Could the Phonecians have beat the Bantu to settle Southern Africa?

eschaton

IOTL, the Bantu began migrating out of the Congo rain forests and into the southern savannas of Africa around 500 BC. This was basically concurrent with Hanno the Navigator exploring West Africa. Within roughly 1,000 years they settled roughly the limit their agricultural package would allow, leaving the Cape with hunter-gatherers and pastoralists until Europeans arrived.

I know there have been threads about the possibilities of a Phonecian South Africa before. What I wondered was more the following. Assuming the Phonecians decide to settle the Cape, could their population expand fast enough to not only thrive in the immediate region, but to beat the Bantu towards settling parts of Southern Africa which historically they had little trouble with?

I'm most curious about the ability of a Mediterranean crop package to adjust easily to the climate in say Natal, or Transvaal.

Any thoughts?
 

Arrix85

Seem a bit strange to have the phoenicians settle that far south when there are so many lands, both in Africa and Europe, much closer. More importantly the phoenicians weren't conquered by the Persians around that time? so no possibility of massive settlements anywhere.
 

Roberto

But why would they? Venturing much beyond the Mediterranean was already a difficult feat at the time, much less settling any lands. Getting all the way to the Cape and colonizing would be absurd.
 

Cash

What is there in South Africa that the Phoenicians would want badly enough to set up colonies? There had to be a reason for a settlement -- diamonds, perhaps?

If Phoenicians do settle there, it opens up all of the eastern African coastline to exploration and trade.
 

Emperor Qianlong

Very unlikely. The Phoenicians did send an expedition along the coast off West Africa in the early 6th century, which may reached as far as Guinea or even Cameroon. However, the problem is this: the Phoenicians were primarily a trade-based civilization, and there simply was nothing to trade yet in the south as the classical civilizations in sub-saharan Africa didn't emerge until centuries later. It's more likely that, say, if Carthage emerges victorious from the Punic Wars (or a similar POD that wipes out Rome), that the Carthaginians would have expanded northwards and established colonies in Gallaecia, Aremorica, the British Isles and perhaps even reaching as far as the Baltic Sea.
 
Errnge

Errnge

Emperor Qianlong said:
It's more likely that, say, if Carthage emerges victorious from the Punic Wars (or a similar POD that wipes out Rome), that the Carthaginians would have expanded northwards and established colonies in Gallaecia, Aremorica, the British Isles and perhaps even reaching as far as the Baltic Sea.
Click to expand...

your idea, not mine ;)
 

eschaton

Yes, I knew the logistics were weird and bordering on ASB. But Southern Africa was all-but-empty (aside from some hunter-gathering populations) during this period, and no one but the Phonecians are the only extra-African population that during this period could have conceivably reached the region.

It just would have been interesting to imagine a world with minimal butterflies, where Europeans start journeying down the African coast, and find as they travel far enough south people get lighter and lighter - until they reach a nest of kingdoms where people look much more like they belong in North Africa.
 
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