Africa’s only Hindu-majority country sits east of Madagascar
Mauritius, an Indian Ocean republic roughly 2,000 kilometres off southeastern Africa east of Madagascar, includes the main island plus Rodrigues, Agaléga, and St. Brandon. It is Africa’s only country where Hinduism is the majority faith, with Indo-Mauritians forming the population bulk beside Creole, Sino-Mauritian and Franco-Mauritian communities, and it was the dodo’s only home.
The republic covers 2,040 square kilometres of land but claims an economic zone of about two million square kilometres of sea. Port Louis, on the main island, is the capital, and Mauritius and Rodrigues belong with Réunion to the Mascarene group. Government follows the Westminster model, the Economist ranks it Africa’s sole full democracy, and the state pays for health care and university tuition. It sits 73rd on the Human Development Index and is often judged the continent’s most peaceful nation.
A Portuguese map smuggled to the Duke of Ferrara by Alberto Cantino in 1502 marks it as Dina Arobi, hinting that Arab sailors found the empty island around 975. Portuguese crews came in 1507 and labelled it Cirne, a slip for Cisne, swan, likely after Diogo Fernandes Pereira’s ship. Admiral Wybrand van Warwyck’s Dutch squadron came ashore at Grand Port in 1598 and named it for Prince Maurice of Nassau. Dutch settlers from 1638 cut ebony, brought sugar cane and deer, and enslaved Malagasy workers, and Abel Tasman sailed from here; they gave up in 1710.
France took charge in 1715 as Isle de France. Governor Mahé de La Bourdonnais, arriving in 1735, turned Port Louis into a naval yard and built a sugar economy. Enslaved people from Mozambique and Zanzibar pushed numbers from 15,000 to 49,000 in thirty years, and around 80,000 captives reached Mauritius and Réunion between 1769 and 1793. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, resident from 1768 to 1771, set Paul et Virginie here.
Britain seized the island on 3 December 1810 and restored the Dutch name. In 1965 London detached the Chagos Archipelago, expelled its people and leased Diego Garcia to the United States; after an International Court of Justice ruling, a May 2025 agreement recognised Mauritian sovereignty. The dodo vanished soon after settlers arrived, but the pink pigeon and Mauritius kestrel survive through conservation.
Source: Mauritius
