French Colonial Policy in seventeenth century Madagascar: François Martin's Account - article ; n°1 ; vol.17, pg 81-97

Aniruddha Ray

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Archipel - Année 1979 - Volume 17 - Numéro 1 - Pages 81-97
III. Aniruddha Ray memaparkan konteks sejarah tentang François Martin waktu berada di Madagaskar dari tahun 1665 sampai 1668; sewaktu Compagnie Française des Indes mencoba untuk menjajah pulau tersebut yang ternyata mengalami kegagalan. Mémoires dari François Martin lebih-lebih lagi menarik karena penulisnya mengemukakan kritik atas pilihan politik pada waktu itu.
17 pages
Source : Persée ; Ministère de la jeunesse, de l’éducation nationale et de la recherche, Direction de l’enseignement supérieur, Sous-direction des bibliothèques et de la documentation.

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• Publié par: ARCHIPEL0
• Publié le: 01 janvier 1979
• Nombre de lectures: 10
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

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Aniruddha Ray
French Colonial Policy in seventeenth century Madagascar:
François Martin's Account
In: Archipel. Volume 17, 1979. pp. 81-97.
ringkasan
III. Aniruddha Ray memaparkan konteks sejarah tentang François Martin waktu berada di Madagaskar dari tahun 1665 sampai
1668; sewaktu Compagnie Française des Indes mencoba untuk menjajah pulau tersebut yang ternyata mengalami kegagalan.
Mémoires dari François Martin lebih-lebih lagi menarik karena penulisnya mengemukakan kritik atas pilihan politik pada waktu
itu.
Citer ce document / Cite this document :
Ray Aniruddha. French Colonial Policy in seventeenth century Madagascar: François Martin's Account. In: Archipel. Volume 17,
1979. pp. 81-97.
doi : 10.3406/arch.1979.1460
http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/arch_0044-8613_1979_num_17_1_146081
LES FRANÇAIS DANS L'OCÉAN INDIEN
AU XVHe s.
FRENCH COLONIAL POLICY IN SEVENTEENTH CENTURY
MADAGASCAR: FRANÇOIS MAkTIN'S ACCOUNT *
by ANIRUDDHA RAY
François Martin was born in 1634 at Paris (') and joined as a
shopboy in a grocer's shop in 1650 at the death of his father. His
other brothers forced him to leave the house. Around 1661, Martin
married Mary Guperly and as a result lost his job (*). In the summer
of 1664, Martin joined the newly formed East India Company and was
♦ This paper was presented at the Indian History Congress (December 1976),
at Calicut University, Kerala.
1. P. Kaeppelin: La Compagnie des Indes Orientales et François Martin, 1908, 45-46,
See also the Introduction of the Mémoires de François Martin, Paris, 1931-34, 3 Vols
by Henry Froidevaux. Martin's is- be called Mémoires here.
2. Robert Challes : Journal d'un Voyage fait aux Indes Orientales depuis 1690, Paris.
3 Vols., III, 11-13. See also, F. Didot: Nouvelle Bibliographie Générale, Paris, 1751,
T. 34, 34-35 ; A. Fleury, "François Martin" in Annales de l'Ecole Libre des- Sciences
Politiques, 15 May 1894, 289-309 ; H. Froidevaux, "Un Explorateur Inconnu de
Madagascar au XVI le siècle, François Martin" in Bulletin de Géographie Historique
et Descriptive, 1896, 5-44; H. Sot tas, Histoire de la Compagnie Royale des Indes Orientales,
Paris, 1904; M.V. Labernadie : Le Vieux Pondichéry, 1673-1815, Pondichéry, 1936. 82
sent to Madagascar in one of its four ships in March 1665 (;»). He was
then an under-merchant with a rather high salary of 600 livres a year.
This is an account of his observations at Madagascar (4), from where
he left for Surat on October 19, 1668 (5), never to return. Other publi
shed and unpublished accounts on Madagascar located at Bibliothèque
Nationale, Paris and at National Archives, Paris have been consulted
to compare his statements and to understand the French attempts of
colonisation at Madagascar and its failure. This study is a necessary
complement to the more well-known use by scholars such as Jadunath
Sarkar and Surendranath Sen (6), of Martin's account of India.
The French merchants at Normandy had already started distant
voyages by the end of 16th century. On November 13, 1600, they
formed a society in co-operation with the merchants of Vitré and La
val^7). In June 1604, Henry IV founded a Company with 15 years
exclusive privileges. Ships were sent irregularly to Madagascar in opposition
3. Mémoires (All references here are from Vol. I), 6. The ships left Brest on
March 7, 1665. L. Pauliat gives the date as March 6 (Louis XIV et la Compagnie
des Indes Orientales de 1664, Paris 1886, 46). Souchon de Rennefort, Secretary of
the Sovereign Council of Fort Dauphin, who travelled with Martin, wrote March
7 in both of his works (Relation du premier voyage de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales
en l'isle de Madagascar ou Dauphine, Paris, 1668 and Histoire des Indes Orientales, Leiden
1688, 13). An unpublished letter of the Directors to the King in 1667 states that the
ships left Brest on March 7, 1665 (Bibliothèque Nationale, to be referred as Z?JVhere
