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- Malagasy is a major Austronesian language spoken on a large island just
off the African coast.
- However, linguists concerned with Malagasy attend Austronesianist
conferences
- As a consequence, understanding of the processes that led to the
evolution of Malagasy are limited by a lack of knowledge of Bantu etc.
- Yet Malagasy is;
- Shot through with African loanwords and with non-Austronesian words
that may be of African origin
- Has partially restructured its grammar on what are presumably African
models
- This paper is a brief overview of recent research in this area
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- The island of Madagascar split from the African mainland some 50 million
years ago, considerably prior to the evolution of humans and indeed
primates.
- Its isolation permitted the evolution of a complex endemic flora and a
fauna dominated by lemurs.
- Late human impact was massive, with large-scale extinctions
- But humans also had to devise names for the unfamiliar species they
encountered
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- It has been claimed since the 1950s that the primary settlement of
Madagascar was by Austronesians from SE Borneo, although the exact dates
and circumstances of this transoceanic movement remain to be settled.
- However, both the earliest settlement and the source of the migrants has
been called into question in recent times.
- The following speculative scenario provides a more nuanced history of
both the coast and the islands
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- It now seems likely that;
- a) Madagascar was first settled, not by Austronesians, but by
hunter-gatherers migrating from the East African mainland prior to 300
BC.
- b) Madagascar was also reached by Graeco-Roman trading ships, which may
have been trading tortoiseshell with the resident foragers and were
responsible for the translocation of commensal murids
- c) There was regular contact between island SE Asia and the East African
coast prior to 0 AD by an unknown people using outriggers and trading in
spices
- d) After a gap, precursors of the modern Malay established a ‘raiding
and trading’ culture based in settlements along the East African coast
from the 5th century onwards
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- e) Malay ships had pressed crews of non-maritime origin from the
Barito-speaking area of SE Borneo
- f) The Malay settlements on the East African coast transported captured
mainland African populations from the Sabaki-speaking area to
Madagascar, primarily for agricultural labour, between the 5th and 7th
centuries AD
- g) That other SE Asian island peoples may also have followed these
established trade routes to East Africa, accounting for a residue of
non-Malay Austronesian items in the Malagasy lexicon
- h) That the Malay impact on Barito society was indirectly responsible
for the evolution of the Samalic peoples, the ‘sea nomads’ of the region
between Borneo and the SW Philippines
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- i) That similarly, on the East African coast, the transfer of nautical
technology to coastal Iron Age cultivators stimulated the development of
Swahili maritime culture
- j) That the expansion of Arab shipping in the Indian Ocean from the 10th
century onwards obscured the Austronesian origins of local seafaring
through the replacement of boat types and maritime terminology
- k) Finally, if the Indian Ocean was criss-crossed by experienced
Austronesian navigators from an early period, then settlement would be
expected on many Indian Ocean islands. Although most islands were
apparently unoccupied at first European contact, they may still have
been reached by Austronesians and that more extensive archaeology will
reveal this
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- The evidence points to sparse hunter-gatherers reaching Madagascar from
the African mainland
- Scattered among the Malagasy live groups of hunter-gatherers variously
known as the Mikea or Vazimba. These peoples are small in stature, and
darker than the neighbouring farmers and herders (although this may be
simply the consequence of their way of life).
- The literature is confusing on the name of these people. In some sources
they are treated as the same, in other they are distinguished, the
Vazimba being the semi-mythical inhabitants of the island and the Mikea
their present-day descendants
- In general they have a tendency to assimilate to agricultural
communities, and all speak varieties of Malagasy. However, there is some
evidence for a lexical substrate distinct from both Bantu and
Austronesian.
- Birkeli (1936) describe some groups and give samples of the unusual
words, names, toponyms and song texts in the languages of the Vazimba
and Baūsi [=Beosy] languages. Stiles (1991, 1998) was later able to
confirm at least some of the Birkeli material.
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- The standard anthropological view is that the Mikea are simply
transformed refugees in the forest of neighbouring populations such as
the Vezo and Masikoro (Tucker 2001 & Mikea website)
- The evidence is that they have similar rituals, social organisation
- Indeed there is no doubt that the Mikea lifestyle incorporates such
individuals, just as the gypsies of Europe incorporate travellers.
- Nonetheless, note the location of the Mikea, exactly where the migrants
form the African mainland landed and the persistence of unetymologisable
vocabulary
- Some of this is ‘avoidance’ vocabulary, i.e. manipulated speech, but
there are words that seem to have mainland cognates
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- Hunter-gatherers do still survive on the African mainland, though not
opposite the proposed crossing point
- Typical populations are the Kenyan Dahalo, the Hadza and the South
Cushitic-speaking peoples such as the Aasax and the Qwadza
- Unfortunately, none of their languages are perfectly described, but it is
possible to make comparisons with unpublished materials
- Hadza and Dahalo produced no results at all, but there are a few
promising comparisons with Southern Cushitic
- Southern Cushitic is a group of languages described by first by Ehret
and later (and much more reliably) by Mous and Kiessling
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- Southern Cushitic consists of four languages spoken by pastoral-type
peoples, Iraqw, Burunge, Goroa and Alagwa
- Two other languages for which only fragmentary records survive are Aasax
and Qwadza (these were almost certainly Southern Cushitic)
- Ehret claimed Dahalo and Ma’a (the famous mixed language) were also
Southern Cushitic but this is not generally believed
- Aasax probably died out as a living language at least thirty years ago
and today there are only ‘rememberers’
- These were recently interviewed by Maarten Mous and some additional
vocabulary recovered
- We can’t make any conclusive link with the residual Mikea vocabulary
but..
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- dahalo, dahalu inhabitants of the forest cf. N. Swahili mdahalo 1/2 ‘Dahalo
people’
- The Dahalo are foragers living in the interior of the Kenya coast, who
speak a Cushitic language which includes click in its phonology.
- The possible etymology may be da- element is related to bada ‘person’
and halo is *haolo ‘forest’ in Malagasy.
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- To Kay Williamson Educational Foundation for supporting the fieldwork
- To Martin Walsh, Sander Adelaar and Thilo Schadeberg for discussions
and comment
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- To the staff at Langley, Va. who have asked not to be named.
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