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Goa during the First Century of Portuguese Rule*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2010

M. N. Pearson
M. N. Pearson
Affiliation:
Univeirsity of New South Wales.
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Extract

“Goa has never been other than fundamentally Indian …” J.M. Richards, 1982.

“The posteritie of the Portingales, both men and women being in the third degree, doe seeme to be naturall Indians, both in colour and fashion.” J.H. van Linschoten, c. 1590.

“Rich on trade and loot, Goa in the halcyon days of the sixteenth century was a handsome city of great houses and fine churches… In the eyes of stern moralists the city was another Babylon, but to men of the world it was a paradise where, with beautiful Eurasian girls readily available, life was a ceaseless round of amorous assignments and sexual delights”. G.V. Scammell, 1981.

Type
Articles
Information
Itinerario , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , March 1984 , pp. 36 - 57
Copyright
Copyright © Research Institute for History, Leiden University 1984

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References

NOTES

1. Richards, J.M., Goa (Delhi, 1982), p. 131.Google Scholar

2. van Linschoten, J.H., The Voyage of J.H. van Linschoten to the East Indies, 2 vols (London, 1885), I, 184.Google Scholar

3. Scammell, G.V., The World Encompassed (London, 1981), p. 243.Google Scholar

4. Sanceau, Elaine, Knight of the Renaissance: D. Joao de Castro (London, 1949), p. 59.Google Scholar

5. See, for example, Boxer, C.R., The Portuguese Seaborne Empire (London, 1969),Google Scholar and my Merchants and Rulers in Gujarat (Berkeley, 1976),Google Scholar and Coastal, Western India (New Delhi, 1981)Google Scholar.

6. Ashin Das Gupta and M.N. Pearson (eds), India and the Indian Ocean, 1500-1800. Forthcoming.

7. See Figueiredo, João Manuel Pacheco de, 'Goa Pre-Portuguesa', Studia 12, 13–14 (1963, 1964)Google Scholar; Pissurlencar, P.S.S., Goa Pré-Portuguesa através dos Escritores Lusitános dos séculos XVI e XVII (Bastora, 1962)Google Scholar.

8. Shastry, B.S., Studies in Indo-Portuguese History (Bangalore, 1981), p. 123.Google ScholarD'Souza, B.G. says from one-sixth to one-quarter: Goan Society in Transition (Bombay, 1975), pp. 25–26.Google Scholar See also Souza, T.R. de, Medieval Goa (New Delhi, 1979), p. 78Google Scholar; Baden-Powell, B.H., “The Villages of Goa in the Early Sixteenth Century", Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1900, pp. 275–7, 285Google Scholar; a letter from Albuquerque to the King, quoted in Pereira, A.B. de Bragança, Historia Administrativa da India Portuguesa (Bastora, n.d.), P. 127Google Scholar.

9. Souza, T.R. de, Medieval Goa, p. 112Google Scholar; cf. Linschoten, I, 179.

10. Boxer, C.R., Portuguese Society in the Tropics (Madison, 1965), pp. 28–29.Google Scholar

11. Schurhammer, Georg, Francis Xavier, His Life, His Times, vol. II. India, 1541-1545 (Rome, 1977), pp. 180–1.Google Scholar

12. Souza, T.R. de, Medieval Goa, p. 115Google Scholar; Scammell, p. 242.

13. Souza, T.R. de, “Glimpses of Hindu Dominance of Goan Economy in the 17th Century", Indica XII (1975), pp. 29–30.Google Scholar

14. Naqui, H.K., Urban Centres and Industries in Upper India 1556-1803 (New York, 1968), pp. 81–82;Google ScholarLai, K.S., Growth of the Muslim Population on Medieval India (A. D. 1000-1800) (Delhi, 1973), pp. 61–62, 218–20;Google ScholarIrfan Habib in Cambridge Economic History of India (Cambridge, 1982), pp. 170–1Google Scholar.

15. For scenes and views of the city, see the Dutch edition of. Linschoten, 3 vols (s'Gravenhage, 1955-1957),Google Scholar and Schurhammer, p. 147 for a city plan, and pp. 148-281 for an extended description of the city in the 1540s.

