Editing History of Madagascar (section)

===Europeans (from 1500)===
[[File:CantinoPlanisphere-Mascareignes.png|thumb|325px|Map of Madagascar and the [[Mascarene Islands]] (1502)]]

Europe knew of Madagascar through Arab sources; thus ''[[The Travels of Marco Polo]]'' claimed that "the inhabitants are Saracens, or followers of the law of Mohammed", without mentioning other inhabitants. Other than its size and location, everything about the island in the book describes southeastern Africa, not Madagascar. European contact began on 10 August 1500, when the [[Portuguese people|Portuguese]] sea captain [[Diogo Dias]] sighted the island after his ship separated from a fleet going to India.<ref name="CathEncy|wstitle=Madagascar">{{CathEncy|wstitle=Madagascar}}</ref>{{r|ley196608}} The Portuguese traded with the islanders and named the island ''São Lourenço'' ([[Saint Lawrence]]). In 1666, [[François Caron]], the director general of the newly formed [[Louis XIV's East India Company|French East India Company]], sailed to Madagascar.<ref>{{cite book |last=Vincent |first=Rose |title=The French in India: From Diamond Traders to Sanskrit Scholars |year=1990 |publisher=Popular Prakashan |isbn=978-0-86132-259-6 }}</ref> The company failed to establish a colony on Madagascar but established ports on the nearby islands of Bourbon (now [[Réunion]]) and [[Isle de France (Mauritius)|Isle de France]] (now [[Mauritius]]). In the late 17th century, the French established trading posts along the east coast. On [[Île Sainte-Marie]], a small island off the northeastern coast of Madagascar, Captain Misson and his pirate crew allegedly founded the famous [[pirate utopia]] of [[Libertatia]] in the late 17th century. From about 1774 to 1824, Madagascar was a favourite haunt for pirates.  Many European sailors were shipwrecked on the coasts of the island, among them [[Robert Drury (sailor)|Robert Drury]], whose journal is one of the few written depictions of life in southern Madagascar during the 18th century.<ref>''From MADAGASCAR to the MALAGASY REPUBLIC'', by Raymond K. Kent pg 65–71</ref> Sailors sometimes called Madagascar "Island of the Moon".<ref>''Madagascar: An Historical and Descriptive Account of the Island and Its Former Dependencies'' by [[Samuel Pasfield Oliver]], p. 6. (excerpted in Google Book Search)</ref>

====European settlements====
By the 15th century, Europeans had wrested control of the [[spice trade]] from the Muslims. They did this by bypassing the Middle East and sending their cargo-ships around the [[Cape of Good Hope]] to India. The Portuguese mariner [[Diogo Dias]] became the first European to set foot on Madagascar when his ship, bound for India, blew off course in 1500. In the ensuing 200 years, the English and French tried (and failed) to establish settlements on the island.

Fever, dysentery, hostile Malagasy, and the trying arid climate of southern Madagascar soon terminated the English settlement near [[Toliara]] in 1646. Another English settlement in the north in Île Sainte-Marie came to an end in 1649. The French colony at [[Tôlanaro]] (Fort Dauphin) fared a little better: it lasted thirty years. On Christmas night 1672, local Antanosy tribesmen, perhaps angry because fourteen French soldiers in the fort had recently divorced their Malagasy wives to marry fourteen French orphan-women sent out to the colony, massacred the fourteen grooms and thirteen of the fourteen brides. The Antanosy then besieged the stockade at Tôlanaro for eighteen months. A ship of the French East India Company rescued the surviving thirty men and one widow in 1674.

