Feeding Globalization. Jane Hooper

to waiting vessels. They were not even the first to bring firearms to the island. Their presence did not eliminate other trade from the island. In spite of new fears provoked by the pirates inhabiting the shores of Madagascar, Europeans continued to acquire fresh water and food from the island. Ships stopped at the shores of Madagascar annually and some even visited known pirate haunts, even though Madagascar had become “a byword for mutiny and desertion,” according to McDonald.¹⁶ The alternatives, of sailors dying from dehydration and scurvy, were comparably more dangerous.¹⁷

      After the decline of piracy on the island’s shores, European ships came in increasing numbers, as the French sought support for their Indian Ocean establishments. This commerce—the arrival of ship after ship from the Mascarenes in search of slaves and food—would leave more of a mark on the lives of most islanders in eastern Madagascar than the comparatively brief pirate-led slave trade. The records created by this growing trade, unconnected to the history of piracy in eastern Madagascar, reveal the limited impact of the Euro-American interlopers on the island. Suddenly, by 1730, trade with the French for the Mascarenes was conducted through a new port, Foulpointe. As on the west coast, the king of Foulpointe sought to monopolize the import of firearms and silver coins into the east coast of the island, although with more limited success than his Sakalava counterparts. By the close of the eighteenth century, this king identified himself to French merchants as Betsimisaraka.¹⁸ In these political innovations, the islanders were more influenced by new political patterns within Madagascar than the presence of pirates on their shores.

      THE PIRATE ISLAND

      The first Anglo-American pirates who sailed into the Indian Ocean during the 1680s visited Madagascar for provisions. Shortly after this first visit, other pirates decided to settle on Nosy Boraha, an island off the east coast of Madagascar.¹⁹ When these foreigners began arriving at Nosy Boraha, they confronted communities in the midst of upheaval, perhaps provoked by the presence of Dutch and French merchants in the region. Communities on the east coast of Madagascar were struggling to control and benefit from commerce with Europeans, but they likely found this task impossible without dominating the trade routes that stretched far into the interior. By 1655, the French found that frequent warfare between populations on Nosy Boraha and Antongil Bay was contributing to a strong demand for guns by populations living near the bay.²⁰ A decade later, the people near the bay were still fighting with those to the interior.²¹ Constant conflict took a toll on local communities in eastern Madagascar. This region, known for its rice production in 1671, was lacking in both cattle and rice only a few decades later following periods of frequent warfare, or so French observations suggest.²²

      It was into this unsettled world that the pirates arrived and began to cultivate alliances with local leaders who sought to gain access to these new trading opportunities. From their base in eastern Madagascar, the pirates raided both European and Muslim shipping throughout the northern Indian Ocean before returning to the island to regroup.²³ By 1697, forty-five of these pirates may have lived on Nosy Boraha, although the EIC could not confirm the exact number.²⁴ Despite linguistic and cultural ties to the European North Atlantic, these itinerants had diverse origins, including England, France, Jamaica, and North America. Many of them were later described as “negro’” or “nègre” by Europeans. The pirate community on Madagascar eventually included retired pirates, ambitious traders, and runaway sailors, all male.²⁵