The origin of Madagascar and its colonization has been speculated and theorized (and thank you to Maya for talking about the origins of Malagasy!). New studies suggest Austronesian colonization between 700-1200CE. They speculate this due to crops found in Madagascar that are distinctive to Austronesia. Nicole Boivin, director of the Max Planck Institute, has said of this finding: “We finally have a signal of this austronesian expansion,” and she also mentions that the Austronesian voyagers did not stop at Madagascar. Instead, some settled the Comoro islands (islands between Madagascar and African coast). However, after collecting samples from both African mainland and the offshore islands like Madagsacar, they noticed a clear boundary between those dominated by African crops and those donated by crops like Asian rice (remember how important rice is in Madagascar!). This suggests the voyagers never made it as far as the coast of Africa.
This study suggests that they were not Indian voyagers, even though the Indians had bustling trade between East Africa and India. This conclusion can be drawn front the fact that, although there is rice, there are none of the other common Indian crops like horse gem and urd found in Madagascar or Comoros. However, with all this in mind, they still recognize that there were plenty of African arrivals to Madagascar over the years as well.
They still do not know who the exact first settlers were, and other studies suggest that the first people came to Madagascar around 400 BCE, suggesting that if this were true, there were already small pockets of people on Madagascar before the Austronesians arrived. Crowther, one of the scientists involved in the study, says “What is clear is that the island has a complex settlement history involving multiple colonizations by different populations at different times… [Her study] is a small piece to the puzzle.” There are still a lot of unanswered questions about Madagascar’s past and we keep learning more!
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