History of Madagascar
By the 15th century, Europeans had wrested control of the spice trade from the Muslims. They did this by bypassing the Middle East and sending their cargo-ships around the Cape of Good Hope to India. The Portuguese mariner Diogo Dias became the first European to set foot on Madagascar when his ship, bound for India, blew off course in 1500. In the ensuing two-hundred years, the English and French tried (and failed) to establish settlements on the island.
Malagasy white-eye
In 1760 the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson included a description of the Malagasy white-eye in his "Ornithologie" based on a specimen collected in Madagascar. He used the French name "Le petit figuier de Madagascar" and the Latin "Ficedula Madagascariensis minor". Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. When in 1766 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his "Systema Naturae" for the twelfth edition, he added 240 species that had been previously described by Brisson. One of these was the Malagasy white-eye. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial name "Motacilla maderaspatana" and cited Brisson's work. Although Linnaeus gave the type locality as Madagascar he confusingly used the specific name "maderaspatana" which is New Latin for Madras (now Chennai) in India. This species is now placed in the genus "Zosterops" that was introduced by the naturalists Nicholas Vigors and Thomas Horsfield in 1827.