UNESCO Ancient Civilizations of Africa (Editor G. Mokhtar)

Madagascar
In the last three and a half centuries, however, the Sandangoatsy have
turned their backs on the sea which was their first home, and it is
probable that the Vazimba of central west Madagascar and the central
highlands have done the same.
The movements of the coast-dwelling Bantu-speakers from the ninth
century account for the African contribution to the settlement of Madagascar,
but we still have to explain why the Indonesian language became
the lingua franca. Some of the Bantu-speakers must have come into contact
with the Indonesians, and it is possible that between different Africans
speaking different languages or dialects Indonesian may have been a
language of convenience. However, Madagascar must have continued to be
the linguistic and ethnic chequerboard for quite a while, at least on the
coast around Baly and Maintirano (Mariano's Bambala), on the Tsiribihina
(according to Drury), and among certain Vazimba tribes in the interior
(according to Birkeli and Hébert). The ancient Vazimba led a rather
primitive life economically. They lived as fishermen on the coasts, but
in the interior they probably depended to a great extent on a crude use
of the natural resources at their disposal. Gathering berries, hunting and
collecting honey were probably sufficient for their needs. According to
Drury, the Vazimba of the Tsiribihina were river fishers, and excavations
have shown great heaps of shells eaten by these berry-gathering peoples
near Ankazoaka and Ankatso.
The symbiosis between the Indonesian and Africans started at the very
beginning of the settlement of Madagascar. By the tenth century a few of
the coastal Bantu-speakers must have converted to Islam. I find striking
the fact that the Muslims of Madagascar share with all the peoples of the
west and north-west coasts the same myth as to their origins, the
myth of Mojomby, or 'the lost island'. Elsewhere 39 I have recounted the
myth in literary form as it was told to me by the Antalaotse of Boina
Bay. According to my informants, Selimany Sebany and Tonga, the
ancestors of the Kajemby and the Antalaotse, once lived together on an
island between the African coast and the Comoros. They lived by trade
and practised the Muslim religion. But when impiety and discord
appeared on the island, Allah decided to punish them: the island sank
beneath a raging sea and only a few righteous men escaped. Some say that
they were miraculously saved, others say that God sent a whale to carry
them away. Kajemby and Antalaotse were descended from righteous men.
It seems likely therefore that the Muslims did not superimpose their
culture on Madagascar, but rather played a catalytic role among the
Africans who had migrated there.
39. P. Vérin, 1970a, pp. 256-8.