As the golden age of Germanic man approached its end around 1,000 B.C., two important forces were godfather to the approaching era: the use of a new raw material, iron, and a slow but constant worsening of the climate. Both forces, which do not seem to have any connection to each other, caused fundamental changes in the Germanic world of the Bronze Age. The new raw material, which also gave this age its name, soon transformed the appearance of material culture, especially of weapons, tools and jewelry, even though the gold glistening metal was still made into jewelry. The worsening climate – together with the natural population increase of a healthy peasant folk – caused the settlement land to gradually become too small. The soil no longer provided enough bread for the larger population; a few bad harvests in successive years, given the harvest balance back then, sufficed to put individual tribes in bitter distress. So there remained no other choice: the young men had to leave in the spring in order to conquer new land, in order to found a new household on their own soil. So the golden age of Germanic man was followed by an age of wandering and fighting, an Iron Age. Already around the year 1,000 B.C. did that greater period of time begin, whose latter portion history tends to designate the Germanic folk wandering.