Seychelles
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Welcome to Seychelles, AfricaGenWeb Project
Seychelles, AfricaGenWeb Project is an on-line data repository for queries, family histories, and source records as well as being resource center to identify other on-line databases and resources to assist researchers in Seychelles.
8/18/2007 - new website created.
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Seychelles History
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Seychelles, officially the Republic of Seychelles, is an archipelago nation of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean, some 1,500 km east of mainland Africa, northeast of the island of Madagascar. Seychelles has the smallest population of any sovereign state of Africa. While Austronesian seafarers or Arab traders may have been the first to visit the uninhabited Seychelles, the first recorded sighting of them took place in 1502, by the Portuguese Admiral Vasco da Gama, who passed through the Amirantes and named them after himself (islands of the Admiral). The first recorded landing and first written account was by the crew of the English East Indiaman Ascension in 1609. As a transit point for trading between Africa and Asia, they were occasionally used by pirates until the French began to take control of the islands starting in 1756 when a Stone of Possession was laid by Captain Nicholas Morphey. The islands were named after Jean Moreau de Séchelles, Louis XV's Minister of Finance.
The British contested control over the islands with the French between 1794 and 1812. Jean Baptiste Queau de Quincy, French administrator of Seychelles during the years of war with England, realised it was pointless to resist whenever a heavily armed enemy war ship arrived. However, he successfully negotiated the status of capitulation to Britain, which gave the settlers a privileged position of neutrality. In all, he capitulated seven times, guiding the colony successfully through difficult times.
Britain eventually assumed full control upon the surrender of Mauritius in 1812 and this was formalised in 1814 at the Treaty of Paris. The Seychelles became a crown colony separate from Mauritius in 1903 and independence was granted in 1976, as a republic within the Commonwealth.
Sources: Wikipedia and CIA World Factbook
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