The African Iron Age is traditionally considered that period in Africa between the second century AD up to about 1000 AD when iron smelting was practiced. In Africa, unlike the Europe and Asia, the Iron Age is not prefaced by a Bronze or Copper Age, but rather all the metals were brought together. The advantages of iron over stone are obvious--iron is much more efficient at cutting trees or quarrying stone than stone tools.

But iron smelting technology is a smelly, dangerous one. This brief essay covers Iron Age up to the end of the first millennium AD.

To work iron, one must extract the ore from the ground and break it into pieces, then heat the pieces to a temperature of at least 1100 degrees centigrade under controlled conditions.

African Iron Age people built a cylindrical clay furnace and used charcoal and a hand-operated bellows to reach the level of heating for smelting. Once smelted, the metal was separated from its waste products or slag, and then brought to its shape by repeated hammering and heating, called forging.

From the 2nd century AD to about 1000 AD, the Chifumbaze spread iron throughout the largest portion of Africa, eastern and southern Africa. The Chifumbaze were farmers of squash, beans, sorghum and millet, and kept cattle, sheep, goats and chickens.

They built hilltop settlements, at Bosutswe, large villages like Schroda and large monumental sites like Great Zimbabwe. Gold, ivory, and glass bead working and trade was part of many of the societies. Many spoke a form of Bantu; many forms of geometric and schematic rock art are found throughout south and eastern Africa.

African Iron Age cultures: Akan culture, Chifumbaze, Urewe

African Iron Age issues: Sirikwa Holes, Inagina: Last House of Iron, Nok Art, Toutswe Tradition

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