In 1665, [[François Caron]], the Director General of the newly formed [[Louis XIV's East India Company|French East India Company]], sailed to Madagascar. The Company failed to found a colony on Madagascar but established ports on the nearby islands of Bourbon and Île-de-France (today's [[Réunion]] and [[Mauritius]] respectively). In the late 17th century, the French established trading-posts along the east coast.<ref name="HISTORY OF MADAGASCAR"/>

====Pirates and slave-traders====
[[File:A new draught of the Island of MADAGASCAR ats St. LORENZO with Augustin Bay and the Island of Mombass at Large NYPL1640654.tiff|thumb|Map of Madagascar and surroundings, circa 1702–1707]]
[[File:A chart of the WESTERN part of the EAST-INDIES with all the adjacent Islands from cape Bona Esperanca to the Island of Zelone NYPL1640657.tiff|thumb|Map of Madagascar and the western portion of the East Indies, circa 1702–1707]]
Between 1680 and 1725, Madagascar became a [[pirate]] stronghold. Many unfortunate sailors became shipwrecked and stranded on the island. Those who survived settled down with the natives, or more often, found French or English colonies on the island or even pirate havens and thus became pirates themselves. One such case, that of Robert Drury,<ref>''From Madagascar to the Malagasy Republic'' by Raymond K. Kent, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1976 ({{ISBN|0-8371-8421-5}}), pages 55–71.</ref>
resulted in a journal giving one of the few written depictions of southern Madagascar in the 18th century.

Notable pirates including [[William Kidd]], [[Henry Every]], [[John Bowen (pirate)|John Bowen]], and [[Thomas Tew]] made Antongil Bay and Île Sainte-Marie (a small island 12 miles off the northeast coast of Madagascar) their bases of operations. The pirates plundered merchant ships in the Indian Ocean, the [[Red Sea]], and the [[Persian Gulf]]. They deprived Europe-bound ships of their silks, cloth, spices, and jewels. Vessels captured going in the opposite direction (to India) lost their coin, gold, and silver. The pirates robbed the Indian cargo ships that traded between ports in the Indian Ocean as well as ships commissioned by the [[East India Company|East India Companies]] of France, England, and the Netherlands. The pilgrim fleet sailing between Surat in India and Mocha on the tip of the Arabian Peninsula were a favorite target, because the wealthy Muslim pilgrims often carried jewels and other finery with them to Mecca. Merchants in India, various ports of Africa, and Réunion showed willingness to [[Fence (criminal)|fence]] the pirates' stolen goods. The low-paid seamen who manned merchant ships in the Indian Ocean hardly put up a fight, seeing as they had little reason or motivation to risk their lives. The pirates often recruited crewmen from the ships they plundered.

With regard to piracy in Malagasy waters, note the (semi-)legendary accounts of the alleged pirate-state of Libertalia.

Prior to the arrival of the Europeans, certain Malagasy tribes occasionally waged wars to capture and enslave prisoners. They either sold the slaves to Arab traders or kept them on-hand as laborers. Following the arrival of European slavers, human slaves became more valuable, and the coastal tribes of Madagascar took to warring with each other to obtain prisoners for the lucrative slave-trade. Instead of spears and cutlasses, the tribesmen fought with muskets, musket-balls, and gunpowder that they obtained from the Europeans, conducting fierce and brutal wars. On account of their relationship to the pirates, the [[Betsimisaraka people|Betsimisaraka]] in eastern Madagascar had more firearms than anyone else. They overpowered their neighbors, the [[Antankarana]] and [[Tsimihety people|Tsimihety]], and even raided the [[Comoro Islands]]. As the tribe on the west coast with the most connections to the slave trade, the [[Sakalava people]] also had access to guns and powder.

Today, the people of Madagascar can be considered as the product of mixing between the first occupants, the ''vahoaka ntaolo'' Austronesians (''Vazimba'' and ''Vezo'') and those arrived later (''Hova'' neo-Austronesians, Persians, Arabs, Africans and Europeans).

[[Genotype|Genotypically]], the original Austronesian heritage is more or less evenly distributed throughout the island. Researchers have noticed the "Polynesian motif" everywhere:<ref>Hurles ''et alii'' (2005), Ricaut ''et alii'' (2009), Hagelberg ''et alii'' (2008)</ref> an old marker of Austronesian populations from before the great immigration to the islands of Polynesia and Melanesia. This fact would require a starting common home among the Proto-Malagasy ''vahoaka ntaolo'' (gone west to Madagascar) and the ancestors of the current Polynesians (left for the Pacific Islands in the East) between 500 BCE – 1 CE.