Being aware of the space we live in, to me, is part of being aware of our existence. But, it seems familiarity with physical space even if does not breed contempt it surely does make us oblivious to it. The plus side is that as a space ‘disappears’ our comfort level with it and within it increase. The downside is that it no longer remains exciting to think, talk and discuss about it!
Despite my repeated trips to Goa, I am still quite ‘aware’ of the space there. Whenever I arrive in Goa my senses get stimulated, its beauty, its weather, its vivid colours, the whiff of sea breeze and many other things immediately uplift my mood. Clearly Goa is still not too familiar and I am thankful for that. The downside is that my comfort levels are still quite low and I am still waiting for the time when I begin to feel ‘at home’ there. But if one can, one must find some virtue in every adverse situation. To me, amidst my discomfort, the unfamiliarity stimulates my desire to know more about the Goan space be it physical, social, cultural or historical. It is the last one that I wish to talk about today. Very soon, I hope that I may begin to talk about the physical space of my apartment and how it is shaping but today, being still away from it, I wish to talk about the physical space surrounding it.
It seems, I am increasingly getting interested in knowing more and more about the history of the places I visit (is it because I myself age!?). Goa of course has a special place in this quest. So what have been my tools till date? Having done the tourist circuit of Old Goa I am clearly looking for more. With some finger work on the Internet and some legwork in Goa and some other parts of India it is not too difficult to find some very interesting and at the same time non-superfluous histories of Goa. Although one is unlikely to find them in the ‘regular’ book shops which shower their love and affection mainly on travel and coffee-table books some treasure troves do exist in almost all cities in India (In Goa one can try the OtherIndiabookstore at Mapusa. Now history can have many shades, today I am going to concentrate on a very specific type – the history of a given space. What tickles my imagination is to stand at a particular spot and try to find out what happened at this very spot, 500 years ago!
For those who want to take up Goan history a little seriously, to begin with, I would recommend - An Historical Sketch of Goa by Denis Cottineau de Kloguen first published in Madras in 1831 and An Historical and Archaelogical Sketch of the City of Goa by Jose Nicolau da Fonseca first published in Bombay in 1878. It is interesting to note here that the two cities where these two books were published have now left behind their colonial names and adopted the Indian versions of their names while Goa, by and large, continues to use the Portuguese spellings of place-names – notable exception is of course Panaji for Panjim, even though the latter is still used quite often. The retention of Portuguese spellings gives rise to very interesting situations at times, especially, since out of state Indians are not at all familiar with the Portuguese idiom and spellings.But more on that some other time! The aforementioned books written in the imperialist tradition of the 19th century, have obvious flaws and have an archaic style of writing and equally archaic outlook, hence they are ‘handle with care’ kind of material, but to me therein lies their charm. If nothing else they illustrate a very ‘picture perfect’ life (perhaps quite a bit different from the real one!) of the rural aristocracy of colonial Goa. For those who do not like the old flavour, a more modern treatment can be found in Medieval Goa by Teotonio R. de Souza. First published in 1979 at New Delhi, this book would be my first choice if you were just beginning your quest. Another interesting one to pick up (and surely ‘handle with care material’) would be, An Ethnography of Goa, Daman and Diu by A. B de Bragança Pereira, originally written in Portuguese and published in 1940. It has been recently (2008) translated by Maria Aurora Couto in English and published by Penguin India. According to the translator, Bragança Pereira wrote this book, at least partly, to counter the Salazarist claims of Lusitanization (portuguization) of Goa, and its cultural inseparability from Portugal. The author sought to assert a separate Goan (and thus Indian) identity against the Portuguese regime. Makes and interesting read no doubt.
Having read the aforementioned books (the last one only partially as yet), I am still hungry for more. For some reason, I still haven’t found what I am looking for. The ‘big picture’ of little places is still not there. I would welcome any suggestions that any of the readers might have.Interestingly, while on the one hand I seek the grand picture, on the other hand, I also am interested in going local. Given that I have a connection with Caranzalem. I would love to find out more about its history. On the Internet all that I have been able to find is that Caranzalem was known for its bull fights in the yesteryear. Some of websites do tell us that the people of neighbouring Taleigaõ had been favoured by Afonso de Albuquerque – the Portuguese commander who conquered Goa from the Bijapuri forces in 1510 (so exactly 500 years ago!) - because the villagers would sail at night and offer food to the Portuguese troops who were starving in Penha de França in northern part of Goa after 1510 when they were defeated at the hands of Adilshah (see for example goanhomes.com). Unfortunately various websites that give us the exact same text do not provide us their source of information. I would love to know what prompted the villagers to help the Albuquerque forces? Was it pure business? Were they trying to get back at Adilshahi administration for some grievance they had against him? Or I am reading it too simplistically and there was a grand picture here?
Another fact that I came to know about Taleigaõ was that in the late 18th or early 19th century a factory to manufacture cloth for exports was established there but it had to be closed down since it was not able to withstand competition from the Gujarati textiles that came in from Diu. I don’t think any trace of that factory still exists but if something is still there I would love to explore it when I go there next. Anyone who has any other leads on local history, please do enlighten me - I would be much obliged.
Despite my repeated trips to Goa, I am still quite ‘aware’ of the space there. Whenever I arrive in Goa my senses get stimulated, its beauty, its weather, its vivid colours, the whiff of sea breeze and many other things immediately uplift my mood. Clearly Goa is still not too familiar and I am thankful for that. The downside is that my comfort levels are still quite low and I am still waiting for the time when I begin to feel ‘at home’ there. But if one can, one must find some virtue in every adverse situation. To me, amidst my discomfort, the unfamiliarity stimulates my desire to know more about the Goan space be it physical, social, cultural or historical. It is the last one that I wish to talk about today. Very soon, I hope that I may begin to talk about the physical space of my apartment and how it is shaping but today, being still away from it, I wish to talk about the physical space surrounding it.
