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English Summary

Elements of an Afro-Austronesian Cultural Syncretism by Jörg Berchem

The aim of the foregoing study is to investigate the origins of, and the reasons for, the widespread assumption of early Afro-Austronesian contacts, that is, contacts between Africa and Southeast Asia. Existing theories are reviewed, and the available evidence for such relationships is examined.

To this end, the author begins by analysing historical records for evidence of Afro-Austronesian contacts. He then re-examines factors such as ‘race’, culture, and language, which have often been cited in the past as grounds for assuming contact between these regions. Although some historical records refer quite clearly to Afro-Austronesian contacts, and others at least suggest their existence, the commonly chosen criteria of ‘race’, culture, and language, together with the often superficial analyses based upon them, are not suitable for reconstructing historical events.

Although such analyses are largely based on misinterpretations and are often the product of racial prejudice, they have nonetheless continued to serve as the basis for far-reaching theories that have shaped perceptions of African history.

After rejecting these erroneous theories and examining the natural circumstances that favoured Afro-Austronesian contacts, the study turns to a summary of the history of the western Indian Ocean.

It becomes clear that contacts between African and Indonesian cultures did indeed exist and that East Africa and Madagascar participated in long-distance trade in the Indian Ocean from very early times.

The linguistic comparison is preceded by a presentation of the methodology. In light of the conclusions reached in the historical chapter, the comparison focuses on the Bantu languages Swahili, Comorian, and Makua on the one hand, and various dialects of Malagasy on the other. These are briefly described. Although other Austronesian and African languages were also included in the comparative material, no direct participation in Afro-Austronesian contacts could be demonstrated for them. The summary of the geographical and social situation of these languages shows that Malagasy and African languages overlap, or once overlapped, in the region of the Mozambique Channel.

The linguistic comparison itself reveals parallel developments in phonology and relationships in morphology and lexicon between certain African Bantu languages and the Austronesian language Malagasy. The results of the linguistic analysis both corroborate the historical conclusions outlined earlier and allow them to be described in greater detail.

Although direct relations between Southeast Asia and the African coast still cannot be proven, Afro-Austronesian relations certainly existed on Madagascar and between Madagascar’s Austronesian cultural sphere and parts of Africa, at least since the settlement of Madagascar by Austronesians and Africans.

On Madagascar, Africans and Austronesians initially lived in separate societies with their own languages. Only after approximately one thousand years did Malagasy begin to be accepted as the common language. However, this long period of shared settlement on the great island was certainly not characterised solely by ‘living side by side’, ‘ignoring each other’, or ‘fighting each other’. Cultural values, material assets, and their names were exchanged. The shared terminology for domestic animals spread throughout the island and indicates that cattle breeding and livestock rearing were introduced to Madagascar by Bantu speakers, where they became a dominant cultural feature among most of its inhabitants.

For their part, Bantu speakers adopted Austronesian agricultural innovations, such as rice and banana cultivation. These reached the African mainland through long-standing relations with Kilwa and other city states of the East African coast, which occasionally imported rice from Madagascar.

Clearly, far fewer Austronesian cultural elements and terms reached the African continent than has often been assumed. African influence on Malagasy was far more extensive.

The Comoro archipelago once served as an important link between the African coast and Madagascar. The profits of the trade passing through it were considerable, as shown by the large number of sultanates that later emerged there. These sultanates followed earlier cultures of another population that appears to have originated in Africa. Eventually, the islands and their sultanates also came under the influence of people from Madagascar. As a natural link between Madagascar and Africa, the Comoros connected Madagascar directly with Zanzibar and the region of the north-eastern Bantu, the only part of the African mainland where Austronesian linguistic influence can be demonstrated. Different languages must have been spoken simultaneously along the trading route from Madagascar via the Comoro Islands to the coast. Only in this way can the similarities in the development of the phonological systems of the participating languages be explained.

Until very recently, Swahili was used as a lingua franca in the north and along the western coast of Madagascar. The influence of Swahili and Comorian, languages used primarily by traders, on Malagasy, whose language and culture had already emerged from African and Austronesian elements, was much stronger than any influence the farming Malagasy could exert in the opposite direction.

It is therefore striking that, alongside words from general cultural and even basic vocabulary, predominantly agricultural terms entered Malagasy from Comorian and Swahili. As Swahili became increasingly important as the language of trade, some Swahili terms were even adopted by Malagasy dialects not spoken on the western coast at all. Because of its isolated distribution, the Malagasy dialect of Maore (Mayotte), which itself provides direct evidence for the presence of Malagasy at least in the Comoro Islands, was especially strongly influenced.

European support helped Malagasy speakers become more influential and gain power over African-speaking communities on Madagascar. As a result, Malagasy displaced African languages, a process that can still be observed in some parts of Madagascar today. Swahili alone was able to maintain itself while the Sultanate of Zanzibar and its long-distance trade flourished, and even the Europeans benefited from Swahili trading and navigational expertise. Owing to changing political circumstances, trade relations with the African continent eventually broke down, and for reasons of integration the last remnants of Swahili-speaking culture are now disappearing in favour of Malagasy, that syncretic culture in which African and Austronesian elements became interwoven.