The history of Madagascar. Madagascar documentary. World Of Knowledge
Madagascar , officially the Republic of Madagascar , and previously known as the Malagasy Republic, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately 400 kilometres off the coast of East Africa across the Mozambique Channel.At 592,800 square kilometres Madagascar is the world's second-largest island country.
The nation comprises the island of Madagascar and numerous smaller peripheral islands.
Following the prehistoric breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana, Madagascar split from the Indian subcontinent around 88 million years ago, allowing native plants and animals to evolve in relative isolation.
Consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot; over 90% of its wildlife is found nowhere else on Earth.
The island's diverse ecosystems and unique wildlife are threatened by the encroachment of the rapidly growing human population and other environmental threats.
The archaeological evidence of the earliest human foraging on Madagascar may date up to 10,000 years ago.
Human settlement of Madagascar occurred by Austronesian peoples, arriving on outrigger canoes from present-day Indonesia, where the contemporary social and religious situation was that of Hinduism and Buddhism, along with native Indonesian culture.
These were joined around the 9th century AD by Bantu migrants crossing the Mozambique Channel from East Africa.
Other groups continued to settle on Madagascar over time, each one making lasting contributions to Malagasy cultural life.
The Malagasy ethnic group is often divided into 18 or more subgroups, of which the largest are the Merina of the central highlands.
Until the late 18th century, the island of Madagascar was ruled by a fragmented assortment of shifting sociopolitical alliances.
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