The great southward Bantu migration in Africa took place in sub-Saharan Africa (south of the Sahara Desert), over some 2,000 years.With the development of the iron blade, reaping became easier for the bantu people and agriculture took on a whole new meaning.fter they had settled in the eastern parts of South Africa, they eventually spread out across the highveld some 1 000 years ago, because of their need for more land on which to practise their growing cattle culture. The first African settlements in South Africa were mainly in the Transvaal and Natal areas.