Descended from the original French and British settlers and their African slaves, the Seychellois mixture has also been enriched by traders from India and China as well as Arabs all intermingling to produce a multi-faceted and paralleled community. Creole is the common language of the islands, but most Seychellois will speak at least three languages fluently: Creole, English and French. Its origins lie in a slave adaptation of French.

But since independence, Creole has been recognized as a language and an institute called 'Lenstiti Creole' has been founded to promote it. Anyone who can speak a little French will be able to understand Creole, which is much simpler to learn, as there is no gender and the verb endings remain constant. Sometimes, to emphasize a word, it is said twice - so for 'very slowly', the Creole version is "dousman dousman". The key to understanding the written version is to read it aloud. Although the basis of Creole is French, there are some English words used: "Ayskrim" for instance (say it out aloud and you will realize this means ice cream).

The main church is predominantly Christian. Roman Catholic covers 88.6 % of the population, the Church of England covers a further 7 %. Others, such as the Seventh Day Adventists, Pentecostal, Jehovah's Witness, Bahai Faith, Muslims and Hindus, cover between them 3.4 %, 1 % have no religion.

The old corsair stood on the scaffold, the noose around his neck. With a final flourish he produced a small scrap of parchment from his cloak and flung it to the crowd below. "My treasure," he bellowed, "to he who can understand."

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Summary|Culture|History
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