial administrators grouped them together and defined them as an ethnic group.

The Bafumbira in Kisoro speak a dialect of Kinyarwanda. Banyarwanda (Rwandans) are one people with three traditional economic classes, cattle-keeping Batutsi and Bahutu land cultivators and Batwa (after the 1994 Genocide Against the Batutsi, these divisions are officially downplayed).

In eastern Congo the following Bantu groups populate the North and South Kivu provinces: Babembe, Bahunde, Bafuliru, Bahavu, Bakumu, Balega, Banande, Banyamulenge/Barundi (of Rwandan/Burundian heritage), Banyanga, Banyindu, Bashi, Bavira, and Batembo.

Traditionally all Bantu were mixed crop and livestock farmers who lived on land that was very fertile, however, porous volcanic soils can make water supply problematic. High population density and land fragmentation often leads to migrations.

Their settlements were a compound with separate houses for all wives and their children. Each wife had her own livestock and vegetable plot. Cattle were kept inside the compound at night as protection from wild animals and thieves.

Nyabingi was the most powerful goddess in the system of traditional beliefs guiding people from birth to death.

Our Stories About the Bantu: