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and enabled the easy transportation of provisions as well as other trading commodities to the island’s shores. The Portuguese learned that the “fair Island of St Laurence” was home to “sheep and much rice and maize, also many oranges and lemons.” Fish were plentiful along the coast and in rivers. The availability of goats, cows, corn, fruits, cloth, and timber also enticed Portuguese captains.⁴⁴ Rice particularly interested the Portuguese, who became aware of a brisk export in the grain to the Middle East via Kilwa.⁴⁵ During their early explorations, they noted that rice supplies in the northwest of Madagascar were so plentiful that twenty ships could not exhaust supplies of the grain.⁴⁶

      Food exports were complemented by a traffic in captive laborers. According to one visitor, the large ports along the northwestern coast were surrounded by farmland and large herds of cattle, with much of the work completed through slave labor.⁴⁷ While this Portuguese assessment was made on the basis of only tenuous evidence, it was clear from other sources that thousands of people were sold on the shores of the island throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. As early as 1506, Portuguese passing by the northwest coast of Madagascar observed a bustling slave trade conducted by “Moors.”⁴⁸ Other sixteenth-century visitors to the island described a traffic with “Arab” traders whose ships carried as many as five thousand slaves from the northwestern ports of Madagascar annually.⁴⁹ The exact magnitude is difficult to judge, in part because the enslaved individuals were shipped to a wide variety of destinations, including Malindi, Mombasa, Mogadishu, Muscat, and Aden.⁵⁰

      Many slaves came from the interior of the island, along with quantities of foodstuffs. In 1640, the captain of the English vessel Frances described his visit to “Mattaledge” (likely Massaliege), where he observed the trade between the people near “Mackamby island” (Nosy Komba?) and those on Madagascar. In March and April of each year, he reported, people from the interior (the “Hoves”) moved in a caffalo (caravan) with ten thousand head of cattle and two to three thousand slaves, both to sell on the coast. Other exports included rice, hides, goats, hens, and various exotic woods.⁵¹ The trade the Portuguese first observed may have been conducted in a similar manner, with slaves being sold for luxury goods such as fine cloth and precious metals.⁵² By the mid-seventeenth century, Portuguese traders had established a regular slave trade on the northwest coast, judging by Dutch mentions of a Portuguese trading agreement with the “strongest king” on the island, perhaps residing in Massaliege.⁵³ Slaves that originated in Madagascar may have been purchased by Portuguese merchants visiting the Comoro Islands or on the East African coast.⁵⁴ The Portuguese preferred other sources for slave labor, although the trade from East Africa was not particularly large before the late eighteenth century.⁵⁵

      Even with the establishment of this food and slave trade with the islanders, misunderstandings were rife. Following their visits to the ports of Madagascar, Portuguese noted the lack of strong centralized authority, with the rule of coastal leaders rarely appearing to stretch far beyond their port cities. Portuguese visitors viewed political, religious, and linguistic divisions among the islanders as a positive feature, making the island more easily conquered.⁵⁶ This was not the reality. Northern coastal communities participated in trading networks that were openly hostile to the Portuguese, particularly in light of their frequent battles for control with Muslims. In 1506, shortly after their discovery of Madagascar, Portuguese sailors and soldiers raided the port cities of “Sada” and “Langane” in northwestern Madagascar. They burnt homes and seized supplies as coastal inhabitants fled.⁵⁷ The Portuguese attackers pursued them into the interior, where they captured the frightened islanders, while other Portuguese watched from the shore as “the sea [became] strewn with drowned men, women, and children.” In a letter to the king, Albuquerque estimated that over a thousand people had died in the two raids. Those who survived were taken captive and given to the Portuguese soldiers, with each “to take as many as he liked.” As their final act of treachery, the Portuguese commander oversaw the theft of goods from the ports, including fine cloth from India, some silver and gold, as well as a large quantity of rice. It took the Portuguese forces three days to complete their plundering.⁵⁸

