Who was the first European to discover Madagascar?
History of Madagascar
Finally, a cutmarked pygmy hippo bone from Ambolisatra has been dated and calibrated to between 60 BCE and 130 CE (2 SDs), but it is from a coastal swamp without indications of settlement in a heavily karstic region. Moreover, a similar bone from the same collection from a nearby site gave two widely divergent dates of 2020 and 3495 BP (MacPhee & Burney 1991). Transient visits to Madagascar that did not result in enduring settlement cannot be ruled out, and may have left some traces.[9]