This made possible population growth and migration into more settled territory. The language spoken by the migrating grain gatherers were ancestors of the large family of afro-Asiatic languages. Sometime later agricultural technology began to change society especially in Egypt. Egyptian religion can be understood by referring to African religion. Twelve thousand years ago the Sahara was habitable, but dry, people hunted across the territory that was later to become Egypt. Hunting and fishing was done on the Sahara when it went through wet phases. The Sahara later went though a progressive drought that led people to withdraw from the desert in all directions. The people who moved south presumably continued as fishermen and agriculturally developed. .
The iron ages began just as agricultural did, it was a slow process. While Iron smelting was being improved, the middle age was already about a thousand years into the Bronze Age. At first iron was rare and expensive, but around the Eleventh Century B.C iron became popular enough to replace bronze tools in ordinary use. This was really the beginning of the Iron Age. Africa basically skipped the Bronze Age altogether, and the time lag between the first farming and the first ironwork. According to studies, Negro people who originally came from Northeastern Nigeria carried iron and agriculture from the fringes of the Sahara to most of Africa. They spoke a language similar to the present day Bantu languages. It is believed the people who spoke the original Bantu language must have left northeastern Nigeria and spread quite rapidly throughout most of central and southern Africa.
Cattle's and Cattle keeping came from the Middle East at a very early time. Cattle's were a very important supplement for the diet of a farming population. As long as Cattle's have a source of drinking water and plenty of land, they can live where crops cannot grow.