      Further aggravating tensions, Portuguese missionaries endeavored to convert coastal peoples in Madagascar, including Muslim populations.⁵⁹ The inhabitants of northwestern Madagascar were willing to trade with visiting European merchants in times of peace, but showed increased concern when the Portuguese threatened to become a more permanent presence on their shores, such as when they established a settlement for trade and Catholic missions at Massaliege in 1585.⁶⁰ The growing antagonism between the missionaries and the coastal people resulted in the murder of a Portuguese priest. Portuguese officials also accused the “Muslims of Madagascar” of harboring their enemies following attacks in East Africa and used this “alliance,” along with the death of the priest, to justify a Portuguese attack on Massaliege in 1587.⁶¹ By the early seventeenth century, some Portuguese blamed an implacable hatred of Christians and the strength of the “commercial sphere of the Arabs” for discouraging the Muslims of the northwest ports of Madagascar from trading with them, although Portuguese violence was a more likely cause of this hostility.⁶²

      Even outside of the north of Madagascar, further from the influence of East Africa, the Portuguese were unable to develop a stable trading presence. Portuguese missionaries focused some of their earliest conversion efforts in Antanosy (near Taolagnaro), a region in the southeastern portion of Madagascar where Portuguese settlers were lured by promises of abundant silver and gold.⁶³ Portuguese missionaries, traders, and soldiers formed a small trading post there in 1510. Their attempts to convert rulers were unsuccessful. The search for gold and silver mines was also abandoned. The Portuguese once again blamed their failures on religious differences, although the influence of Islam in this area was far more diffuse than in the north.⁶⁴

      By the seventeenth century, many Portuguese still struggled to maintain peaceful relationships with island leaders. An English visitor reported the following story in 1640 and some portions of his narrative can be confirmed by referring to a letter written by a Portuguese priest around the same period.⁶⁵ King Tinguimaro (Itongomaro), the ruler of “Mangakelly” (Mangakely) on the island of “Assada” (likely Nosy Be) had been trading with the “Moors” and Portuguese for decades.⁶⁶ These interactions were described as generally peaceful, until two of the king’s wives (or concubines) were found missing after the departure of some Portuguese merchants. The English narrator tells us that “it was knowne” to the islanders that the merchants had taken the women back to Mozambique. The king sent a message to Massaliege informing the Portuguese that they should not return to his island until they returned the women. He explained that he had already converted to Christianity and expected a certain level of respect from the Portuguese.⁶⁷ Portuguese merchants returned the women to Nosy Be two years later and the king assured the kidnappers that he was not angry. Instead he told them that “they were wellcome and made them a great feast.”⁶⁸ Yet after one of the women appeared with a light-skinned child of European parentage, the king was offended and killed one of the Portuguese men. Both women were also put to death. The king died soon after, his heirs suspecting poisoning by the Portuguese and vowing revenge, although there is no evidence they were ever able to achieve this aim.⁶⁹ The English, trading rivals of the Portuguese by 1640, may have been told an exaggerated version of the story, but this incident suggests violence continued to mar relationships between Portuguese and island officials.

      Another encounter, described by one of the first Dutch to visit the region, provides further evidence of Portuguese influence. When the ruler of the Comorian island of Mwali (Mohéli), dressed like a “Turque,” boarded a visiting Dutch ship in 1601, he instantly began questioning the Dutch captain, Admiral G. Spilberg, about navigation and European maps.⁷⁰ By the time other European groups arrived in northwestern Madagascar, many of the leaders and traders could speak passable Portuguese and this ruler was no exception.⁷¹ The king on this small island, to the surprise of the captain, not only proved knowledgeable in the art of navigation, but also had recently traversed the Red Sea during a trip to Mecca. His ease in trade with the European merchants also reflected a century of engagement with Portuguese traders. As if to confirm this fact, a few days later Spilberg spotted

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