Mascareignes

The Mascareignes are three island S of the south-west of the Indian Ocean located at nearly a thousand of kilometers at broad of the east coast of Madagascar between the parallel nineteenth southern and the Tropic of Capricorn. Two State S exert to them Souveraineté on this Archipel of origin Volcan ic a long time uninhabited that the navigator Portuguese Pedro de Mascarenhas would have discovered the February 9th 1513. Thus, while the French Republic regards the Meeting as a area and a department with whole share, the Mauritius and the island Rodrigues form together, since the March 12th 1968, a République of Maurice completely independent of the the United Kingdom, although member of the the Commonwealth. This Republic controlling the small islands Agalega and the shelves of Cargados Carajos, located enough far more at north, one often attaches them to Mascareignes by practice.

Geography

In spite of the important distance which exists between the principal islands, it is habit to employ the term of Archipel to indicate Mascareignes, because of their common history and of their geological origin indissociable. All three were colonized by the same European powers as from the 17th century after being formed by same the Point hot there is that several million years: the Not hot of the Meeting, also at the origin of the Trapps of Deccan.

History

With the the Middle Ages, the islands are discovered by the Arab navigators who square the Mer of Zanj.
From a European point of view, the Archipel would have been discovered by the navigator Portuguese Pedro de Mascarenhas the February 9th 1513. Its name would then have been given to him as of 1528 in homage to this last by its fellow-member navigator Dom Diogo Rodrigues, which gave his name to the island Rodrigues.
June 25th 1638: first taking possession of the islands by the France.
June 29th 1642: second taking possession of the islands and first unloading in roads of Saint-Paul, with the Meeting.
1735 : Bertrand-François Mahé of Bourdonnais becomes the first General governor of Mascareignes.
1764 : bankruptcy of the Company of the Indies and repurchase of Mascareignes by Louis XV. This one becomes effective in 1766.

Demography

Today, the archipelago of Mascareignes is populated of more than two million inhabitants. Those are called the Mascarins .

See too

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