Description of the Island and City of Goa

book ii Description of the Island and City of Goa [fol. 90r] The island of Goa,1 which has always been prized and venerated by the Indian Gentiles of the East as a sacred and religious object, is located on 1 Goa was called Tiçuari by the Portuguese, which was anglicized as Tissuary; it is known today as Tiswadi. Portuguese Goa consisted of the island referred to here and several smaller islands: Chorão, Divar, and Jua. Tiçuari was bounded to the north by the Mandovi River and to the south by the Zuari River. The port city of Goa was located on Tiçuari. In 1510, Portuguese forces under Albuquerque wrested Goa from the sultan of Bijapur. Then, in 1543, the Portuguese acquired two more districts as buffer zones on the mainland: Bardes to the north and Salcete to the south. These three districts—the Ilhas, Bardes, and Salcete—are referred to as the Velhas Conquistas (“old conquests”); see Pearson, Portuguese in India, 89. Silva y Figueroa included in his Commentaries Manuel Godinho de Erédia’s map of Goa, the admin- istrative center of the Portuguese Estado da Índia (see Plate 1), and also provided a physical description of the city in the text. Unfortunately, both the map and the prose description are confusing on two counts. First, as already mentioned, Silva y Figueroa’s descriptions are ori- ented as one approaches the land from the sea, which should not prove overly problematic, per se. But it is difficult to follow the author’s descriptions on Erédia’s map because, while the compass rose is clearly pointing north, most of the writing perversely reads south to north instead of north to south. The interested reader can best follow Silva y Figueroa’s description on Erédia’s map by turning it upside down. Second, because the author’s physical description of Goa is rather confusing, a few comments on its historical geography are in order. Many of the locations we have already mentioned appear on Erédia’s map: the island of Goa is written as i. de Goa; Chorão is written as Choram; today’s Jua is identified as Iunga: maior and S. Estevão (for further details, see p. 166 n. 12 and p. 167 n. 15). Neither the Mandovi River nor the Zuari River is found on the map. Silva y Figueroa generally equates the term Old Goa with the first district (Portuguese Ilhas, meaning “islands”) acquired by the Portuguese, and in particu- lar with the port and its edifications that were seized from the sultan of Bijapur. Today, while Old Goa may mean the same thing it did to Silva y Figueroa, it may also refer to the old capital of Portuguese India, which, because of public health concerns, was moved to New Goa, or the new capital of Panjim, known locally as Panaji, in the mid-eighteenth century. Many of the locations mentioned in Silva y Figueroa’s description of Goa are found on Erédia’s map. In order to further facilitate cross-referencing between the two, we have generated “mas- ter” notes when Silva y Figueroa’s narrative first mentions: (1) the island of Goa, as in the present note; (2) subdivisions, parishes, or neighborhoods, prominent landmarks (churches, convents, monasteries, hillocks) on the island of Goa, anchorages (see p. 165 n. 7), crossings (see p. 170 n. 22), streets (see p. 197 n. 105), locations outside the walls of the city (see p. 164 n. 5); and (3) the lesser islands (see p. 166 n. 12), which were territories that were integrated into their colonial administration in this region. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��7 | doi ��.��63/9789004346321_004 Description Of The Island And City Of Goa 161 Manuel Godinho de Erédia’s map of Goa and its surroundings, circa 1616. map of circa Goa and its surroundings, Manuel Godinho de Erédia’s plate 1 plate.

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