Changes

There was no private property in these settlements, as property was shared among the community.  Typically a family member served as the leader of each family or “kinship group,” and there was no formal government.

There was no private property in these settlements, as property was shared among the community.  Typically a family member served as the leader of each family or “kinship group,” and there was no formal government.

Fruits, particularly bananas, initially imported from Southeast Asia by traders, were a major source of nutrition that helped increase the health and population.  Malay sailors brought the banana over the Indian Ocean to an island known as Madagascar (see the large island off the east coast of Africa in the figures to the right), where the people still speak a language similar to that spoken in Malaysia.

Fruits, particularly bananas, initially imported from Southeast Asia by traders, were a major source of nutrition that helped increase the health and population.  Malay sailors brought the banana over the Indian Ocean to an island known as Madagascar (see the isolated island off the southeast coast of Africa in the figures to the right), where the people still speak a language similar to that spoken in Malaysia.

The primary African religion was “animism”, or a belief that spirits exist in nature similar what some American Indians believe.  The religion was handed down from generation to generation not in writings, but in oral stories.  The storytellers are called “griots”.  There was a little bit of farming along the edges of the rain forests, but most of the activity was a “hunting-gathering” type, in when men hunted for food rather than growing it on farms.  In central Africa there was some cattle raising.

The primary African religion was “animism”, or a belief that spirits exist in nature similar what some American Indians believe.  The religion was handed down from generation to generation not in writings, but in oral stories.  The storytellers are called “griots”.  There was a little bit of farming along the edges of the rain forests, but most of the activity was a “hunting-gathering” type, in when men hunted for food rather than growing it on farms.  In central Africa there was some cattle raising.