The Sainte-Marie island, located in the north-east of Madagascar, stretches over about 50 kilometers. Between the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea, the island abounds in assets to shelter sailors in search of food and peace: a vast coastline with many creeks, a luxuriant vegetation, fresh water and a warm and welcoming community. The most famous bay of Ambodifotatra treasures memories of a mythical period when Sainte-Marie was a hideout for pirates. The Island of Forbans, dominated by the pirates' cemetery and protected by an isle named “Ilot de Madam”, is located in the heart of the island.

Pirates’ history: an orally passed on treasure that grows richer with each generation, for three centuries now.

It is believed that in the middle of the 17th century, more than a thousand privateers, freebooters and traffickers of all kinds once reigned over this small piece of land.

The story goes that English, French and American pirates hid some of their treasures there. Thomas White, an Englishman, is said to be the grandfather of the famous Malagasy princess Betty, who gave the island to France in 1750. It is also believed that Caribbean pirates, chased away by the English monarchy at the beginning of the 18th century, took refuge in the welcoming waters of Sainte-Marie. The question is, how much is left of the great piracy era?

Hardly anything: the leftovers of history are mostly the work of the Indian Company, a prosperous trading company that dominated the island in the 18th century: a landing stage, a strong and a few graves in a devastated cemetery. This is the famous pirate cemetery, which is more the cemetery of traders than of forbidden men: we can meet merchants, governors, a few privateers, women, children and missionaries; but few pirates.

A memorial to the famous pirate William Kid, who was hanged in England in 1701, and a quaint headstone engraved with two tibias surmounted by a hilarious skull, the tomb of a certain Pierre le Chartier, who was born in Normandy and died in Sainte-Marie in March 1834, but nobody knows anything about him.

Pirates die without leaving many traces: their ships are sunk and their bodies are more often thrown into the sea than lying wisely underground. Their intense activity around Sainte-Marie has been attested by others: acts of the maritime companies that declare the disappearance of ships, judgments and a few interesting or terrifying stories. Few vestiges remain, but their presence seems much more alive in the collective memory than the merchants.

The power of the cemetery is not to provide historical clues, but to bring together in the same place of memories: the enemy brothers, pirates and merchants; and to bring them back to life through an epitaph.

Sources : Madagascar Treasure Island, lle Sainte Marie Madagascar, Office du Tourisme de Sainte-Marie