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The place of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean’s ancient migrations
Claude Allibert, Professor - National Institute of Languages and Oriental Civilizations,
University of Paris, France
“I will rely on documents written by two important authors: Piri Reis, a Turkish admiral who sailed around
the Indian Ocean area in the 16th century and Flacourt Etienne, a French Governor of Fort-Dauphin in
the 17th century. Two main inputs should be retained from Flacourt. He describes three human groups,
the third of which is the Zafikazimambo who came fromMozambique. “Zafi” is an real Malagasy word
whereas Kazimambo is not initially Malagasy. “Mambo”means a Mozambican lord and even the sons of
the Kazi women. The other main groups are the Zafy hibrahim and the Zafiramini. Falcourt sees a link
between Abraham and the Zafy Ibrahim. As there is no record of Mohammedanism in this group and as
the members do not work on Saturdays, Flacourt deduced the presence of Jews. This theory has gradually
disappeared but some continue to believe it in Madagascar.
Jean Pirier is the second person to address this issue in 1965. He had a more convincing theory about the
affiliation and saw an anti-Islamic or para-Islamic stratum. In other words, according to him, these people
are not Muslims because they belong to a divergent Arabic group when Mahomet invokes Allah to create
this religion. This division would be the origin of the Zafy hibrahim. Later, Paul Ottino, who is always clever,
suggests that they can be Nestorians but did not provide any relevant information.
Jean Claude Hebert has recently suggested that this group came from north-west India. It should be
noted that Boraha is one of the Nosy Ibrahim (St. Mary) names. In an excellent article written in 1902,
Gabriel Ferrand rejected the hypothesis of a Jewish migration, because these people did not know the
name of Yaweh, the main deity of this religion. The fact of not working on Saturdays can simply means
the observance of a fady – a day which is very common among the Malagasy population. So if the word
Abraham was to be kept, then it would have been translated into the Malagasy words Abrahimo or
Ibrahima.
Some authors agree on the existence of a Himyaritic stratum, a pre-Islamic population from the South coast
of Arabia. Such a hypothesis is very interesting and brings us to a period just before the Islam advent. So, I
would link them with these Himyaritic movements. Moreover, the voyage on the Eritrean Sea reports the
presence of Mopharites on the African coast. According to Flacourt, they would be the introducers of the
geomancy. Excavations conducted in Mayotte showed a contact between Bantu Islamized populations
with Austronesian in the 9 to 10th centuries. This movement enters in Madagascar through the north
and along the east coast. At this time, the Arabs who were looking for commercial products (turtle shells,
copal, quartz, iron and chlorite schist…) called Madagascar “Qmr” (under the Magellanic cloud showing the
south) or Qanbalu.
Thus, it is undeniable that Madagascar has played an early role in the maritime trade and the population
migrations in the south-west part of the Indian Ocean. This eastern part of Madagascar contains some of
the witnesses of that past.”
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