16. Schurhammer, p. 228.

17. Tombo, Arquívo nacional da Torre do, Lisbon, ('ANTT'). “Colecçao de São Vicente", III, f.513.Google Scholar It should be noted that this phrase was something of a formula. Portuguese Kings justified most activities as being "muito a servigo de Deus e ao meu e aproveitamento da minha terra".

18. Couto, Diogo do, Da Asia, 15 vols (Lisbon, 1778-1788), VII, ix, 17.Google Scholar

19. Souza, De, Medieval Goa, p. 115Google Scholar; Boxer, , Seaborne Empire, p. 79Google Scholar.

20. See de Souza, “Hindu Dominance", Passim; this seems to show Boxer's 50.000 to be too low, and also points to massive conversions in the seventeenth century.

21. Linschoten, I, 229-30.

22. Carletti, Francisco, My Voyage around the World (London, 1964), p. 204.Google Scholar

23. Linschoten, I, 181-2.

24. Souza, De, Medieval Goa, pp. 93–94;Google ScholarMelo, Carlos Mercês de, The Recruitment and Formation of the Native Clergy in India (16th-19th Century): An Historico-Canonical Study (Lisbon, 1955), p. 86Google Scholar.

25. Mercês de Melo, pp. 21-22.

26. Ibid., pp. 22-23. 26; D'Costa, Anthony. The Cristianization of the Goa Islands (Bombay, 1965), pp. 173–4Google Scholar.

27. Schurhammer, pp. 470-1; D'Costa, pp. 49, 97-99, 100, and see generally Heras, H., The Conversion Policy of the Jesuits in India (Bombay, 1933)Google Scholar.

28. Schurhammer, p. 213.

29. See D'Costa, pp. 182-7; Boxer, C.R., Race Relations in the Portuguese Colonial Empire, 1415-1825 (Oxford, 1963), p. 124Google Scholar; Harrison, J.B., “The Portuguese", in Basham, A.L., ed., A Cultural History of India (Oxford, 1975), pp. 346–7Google Scholar.

30. Rivara, J.H. da Cunha, ed., Archivo Portugues Oriental, 6 vols (Nova Goa, 1857-1877), III, 412–3. IV, 23, 52.Google Scholar

31. Historical Archives of Goa ("HAG"), “Livro Verde", I, ff. 71-73r; “Provisoes a favor da Cristandade", ff. 75r-76, 99r-100.

32. Pissurlencar, pp. 42-43; see generally Anand, Mulk Raj et al., Golden Goa (Bombay, 1980), for Indo-Portuguese interaction in architecture and decorationGoogle Scholar.

33. Richards, , Goa, p. 27Google Scholar; B.G. D'Souza, pp. 150, 242-55; Boxer, , Race Relations, pp. 75–76;Google ScholarRibeiro, Orlando, “Originalidade de Goa", III Coloquio Internacional de Estudos Luso-Brasileiros, Actas, I (Lisbon, 1957), pp. 175–7Google Scholar.

34. Ribeiro, p. 177.

35. Hunter, W.W., A History of British India, vol. I (London, 1899), p. 157.Google Scholar

36. Pissurlencar, pp. 42-43.

37. Linschoten, I, 207-8, 212-3; Laval, Francois Pyrard de, The Voyage of Francois Pyrard de Laval, 2 vols (London, 1887-1890), II, passimGoogle Scholar.

38. ANTT, “Corpo Chronologico", 1–108.Google Scholar

39. Sanceau, , Knight of the Renaissance-, see also Merchants and Rulers in Gujarat, pp. 95–96.Google Scholar

40. Boxer, C.R., The Church Militant and Iberian Expansion, 1440-1770 (Baltimore, 1978), pp. 41, 45.Google Scholar

41. Richards, p. 18; I have been unable to verify this yet.

42. This claim is spelt out in more detail in my Merchants and Rulers in Gujarat, especially chapters 5 and 6, and in my “Pre-Modern Muslim Political Systems,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, CII (1982). If one were to extend this argument to later times, one could say that major change occurred in Goa (as a result of a change in the aspirations and nature of the-ruling group) only under Pombal, or perhaps even not until the Indian conquest of 1961.

