Portuguese Settlements in India

1. Portuguese Advent in India
2. Portuguese settlements
3. Portuguese in Calicut
4. Portuguese in Cochin
5. Portuguese Fort in Kannur
6. Portuguese in Goa
7. Portuguese in Mumbai
8. Daman and Diu
9. Portuguese in Hooghly
10. Portuguese in Coromandel Zone
11. Impact of Portuguese in Indian Culture
12. Significance of the Portuguese
13. Conclusion
14. FAQs
15. MCQs

Portuguese Settlements in India – by Hugo Refachinho

Portuguese Advent

Portuguese Advent in India

• The Renaissance movement, with its appeal to exploration, captivated Europe in the fifteenth century.
• Europe made considerable improvements in shipbuilding and navigation during this time.
• As a result, there was a tremendous yearning across Europe for adventurous naval expeditions into the unknown countries of the East.
• The Portuguese State of India, sometimes referred to as Portuguese India, was a Portuguese colonial state in India.
• The Portuguese were the first Europeans to arrive in India, and they were also the last to go.
• In 1498, Vasco De Gama became the first Portuguese to set foot in India. Portuguese rule in India, on the other hand, is said to have lasted from 1505 until 1961.
• Despite the fact that Portuguese colonisation outlasted its English rival, it had little impact outside its borders.
• Under the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494), the Rulers of Portugal and Spain divided the non-Christian world in 1497 by an imaginary line in the Atlantic, some 1,300 miles west of the Cape Verde Islands.
• According to the deal, Portugal could claim and occupy whatever east of the line, while Spain could claim and occupy everything west of it.
• As a result, the stage was prepared for Portuguese incursions into the waters of the Indian Ocean.
• On the 20th of May 1498, Vasco da Gama arrived at the port of Calicut in South-West India.
• This date, May 20, 1498, marked the beginning of a new chapter in Indian history.

Portuguese settlements in India

• Around Goa, the Portuguese had occupied sixty miles of shoreline.
• They controlled a short strip of land on the west coast from Mumbai to Daman and Diu, as well as the approaches to Gujarat, with four key ports and hundreds of cities and villages.
• They controlled a series of maritime strongholds and commercial ports in the south, including Mangalore, Cannanore, Cochin, and Calicut.
• And, while their power in Malabar was not strong, it was sufficient to exert influence or control over the local kings who controlled the spice-growing region.
• On the east coast, the Portuguese constructed military installations and towns at San Thome (near Chennai) and Nagapattinam (in Tamil Nadu).
• Hooghly in West Bengal had grown into a wealthy settlement by the end of the 16th century.

Portuguese in Calicut

Portuguese in Calicut

• Vasco da Gama was dispatched by King Dom Manuel I of Portugal and arrived at Calicut on May 17, 1498, at Kappad.
• The Portuguese began to expand their domains and govern the waters between Ormus and the Malabar Coast, as well as south to Ceylon, after discovering a maritime passage from Europe to Malabar in 1498.
• Traditional hospitality was extended to the navigator, but an interview with the Zamorin yielded no tangible results.
• In 1500, the King of Portugal dispatched the next voyage, which was led by Pedro lvares Cabral.
• In February 1502 Vasco da Gama returned to Calicut with 15 ships and 800 soldiers.
• When his request to eject all Muslims from Calicut was rebuffed, da Gama stormed the city and captured numerous rice boats, chopping off the crew’s hands, ears, and noses.
• In 1531, a Portuguese fort was built in Chaliyam as part of a peace accord between Portuguese Viceroy Nuno da Cunha and the Samutiri of Calicut.
• The Kozhikode army ultimately besieged, seized, and destroyed Fort Chaliyam in 1571.

