Madagascar is an island country located in the Indian Ocean, approximately 400 km off the coast of East Africa. It’s the fourth largest island in the world with a mysterious history. Given its proximity to mainland Africa, one would assume that the original inhabitants were Africans.
However in one of the most fascinating and incredible feats of human exploration, the original inhabitants were in fact Southeast Asian seafarers known as Austronesians.
The Austronesians were a group of peoples who spoke languages belonging to the Austronesian language family. They originated in Taiwan around 3000 BCE and began a series of migrations to Island Southeast Asia, mainland Southeast Asia and Oceania. The Austronesian expansion is one of the most incredible and impactful migrations in human history, reaching as far as the island of Madagascar.
But how did it happen? How did Southeast Asian seafarers from modern day Indonesia or Malaysia make the 6,000 to 8,000 kilometre journey across the Indian Ocean? And why?
We may never know what drove people to embark on a perilous journey to the unknown and leave everything behind. But we can make some educated guesses.
Population growth could’ve been a driver. As agriculture developed and populations grew, there was greater pressure to find new lands. Austronesians were master navigators and boat builders, and perhaps they set out to find new resources and peoples with whom to trade. And maybe it came down to the spirit of exploration, something that’s been a defining characteristic of humanity since homo sapiens migrated out of Africa 70,000 to 100,000 years ago.
It’s very unlikely that the Austronesians had specific knowledge of Madagascar before their journey. The island was uninhabited and totally removed from their known world. And the journey itself probably involved stopping at intermediate islands like Sri Lanka, Maldives or Comoros.
And this is where the mystery deepens. It’s possible that some Austronesian seafarers decided to settle at intermediate locations like Sri Lanka, the Maldives or Comoros, while others continued voyaging towards Madagascar. This pattern of island-hopping and partial settlement is consistent with how the Austronesians expanded across the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
But there’s insufficient evidence of any Austronesian settlement or influence in these intermediate islands. Which then leads one to ask, did they make the journey directly to Madagascar? If so, how could they have possibly done this? One explanation is that Austronesians used these intermediate islands as stopping points or temporary settlement from which to continue their epic voyage.
Austronesians used outrigger canoes, which are stable, double-hulled boats that allow seafarers to travel long distances. As master navigators, they would’ve relied on natural signs such as the behaviour of birds and marine life to detect the proximity of land. Using trade winds and ocean currents to their advantage, they would’ve been able to travel enormous distances with the right provisioning of supplies.
Eventually Austronesians reached Madagascar; an uninhabited land of abundant resources and rich soil that would’ve been ideal for agriculture. They’d finally reached an island on which they could thrive. But the mystery remains; how did they do it?
It’s one of the most fascinating stories of exploration in human history. Madagascar was first settled by Austronesian peoples from Borneo around 350 BCE, followed by Bantu migrations from mainland Africa as Bantu-speaking peoples from East Africa began crossing the Mozambique Channel between the 1st and 10th centuries CE.
Over time, the population of Madagascar became a mix of Southeast Asian and African ancestry, creating the unique Malagasy culture that exists today.
