Historic Site
5/5
Iconi Cliffs & Sultan's Palace
The dramatic Iconi Cliffs and adjacent royal palace ruins in Iconi, Grande Comore, mark one of the most tragic historical sites in the Indian Ocean. In the early 19th century, dozens of local women threw themselves from the sheer basalt cliffs into the surging ocean to escape capture by Malagasy Sakalava slave raiders. Today, the ruined palace of the Bambao sultans and the sheer sea cliffs are renowned for eerie phantom cries, ghostly female apparitions, and a heavy aura of historical sorrow.