“Hale!” “Halele!”
Centuries ago, a king reigned over Mayotte. That year, the sea was empty: the fishermen came home empty-handed and the people were hungry. The king consulted the soothsayers, who told him that the god of the sea demanded an offering. In despair, the king decided to give him what he held most dear: his own daughter.
The queen refused this sacrifice. To save her daughter, she tried to kill the king. She failed, but wounded him so badly that he lost his sight.
The king, blind and stubborn, did not give up. When the day came, he was led with the princess up to the heights of Petite-Terre. Believing he stood at the edge of the ocean, he threw her into the void. But it was not the sea: it was the crater and its dark waters.
As the princess disappeared, a swarm of frogs burst out of the water, swirled through the air, then plunged back in. Since that day, the lake has had its strange colour. It is also said that a djinn lives in its depths: when the surface bubbles, he is angry.
It is also said that at the bottom of the lake lies the gate of the djinns. At night, spirits come out of it to prowl around the crater and torment those who come near. So it is better to admire Dziani by day.
What we know about it
Dziani Dzaha is a crater lake on Petite-Terre, considered sacred. Its very salty, alkaline waters are home mainly to micro-organisms, which give it its green colour; bubbles of volcanic gas sometimes rise to the surface. Scientists study it as a “natural laboratory” of the Earth's earliest ecosystems.
The legend, for its part, explains the colour and bubbling of the lake and is a reminder that it is not to be approached lightly. Read: Petite-Terre and Lake Dziani.
Further reading
- Voices of the archipelago Noël J. Gueunier, avec le conteur Madjidhoubi Saïd, Contes comoriens en dialecte malgache de l'île de Mayotte (4 volumes), 1990 – 2011. Peeters, then Karthala.
- Outside view Claude Allibert, Mayotte, plaque tournante et microcosme de l'océan Indien occidental : son histoire avant 1841, 1984. Anthropos.