Chaliyam Fort

Portuguese in Cochin

Portuguese in Cochin

• Kochi was the site of India’s first European colony. After being repulsed from Calicut, the Portuguese Admiral Pedro lvares Cabral arrived at Cochin in the year 1500.
• The Portuguese were welcomed as guests by the king of Kochi, a competitor, and a covenant of friendship was made.
• The admiral persuaded the monarch to allow them to construct a factory in Cochin by promising his help in the invasion of Calicut.
• The monarch, encouraged by the support, declared war on the Calicut Zamorins.
• When the admiral saw the Zamorin’s abilities, he withdrew in terror.
• The Portuguese constructed the Santa Cruz Cathedral Basilica in Kochi.
• Portugal ruled the Port of Kochi from 1503 until 1663, with the approval of the Kochi Raja. Kochi was the Portuguese’s principal foothold in India until 1510.
• Saint Francis Xavier came in 1530 and established a Christian ministry.
• Since the Inquisition was founded in Portuguese India in 1560, the subsequent Portuguese period was harsh for the Jews residing in the territory.
• Vasco da Gama, the Portuguese viceroy, was buried at Kochi’s St. Francis Church until his body was removed and re-interred in Portugal in 1539.
• The Portuguese influence in Kerala began to wane shortly after Albuquerque’s arrival.

Santa Cruz Cathedral Basilica

Portuguese Fort in Kannur

Portuguese Fort in Kannur

• Angelo’s Fort, also known as Kannur Fort, is a huge triangular laterite fort that is one of Kannur’s most historically significant landmarks.
• The fort was built in 1505 by the first Portuguese Viceroy, Don Francesco de Almeida, and is flanked by massive bastions that provide for an impressive spectacle.
• This colossal triangular laterite building is surrounded by towering bastions, creating an intimidating picture.
• It passed into the hands of the Dutch and then the British, who remodelled and re-equipped it as their principal military bastion in Malabar.
• The main attractions here are Mopilla Bay and Dharmadam Island.
• Mopilla Bay is a natural harbour, and the fort provides a beautiful view of it, as well as a sea wall that separates the turbulent sea from the interior water.

Portuguese Fort in Kannur

Portuguese in Goa

Portuguese in Goa

• In 1510, the Portuguese invaded Goa and defeated the Sultanate of Bijapur.
• The Portuguese occupation lasted around 450 years and had a significant impact on Goan culture, food, and architecture.
• After a 36-hour flight, the Indian Army invaded and captured Goa in 1961.
• Goa, Daman, and Diu merged to become the union territory of Goa, Daman, and Diu. Goa was awarded statehood in 1987.
• In Goa, Albuquerque established a Portuguese mint. Local shopkeepers and Timoji have expressed their dissatisfaction with the money shortage.
• The new coin was issued to commemorate recent triumphs. Its worth was based on the value of existing coins. In Portuguese Malacca, a new mint was established.
• During the Portuguese rule of Old Goa, the chapel of St. Catherine was erected.
• Albuquerque and his successors mostly preserved the customs and constitutions of the island’s thirty village communities, removing only the sati ritual, which saw widows burnt on their husbands’ burial pyre.
• In 1526, a registry of these traditions was produced, and it is considered one of the most important historical documents on Goan customs.
• The Cathedral, a 16th-century structure built during Portugal’s Golden Age, is the biggest cathedral in Asia as well as the largest church in Portugal.
• Portugal enhanced Goa in a variety of ways, the most evident of which is in its architecture.
• Velha Goa, the historic capital, is now a UNESCO World Heritage site with churches, chapels, and convents.

chapel of St. Catherine

Portuguese in Mumbai

Portuguese in Mumbai

• Bombay city was an archipelago of seven islands when the Portuguese Armadas arrived.
• The Portuguese in Goa and Bombay-Bassein were instrumental in the establishment and flourishing of their Latin Christian religious orders in Bombay.
• When the islands were leased to many Portuguese officers throughout their dictatorship, they gave them various names, which eventually became known as Bom Baim.
• St. Michael’s Church in Mahim, St John the Baptist Church in Andheri, St Andrew’s Church and the Basilica of Mount Bandra (Bombay) in Bandra, and Gloria Church in Byculla were all erected by Portuguese Franciscans and Jesuits.
• The Portuguese also erected defences such as the Bombay Castle, Castella de Aguada (Castelo da Aguada or Bandra Fort), and Madh Fort surrounding the city.
• The viceroy in Goa disobeyed the Portuguese crown and delayed a complete handover of the seven islands.
• So even after the treaty, some villages in the seven islands of Bombay remained under the control of Velha Goa, and it was only after the Battle of Bassein in 1739 that the islands were fully acquired by the English East India Company.

