## Introduction  
The history of migration between East Africa and Madagascar is at least as old as human settlement of the Great Island in the first millennium. In the debate on this settlement, two conflicting arguments emerged early in the twentieth century. The first tended to associate Madagascar with the Malay world (Grandidier, 1908), while the other emphasized Arabic and Bantu influences (Ferrand, 1909). The contribution of the African continent would manifest itself by the presence on the island of the 'Makoa' or 'Masombika' people, originally from East Africa. According to Deschamps (1959), at least some of the Makoa living in the twentieth century on the west coast of Madagascar originated from 'much earlier voluntary migrations'. This hypothesis is open to critical assessment. The crossing of the early Makoa differs from other East African migrations, ${ }^{1}$ in that it was forced. Witnesses who claim a Makoan identity report that their ancestors, born on the continental mainland, were 'lost' (very) upon their arrival on the Malagasy shores. This term, which derives from the  
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[^0]:    1 East Africans who came on a voluntary basis to set up home on the west coast of Madagascar in the nineteenth century, including the Ajojo [Comorians], the Soahili [Swahili], the Ngodja [from Zanzibar] and the Ngodji [from Angoche in Mozambique] were Muslims and spoke Swahili. Their migration was often motivated by trade, including slavery.