Disclosure : This site contains affiliate links to products. We may receive a commission for purchases made through these links.

Madagascar

Two thousand years ago, Madagascar was probably uninhabited. An island twice the size of Great Britain, it was home to unique species of flora and fauna that were undisturbed by humanity until the first navigators landed on its shores. Since then, the changes imposed by humans on the wide range of environments to be found in this mini-continent have formed one of the threads of Madagascar`s history. No one knows where the island`s first inhabitants came from, but there was a strong connection from the earliest period to the islands of South East Asia – today`s Indonesia.Austronesians, Arabs, Portuguese, and Dutch sailors and traders successively dominated the sea-lanes around Madagascar, some of the world`s oldest long-distance shipping routes. Over the centuries, Madagascar developed its own distinctive language and cultural systems, absorbing migrants from every shore of the Indian Ocean. In the nineteenth century, Britain and France projected a new type of global power that had a major effect on the island, which became a French colony from 1896 to 1960.Throughout this colourful and often turbulent history, the tension between the formation of a highly original culture and the absorption of immigrants, the development of strong social hierarchies, a long experience of slavery and the slave trade, have all had effects that are still felt today. Now home to 17 million people, Madagascar is one of the world`s most fascinating and least-known societies.

Related Products:

The Gardens of Mars: Madagascar, an Island Story Thank You, Madagascar: Conservation Diaries of Alison Jolly Lemurs of Madagascar Wildlife of Madagascar Madagascar Bradt Guide Madagascar Wildlife Bradt Guide Insight Guides Madagascar Madagascar – The Eighth Continent: Life, Death and Discovery in a Lost World Lonely Planet Madagascar Baobabs of the World: The Upside-Down Trees of Madagascar, Africa and Australia SHOM Chart 6307 – Cรดte Est de Madagascar – Mouillages Madagascar F&B Insight Guides Pocket Madagascar (Travel Guide with free eBook) Madagascar ITMB Wasteland With Words: A Social History of Iceland Madagascar Reise Know-How Admiralty Chart 716 – Seychelles Group to Madagascar and Agalega Islands Berlitz Pocket Guide Madagascar (Travel Guide with Dictionary) NGA Chart 61500 – Madagascar-South Coast NGA Chart 61550 – Madagascar-East Coast NGA Chart 61300 – Madagascar-North Coast and Seychelles SHOM Chart 7489 – Approches Sud-Est de Madagascar SHOM Chart 6673 – De l’™archipel des Chagos ร  Madagascar SHOM Chart 5949 – Mouillages ร  la cรดte Est de Madagascar SHOM Chart 6595 – Mouillages de la cรดte Est de Madagascar SHOM Chart 6672 – De Maputo ร  Muqdisho – Madagascar SHOM Chart 7487 – Approches Nord-Est de Madagascar A Political History of the World: Three Thousand Years of War and Peace Default ThumbnailMadagascar IGN 85125 The Aye-Aye and I Default ThumbnailAdmiralty Chart Folio 37 – Madagascar Manhattan: Mapping the Story of an Island French Wine: A History Leviathan: The Rise of Britain as a World Power Flag of Madagascar Admiralty Chart 718 – Islands North of Madagascar Default ThumbnailAdmiralty Chart 3905 – North Eastern Approaches to Madagascar Bideford Bay & Lundy Island 1896 – 292/275 Admiralty Chart 3906 – South Eastern Approaches to Madagascar Generic Tree Flora of Madagascar