43. For Timmayya see B.S. Shastry, pp. 92-127; Scammell, G.V., “Indigenous Assistance in the Establishment of Portuguese Power in the Indian Ocean", Correia-Alfonso, John, ed., Indo-Portuguese History: Sources and Problems (Bombay, 1981), p. 172Google Scholar.

44. See Disney, A.R., “The Portuguese Empire in India, c. 1550-1650", in , Correia-Alfonso, ed., p. 156Google Scholar.

45. Couto, X, i. 4.

46. Barros, João de, Asia. 4 vols (Lisbon, 1945-1946), II, p. 2,Google ScholarThe Commentaries of the Great Alfonso Dalbuquerque, 4 vols (London, 1875-1884), II, 95,Google Scholar claims a revenue of only 200,000 pardaos. The sources on which the following paragraphs are based use several different monetary units. To facilitate comparisons I needed a common unit; finally I decided on standard Mughal rupees, and their division into lakhs (100,000) and crores (10,000,000). I used the following conversion ratios: one rupee = 200 reis; one xerafim = 300 reis; one pardao d'ouro = 360 reis; one pardao em tangas = 300 reis; one cruzado = 400 reis. My readers will be as aware as I am of how arbitrary at times this is.

47. ANTT, “Cartas de Vice Reis", no. 134; see also another, largely illegible, list in ANTT, “Corpo Chronologico", 3-10-75.

48. As Gavetas da Torre do Tombo, 10 vols (Lisbon, 1960-1974), V, 244–248.Google Scholar

49. Ibid., Ill, 213. The scribe noted resignedly at the end of this account “This is what Goa raised last year, leaving aside what the officials stole".

50. Arquívo Historico Ultramarino, Lisbon ("AHU"), Codice 500, passim.

51. Paes, F., “Goa,” O Oriente Português, no. 66, p. 97.Google Scholar

52. Falcão, Luis de Figueiredo, Livro em que se contém toda a Fazenda e real patrimónío dos Reinos de Portugal, India e Ilhas adjacentes (Lisbon, 1859), pp. 75–78.Google Scholar

53. Pearson, , Merchants and Rulers, pp. 97, 109.Google Scholar

54. AHU, Codice 500, passim.

55. Figueiredo Falcão, loc cit.

56. This apparent increase was no doubty largely vitiated by the price rise of the sixteenth century, felt in coastal India as much as in Europe. See Godinho, V.M., Ensaios, II (Lisbon, 1968), pp. 157–74Google Scholar.

57. See Souza, de, Medieval Goa, pp. 64–65;Google Scholar D'Costa, pp. 20- 25; Baden-Powell, pp. 261-91.

58. HAG, 'Livro Verde', I, f. 225; cf. prices paid by the Convent of Santa Monica for three villages in Bassein in ANTT, Documentos Remetidos da India, XVI, ff. 164-5.

59. Harrison in Basham, p. 341.

60. Scammell, , World Encompassed, p. 265Google Scholar; see also Boxer, C.R., “Asian Potentates and European Artillery in the 16th-18th Centuries", Journal of the Malay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, XXXVIII (1965)Google Scholar.

61. Barros, II, v, 2.

62. AHU, Codice 500, passim, and almost exactly the same figures for 1600 in Figueiredo Falcão, pp. 75-78, and for the mid 1620s in AHU, Codice 219.

63. Paes, p. 97; AHU, Codice 500, passim.

64. On this see Coastal Western India, chapters 4 and 5.

65. For another article stressing mutual influence and synthesis, see Dias, Mariano Jose, “The Hindu-Christian So- ciety of Goa", Indica, XVII (1980), pp. 109–16Google Scholar.

66. See Hodgson, Marshall, The Venture of Islam (Chicago, 1974, 3 vols)CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Wallerstein, Immanuel, The Modern World-System: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century (New York, 1974)Google Scholar.