It seems, I am increasingly getting interested in knowing more and more about the history of the places I visit (is it because I myself age!?). Goa of course has a special place in this quest. So what have been my tools till date? Having done the tourist circuit of Old Goa I am clearly looking for more. With some finger work on the Internet and some legwork in Goa and some other parts of India it is not too difficult to find some very interesting and at the same time non-superfluous histories of Goa. Although one is unlikely to find them in the ‘regular’ book shops which shower their love and affection mainly on travel and coffee-table books some treasure troves do exist in almost all cities in India (In Goa one can try the OtherIndiabookstore at Mapusa. Now history can have many shades, today I am going to concentrate on a very specific type – the history of a given space. What tickles my imagination is to stand at a particular spot and try to find out what happened at this very spot, 500 years ago!
For those who want to take up Goan history a little seriously, to begin with, I would recommend - An Historical Sketch of Goa by Denis Cottineau de Kloguen first published in Madras in 1831 and An Historical and Archaelogical Sketch of the City of Goa by Jose Nicolau da Fonseca first published in Bombay in 1878. It is interesting to note here that the two cities where these two books were published have now left behind their colonial names and adopted the Indian versions of their names while Goa, by and large, continues to use the Portuguese spellings of place-names – notable exception is of course Panaji for Panjim, even though the latter is still used quite often. The retention of Portuguese spellings gives rise to very interesting situations at times, especially, since out of state Indians are not at all familiar with the Portuguese idiom and spellings.But more on that some other time! The aforementioned books written in the imperialist tradition of the 19th century, have obvious flaws and have an archaic style of writing and equally archaic outlook, hence they are ‘handle with care’ kind of material, but to me therein lies their charm. If nothing else they illustrate a very ‘picture perfect’ life (perhaps quite a bit different from the real one!) of the rural aristocracy of colonial Goa. For those who do not like the old flavour, a more modern treatment can be found in Medieval Goa by Teotonio R. de Souza. First published in 1979 at New Delhi, this book would be my first choice if you were just beginning your quest. Another interesting one to pick up (and surely ‘handle with care material’) would be, An Ethnography of Goa, Daman and Diu by A. B de Bragança Pereira, originally written in Portuguese and published in 1940. It has been recently (2008) translated by Maria Aurora Couto in English and published by Penguin India. According to the translator, Bragança Pereira wrote this book, at least partly, to counter the Salazarist claims of Lusitanization (portuguization) of Goa, and its cultural inseparability from Portugal. The author sought to assert a separate Goan (and thus Indian) identity against the Portuguese regime. Makes and interesting read no doubt.
Having read the aforementioned books (the last one only partially as yet), I am still hungry for more. For some reason, I still haven’t found what I am looking for. The ‘big picture’ of little places is still not there. I would welcome any suggestions that any of the readers might have.Interestingly, while on the one hand I seek the grand picture, on the other hand, I also am interested in going local. Given that I have a connection with Caranzalem. I would love to find out more about its history. On the Internet all that I have been able to find is that Caranzalem was known for its bull fights in the yesteryear. Some of websites do tell us that the people of neighbouring Taleigaõ had been favoured by Afonso de Albuquerque – the Portuguese commander who conquered Goa from the Bijapuri forces in 1510 (so exactly 500 years ago!) - because the villagers would sail at night and offer food to the Portuguese troops who were starving in Penha de França in northern part of Goa after 1510 when they were defeated at the hands of Adilshah (see for example goanhomes.com). Unfortunately various websites that give us the exact same text do not provide us their source of information. I would love to know what prompted the villagers to help the Albuquerque forces? Was it pure business? Were they trying to get back at Adilshahi administration for some grievance they had against him? Or I am reading it too simplistically and there was a grand picture here?
Another fact that I came to know about Taleigaõ was that in the late 18th or early 19th century a factory to manufacture cloth for exports was established there but it had to be closed down since it was not able to withstand competition from the Gujarati textiles that came in from Diu. I don’t think any trace of that factory still exists but if something is still there I would love to explore it when I go there next. Anyone who has any other leads on local history, please do enlighten me - I would be much obliged.
Hi KK,
ReplyDeleteQuite a profound opening para...I'd need to read it a couple of times to follow it fully!
I've to say that I've wondered about the extent of Portuguese influence we'd continue to see in Goa -- with so many temples coming up at every corner and many Hindus living there, it's fast getting diluted...for good or bad. I haven't yet got intrigued about the history as the present is keeping me both enthralled and baffled but to help you through your research, I should share http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com/ whose posts I had been following earlier and who'd reviewed some books on Goa. You'd need to rummage through as I didn't see that post in a quick scan.
If you're seeking opinions, I'd vote for the 'blue sky note' above to become About Me.
Would look out for more.
Jyoti
Thanks a lot Jyoti for your comment.
ReplyDeleteI hope the first paragraph is only "profound" and not abstruse. Yes the remnants of Portuguese influence in Goa and how Goa has changed since 1961 vs the remnants of British influence in rest of India since 1947 is an interesting issue. I often wonder about it. The past naturally has a close connection with the changes that one sees in Goa since then. The coming up of new temples that you have mentioned, in my opinion is, amongst other things, as much a function of the destruction of temples by the Portuguese during the bouts of intolerance they displayed from time to time during their nearly half a century rule in Goa, but it is also has to do with the changing composition of Population in Goa since 1961. I am aware of Frederick Noronha's blog and do read it often. In fact I have seen the post you are referring to. The purpose of my post was to give my opinion as to which books I personally consider important for the issue at hand and why.