History of Comoros - Early Inhabitants

Early Inhabitants

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 earliest evidence of settlement of the islands dates from the eighth century. Traces of this original culture have blended with successive waves of African, Arab, Malagasy and Shirazi immigrants.

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.

Over the centuries, the Comoro Islands were settled by a succession of diverse groups from the coast of Africa, the Persian Gulf, Indonesia, and Madagascar. Portuguese explorers first visited the archipelago in 1505.

Apart from a visit by the French Parmentier brothers in 1529, for much of the 16th century the only Europeans to visit the islands were Portuguese; British and Dutch ships began arriving around the start of the 20th century and the island of Ndzwani became a major supply point on the route to the East. Ndzwani was generally ruled by a single sultan, who occasionally attempted to extend his authority to Mayotte and Mwali; Ngazidja was more fragmented, on occasion being divided into as may as 12 small kingdoms.

Both the British and the French turned their attention to the Comoros islands in the middle of the 19th century. The French finally acquired the islands through a cunning mixture of strategies, including the policy of 'divide and conquer', chequebook politics and a serendipitous affair between a sultana and a French trader that was put to good use by the French, who kept control of the islands, quelling unrest and the occasional uprising.

For the history of the native sultanates on several of the major islands, see Sultans on the Comoros.

William Sunley, a planter and British Consul from 1848 - 1866, was an influence on Anjouan.