1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Flacourt, Étienne de

FLACOURT, ÉTIENNE DE (1607–1660), French governor of Madagascar, was born at Orleans in 1607. He was named governor of Madagascar by the French East India Company in 1648. Flacourt restored order among the French soldiers, who had mutinied, but in his dealings with the natives he was less successful, and their intrigues and attacks kept him in continual harassment during all his term of office. In 1655 he returned to France. Not long after he was appointed director general of the company; but having again returned to Madagascar, he was drowned on his voyage home on the 10th of June 1660. He is the author of a Histoire de la grande isle Madagascar (1st edition 1658, 2nd edition 1661).

See A. Malotet, Ét. de Flacourt, ou les origines de la colonisation française à Madagascar (1648–1661), (Paris, 1898).