Heritage & Culture

A 42 hectare Roman town on the edge of the empire, inscribed in 1997, that was an Amazigh capital first and an Idrisid one last.

Rice at every meal, an accompaniment beside it, and a chili paste on the side. What to eat in Madagascar and what the menu is telling you.

Ancestors are present, fady are local and binding, and a good speech is an art form. How Malagasy society works, and how to be a guest in it.

Madagascar was settled from Borneo and from East Africa, and Malagasy people were later enslaved and shipped across the same ocean. A double history.

The rainforest most visitors to Madagascar actually see, three hours from the capital, and not one of the six components of the Atsinanana inscription.

The upper town of Antananarivo, its royal palace and its nineteenth century streets, on the Tentative List since 2016 and not inscribed.

Six rainforest parks along the eastern escarpment, inscribed in 2007, on the Danger List for fifteen years and removed from it in 2025.

Limestone needles, canyons and dry forest across western Madagascar, in a serial property that was renamed and greatly extended after inscription.

A royal city, a burial ground and a set of sacred places on a hill north of Antananarivo, still visited by pilgrims after five hundred years.

One of the oldest botanical gardens in the southern hemisphere, and the clearest surviving record of the plant economy that indenture was imported to serve.

Four cuisines arrived on one small island and did not stay separate. What to eat in Mauritius, from street samoussas to a Sunday biryani.

Two forced migrations built Mauritius and the island remembers them separately. Slavery, indenture, and where a returning descendant can begin.