Paris Mss, NA, Fr. 9353 : Requête ou écrit des Directeurs de la Compagnie de*
Indes Orientales au Roy, f. 30). S.P. Sen (The French in India, Calcutta, 1948 28)
gave the date as March I, following Martin who had obviously made the mistake
4. Mémoires, 12-172. Alfred Grandidier first published this part of the account
of Madagascar in Histoire de Madagascar, Paris, 1880, V.I. Portions of his
of have been published in the form of articles since then.
5. Mémoires, 146.
6. G.B. Malleson : History of the French in India, Edinburg, 1868; Surendra Nath
Sen: Foreign Biographies of Sivaji, Calcutta, 1927; Jadu Nath Sarkar : House of
Sivaji, Calcutta, 1955.
7. Charles de la Roncière, "La Politique Coloniale des Malouins", published in
Revue de la Colonie Française, 1913, 1er année, 39-72. 8S
to the Dutch (*). The accounts of Madagascar and other islands, given
by the Parmentier brothers and Pyrard de Laval (') had encouraged
Cardinal Richelieu to promote the formation of a new Society of the
Orient in 1642 with 20 years privileges (l0).
In March 1642, the French landed at Madagascar and established
a base at Fort Dauphin in the Taolanara region on the coast (").
Relation with the local inhabitants was far from friendly. Also the
successive mutinies of the catholic French settlers, sometimes in coope
ration with the local inhabitants, routed the rigorous and sometimes
inhuman rule of the Protestant Governor Pronis. In 1648, Flacourt took
over as Governor but pursued the same policy of his predecessor, in a
milder form, though neither the French government nor the Company
8. For the interesting world tour of Pierre de Malherbe de Vitré in 1609, who
met Akbar and Shah Abbas of Peisia, see an article by Charles de la Roncière,
"Un Manuscrit à retrouver, le premier voyage Français du Monde" in Revue
d'Histoire, Paris, 1907, September 7. For the account of" the Parmentier brothers,
who did not meet Dutch opposition in the 16th century, see their book Le Dis
cours de la Navigation, ed. by Ch. Shefer, Paris 1833. In 1527 and in 1529, the
Parmentier brothers landed on the western coast of Madagascar. On September 9,
1606, the Dutch had forbidden their countrymen to take service in any foreign
ship beyond the Cape of Good Hope or in the Detroit of Magellan. On Decemb
er 28, 1617, the Dutch seized the French ship St. Michel near Bantam. In 1619.
the Dutch seized another French ship, Espérance and burnt it. On February 18,
1667, the Dutch again seized the French ship St. Charles. The experience of the
pilot, Jean le Telier (Voyage faict aux Indes Orientales, Dieppe 1631) is a clear case
of continued and deliberate Dutch opposition to French voyages.
9. Payrard de Laval : The Voyage of François Pyrade de Laval, tr. into English by
A. Gray, London, 3 Vols., 1887. See also François Martin de Vitré : Description
du Voyage faict aux Indes Orientales par les en l'an 1603, Paris 1604, who
was with Laval. But it was the glowing account of François Cauche de Rouen
(Relation de Voiage, Paris 1638) which inspired Richelieu most.
10. Royal privileges were granted to this new Company, under the patronage
of Fouquet, Marshal Duc de la Meilleraye, dated June 24, 1642. But the real
inspirator was Captain Rigault of the Marines and several rich bankers of Nor
mandy. After Richelieu's death, the Regency, acting under the minority of Louis
XIV, confirmed these privileges by an edict dated September 20, 1643 for 20
Company" years (cf. John in A Harris, Complete "History Collection of the of Voyages Rise and Progress Travels, of London, the French 1745, East 2nd India éd..
2 Vols., 1764, 149-50).
11. According to Etienne de Flacourt (Relation de V isle de Madagascar, Paris, 1658,
193-197), Sr. Pronis and others landed at Mascareigne (called Bourbon and later
changed to Réunion) in March 1642. At Madagascar, they at first selected a village
at Anesy and because of its bad climate, moved to neighbouring peninsula of
Taolanara, named Fort Dauphin. Andre stated the first landing was made in
September 1642 (Madagascar, Paris, 1908, 43). Also see, L.M. Maclend Madag
ascar and Its People, London, 1865, 8-10. 84
gave him any support. In 1655, Flacourt returned to Paris to remedy
this administrative negligence. He was drowned while returning to
Madagascar on June 10, 1660. He wrote two books on Madagascar,
which formed basic information material on French policy at Madag
ascar (}2). By 1661, two parties had already been formed within
the Company regarding the policy to be pursued at Madagascar (13).
The French Government was by that time financially in a critical
situation with an empty treasury due to the Wars of the Fronde, which
had just ended. As a result, the Company was neglected. By 1656, the
Company had been reconstituted with the Duc de Meillerayc holding
the major shares (M).
He sent several ships to Madagascar, the last one arriving at Ma
dagascar in 1663. But other powers were not inactive. Between 1638
to 1658, the Dutch conquer