February 11, 2013

"The history of Comoros goes back some 1,500 years."

"According to myth, the Comoros islands were first visited by Phoenician sailors. The earliest inhabitants of the islands were probably Arabs and Africans, the latter probably Bantu-speaking... The most notable of these early immigrants were the Shirazi Arab royal clans, who arrived in Comoros in the 15th and 16th centuries and stayed to build mosques, create a royal house and introduce architecture and carpentry."

Comoros — it's some little islands near Madagascar — is today's "History of" country.

9 comments:

Phil 314 said...

Made famous by the movie "Lorenzo's Oil"

Palladian said...

The Comoros produces some beautiful natural aroma materials. I use several Comoran essential oils and absolutes in my perfumery work.

Anonymous said...

I always have a hard time telling apart the Comoros, Seychelles, and the Maldives. Generally speaking, the Seychelles is the best of the bunch, the Maldives are in the middle, and the Comoros are the worst.

No snow, of course.

Peter

edutcher said...

But everyone's full-flavored, we assume.

From its position, looks like a natural hangout for pirates.

David said...

Shorter version of linked article: French Colony.

Æthelflæd said...

Surely the Comoros are mentioned in O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin series. It just seems like a given that Stephen must have gone collecting bugs and Aubrey hooking up with native girls.

Æthelflæd said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
sykes.1 said...

Madagascar was first settled by Malayasians, so it it likely the Comoros were, too. The Africans were brought over as slaves by the Arabs and French.

Mitch H. said...

Speaking of the non-transitive value of political titles across cultures and regions, the "sultans" of the Indian Ocean are laughably incommensurate with the original concept of the Turkish sultanate. Originally it was a title similar to that of the Japanese shogun, a universal, secular ruler who answered to no-one, and yet not claiming the title of caliph. Once you get to backwaters like the Comoros - which had a political menagerie of almost two dozen "sultans" scattered across the various islands - the title essentially becomes meaningless, meaning something like "sovereign prince", and each one having no more power than a 17th century Highlander clan chieftain.

I like the flag of Comoros, it's creepy and weird - back when I still was playing around in Nation States, I appropriated it for my Republic of R'lyeh, as the five stars and crescent has a certain Cthuloid flair.