Castella de Aguada

Daman and Diu

Daman and Diu

• Nino da Cunha took Diu and Bassein from Gujarat’s Bahadur Shah in 1530 CE.
• They also founded colonies on the west coast at Salsette, Daman, and Bombay, and on the east coast at San Thome near Madras and Hugli in Bengal.
• However, by the end of the 16th century, Portuguese dominance in India had waned, and they had lost all of their newly gained holdings in India save Daman, Diu, and Goa.
• When Humayun retreated from Gujarat in 1536, Bahadur Shah’s ties with the Portuguese deteriorated.
• Bahadur Shah planned to build a partition wall after the residents of the town began battling the Portuguese.
• In response, the Portuguese began discussions, during which time the monarch of Gujarat was invited aboard a Portuguese ship and assassinated in 1537.
• Da Cunha also aimed to enhance Portuguese influence in Bengal by placing a large number of Portuguese nationals in the city of Hooghly.

Portuguese in Hooghly

Portuguese in Hooghly

• After getting permission from the Mughal ruler Akbar, the Portuguese constructed the town of Hooghly-Chinsurah on the banks of the Hooghly river in 1579.
• Bandel flourished as a port and commercial colony, and the Portuguese even built a chapel there.
• During the siege of Hooghly in 1632, however, the Mughals set fire to the magnificent Bandel Church.
• According to legend, Shah Jahan had a priest from the church and a few thousand Christians carried to Agra and put to death by fierce elephants.
• The Hooghly river valley is peppered with townships like Chinsurah that have a rich colonial past when taken as a whole.
• Trading settlements were established by the Portuguese, Dutch, French, Danes, and British. And there are still monuments from that period in the area.

Bandel Church

Portuguese in Coromandel Zone

Portuguese in Coromandel Zone

• Saidapettai, Crompettai, and Ulundurpettai are only a few of the locations in Tamil Nadu with the suffix ‘pettai.’ The list of places with the suffix ‘pettai’ runs into the hundreds.
• Pettai is a derivation of Porto, Portugal’s second-largest city after Lisbon, and Porto means port in Portuguese, which is why the suffix pettai is used in various districts in Chennai.
• Tuticorin was founded by Portuguese and Dutch settlers before the British arrived, which explains why the city in southern Tamil Nadu is heavily influenced by the Portuguese, even down to the architecture and surnames of its residents.
• According to local census estimates, nearly 2 lakh fishermen in the Tuticorin and Tirunelveli districts had Portuguese surnames.
• In and around the Coromandel area, there were Portuguese settlements.
• The earliest church erected by the Portuguese in the area was the Luz Church in Mylapore, Madras (Chennai) in 1516, and the So Tome or San Thome temple was renovated by them in 1522.

Impact

Impact of Portuguese in Indian Culture

• The Portuguese presence in Goa and other parts of India has resulted in the adoption of Western architectural characteristics.
• The upshot of this clash of cultures produced a very unique style for both religious and secular structures (churches, convents, and Hindu temples).
• The architecture, particularly that of churches, is reminiscent of southern Europe. There are traces of Portuguese fado in the music.
• The Portuguese contributed potatoes, tomatoes, pineapples, and cashews to the diet, and Goans produce feni, their form of moonshine, from the apple of the cashew tree.
• Tobacco cultivation was introduced to India by them.
• They disseminated Catholicism over India’s western and eastern coasts.
• In 1556, they created the first printing press in India, in Goa.
• The earliest scientific publication, ‘The Indian Medicinal Plants,’ was published in Goa in 1563.
• They were the first to use the Cartaze System to outline “How to build maritime trade and mastery over the sea” (i.e. under this system anyone who passes through the Portugal territories must buy permits otherwise they are supposed to be captured.)
• They were the first Europeans to disseminate Christianity throughout India and Asia.

