Antanosy

The Antanosy, whose name means people of the island, are a Malagasy people of Anosy in south-eastern Madagascar, around Fort Dauphin harbour. Ironworking reached them in the thirteenth century with Indian Ocean trade, and Chinese celadon circulated until the fifteenth, when the Efaho valley was divided among fortified chiefdoms.

Tradition brings the Zafiraminia clan to Anosy in the fourteenth century; by the mid-seventeenth century they ruled from Fanjahira. In 1613 a Portuguese landing met King Andriantsiambany and five hundred warriors, and French governors at Fort Dauphin burned villages and enslaved thousands before a rising in 1674 forced the garrison out.

The Antanosy then traded under their own chiefs until the nineteenth century. In 1817 Jean Rene, governor of Toamasina and son of a French settler and an Antanosy mother, swore a blood oath with Radama I of Imerina; in 1825 a Merina army under Ramananolona took Fort Dauphin, ending Antanosy independence.