Pastor Lauga follows poet Rainandriamampandry to the place of execution for his role in the Menalamba rebellion against French rule. Antanananrivo, Madagascar. October 15, 1896 [793×600]

The [*Menalamba* rebellion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menalamba_rebellion) started on september 1895, months after French troops took over the royal palace in Antananarivo, exiled PM Rainilaiarivony to Algiers and left Queen Ranavalona III and much of her administration without any major power.

Common peasants from the highlands rebeled as the *menalamba* (“red shawl”), so named because their shawls wers smeared with the red laterite soil; they rebelled for traditional ancestor veneration and foreign missionaries (although folk Christian native preachers also led the rebellion) and rejected corvée labour. Even though they didn’t rebel to restaure monarchy, as they felt that the queen threw the Merina kingdom to the dogs, some royal insiders helped the movement.

In order to quell the revolt, on October 15, 1896, General Joseph Gallieni executed the queen’s uncle Ratsimamanga and her Minister of War, Rainandriamampandry; the year after, Ramisindrazana, the queen’s aunt, was exiled to Réunion.

Some rebels, particulary Protestant ones, believed that the British would support them, to not avail, and the 1897 hunger forced some revels to surrenced, although isolated remnants still fought until 1903.