Significance

Significance of the Portuguese

• Most historians agree that the arrival of the Portuguese not only signalled the beginning of the European age, but also the growth of maritime power.
• The Cholas, for example, had been a maritime force, but this was the first time a foreign power had arrived in India by water.
• The Portuguese ships were armed with cannons, and this was the first step toward securing a monopoly over commerce by threatening or using force.
• The Portuguese used body armour, matchlock soldiers, and weapons landed from ships in the Malabar in the 16th century, demonstrating military innovation.
• On the other hand, a significant military contribution made by the Portuguese onshore was the system of drilling infantry groups, modelled after the Spanish model, which was implemented in the 1630s as a response to Dutch pressure.
• The Portuguese were masters of advanced maritime tactics.
• Their multi-decked ships were strongly built, as they were meant to fight out Atlantic gales rather than go ahead of the regular monsoons, allowing them to carry more weapons.
• Goa became a centre of complex filigree work, fretted foliage work, and metalwork incorporating diamonds as the silversmith and goldsmith arts thrived.
• However, while the interiors of churches built under the Portuguese include a lot of woodwork and art, as well as painted ceilings, the architectural plans are often plain.

Conclusion

Conclusion

The Portuguese State of India, sometimes known as Portuguese India, was a Portuguese colonial state in the Indian Subcontinent. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to arrive in India and the last to go. Vasco De Gama was the first Portuguese to set foot in India in 1498. However, Portuguese control in India is considered to have lasted from 1505 until 1961. Although Portuguese colonialism outlasted its English counterpart, it had little effect outside of its territories.

FAQs

Question: Who is Vasco De Gama?

Answer:

Vasco da Gama, a Portuguese navigator whose trips to India (1497–99, 1502–03, and 1524) paved the way for a maritime route between Western Europe and the East through the Cape of Good Hope. The first European to reach India by water was a Portuguese adventurer. His first trip to India through the Cape of Good Hope was the first to establish an ocean link between Europe and Asia, uniting the Atlantic and Indian seas, and therefore the West and the Orient.

Question: Where are the commercial seaports established by the Portuguese?

Answer:

They controlled a short strip of land on the west coast from Mumbai to Daman and Diu, as well as the approaches to Gujarat, with four key ports and hundreds of cities and villages. They controlled a series of maritime strongholds and commercial ports in the south, including Mangalore, Cannanore, Cochin, and Calicut.

Question: Briefly explain about the Treaty of Tordesillas?

Answer:

The Treaty of Tordesillas (1494), the Rulers of Portugal and Spain divided the non-Christian world in 1497 by an imaginary line in the Atlantic, some 1,300 miles west of the Cape Verde Islands.

MCQs

MCQs

Question: Hooghly was used as a base for piracy in the Bay of Bengal by [ UPSC 1995]

(a) the Portuguese

(b) the French

(c) the Danish

(d) the British

Answer: (a) See the Explanation

The Portuguese used Hooghly as a piracy base in the Bay of Bengal. During Shah Jahan’s reign, Qasim Khan, the Governor of Bengal, subdued and imprisoned tens of thousands of Portuguese.

Therefore option (a) is the correct answer.

Question: When the Portuguese arrived in India, the foreigners whom they encountered as trade rivals were the [UPSC 1991]

(a) Persians

(b) Arabs

(c) Dutch

(d) English

Answer: (b) See the Explanation

The Arabs were the foreigners that the Portuguese faced as trading rivals when they landed in India. The Portuguese attempted to overturn the Arab monopoly on the Indian spice trade. Within twenty years of their presence in India, they succeeded after repeated fights with the Arabs.

Therefore option (b) is correct.