Date: 2025-08-21 Page is: DBtxt003.php txt00028048 | |||||||||
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MAURITIUS TIMELINE from BBC ...Some key dates in the history of Mauritius 
IMAGE Mauritius beach Original article: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-13882233 Peter Burgess COMMENTARY Peter Burgess | |||||||||
TIMELINE ...Some key dates in the history of Mauritius:
Mauritius has a reputation for stability and racial harmony
10th Century - Malay, African and Arab sailors visit island but do not settle.
1510 - Portuguese navigator Pedro Mascarenhas visits the island and names it Cirné but the Portuguese do not establish a permanent settlement.
1598 - Dutch claim the uninhabited island and rename it after their head of state, Maurice, Prince of Orange and Count of Nassau.
1664-1710 - Dutch withdraw after repeated attempts at colonisation. By this time the dodo - a unique bird found only on Mauritius - has become extinct.
1710-1810 - French take possession, establishing a sugar industry based on slave labour.
1796 - Settlers break away from French control when the government in Paris attempts to abolish slavery.
1810 - British troops land in Mauritius after defeating French forces.
1814 - Mauritius, Seychelles and Rodrigues ceded to Britain under Treaty of Paris.
1834 - British abolish slavery.
1835 - Indentured labour system introduced. In subsequent decades hundreds of thousands of workers arrive from India.
1966 - Britain agrees to the building of a key US military base on the largest island, Diego Garcia.
1968 - Mauritius becomes independence.
1968-73 - Some 2,000 residents of the Chagos archipelago are expelled.
1973 - Construction of US base is complete.
Diego Garcia, the largest of the Chagos Islands and a joint UK-US military base Image source,Getty Images | |||||||||