TELLING A STORY THAT BEGAN OVER 450 YEARS AGO: GOA'S INQUISITION Alan Machado (Prabhu)
Where does one begin to tell a story that began over 450 years ago? Of an institution that operated for 250 years? A story deliberately kept secret by that very institution, a fact that allowed others to malign and distort that story and create a Black Legend, mostly without credible evidence, that many of us believe in today? How much of that story is true, how much false, how much just motivated propaganda? The narrative of Goa's Inquisition that most of us are familiar with comes mainly from secondary sources, written almost exclusively by Dutch and English writers. They had reason to create the Black Legend, and they created it without access to the rich resource of primary documentation kept secret through the centuries. Inquisitors recorded the proceedings of every case and preserved them in a secret room (secreto) of the Sabayo Palace. In 1623, Inquisitor Figueira compiled a report (Reportorio) of all case files preserved in the secreto. It is available in Lisbon's Biblioteca Nacional along with a list of autos-da-fe compiled in 1863 by Antonio Moreira. In 1774, an inventory of all files and other documents was made. It is available in Lisbon's Archivo Nacional de Torre do Tombo along with many auto-da-fe lists and other documents. These lists give the names, personal details, offences, and punishments of some 11,000 odd persons who were investigated. I have compiled this list. My estimate of the total number investigated comes to between 20,000 to 25,000. So we have details of about half the number of persons judged. They tell us a different story than what the Black Legend would like us to believe. You may well ask why we should trust these documents. I would reply, for the simple reason that these documents were never meant to be released to the public. The inquisitors believed they were doing God's and the king's work. They had no reason to falsify records. Auto-da-fe lists, sometimes case files, were sent annually to Lisbon. The secreto was a closely guarded room with only the two inquisitors and procurator having keys. I would like to make a clarification here. While we have about 100 auto-da-fe lists, we have hardly any detailed case files. This is because many were destroyed during the Maratha invasion of 1684 when some documents were sent to Murmugao fort for safe keeping, and others burnt. After the closure in 1812, documents not sent to Rio were most likely burnt. One may very justifiably ask why this treasure trove has been largely ignored in the historiography of Goa's Inquisition. The main reason is the extreme secrecy exercised by the Inquisition. This absence of information allowed English and Dutch Protestant writers to create the Black Legend during a time when the Netherlands and England were engaged in continual warfare with Spain, and Britain was convulsed by a violent confrontation between Catholic and Protestant factions. The Spanish Inquisition, a Catholic institution belonging to an enemy country, was the ideal target for a vicious propaganda offensive. That Black Legend engulfed Goa's Inquisition. Rev Buchanan, a Protestant Englishman, brought this narrative to India at a time when Britain was rapidly expanding its territories in India. It gave him an opportunity to undermine Britain's main Christian rival in India, Catholic Portugal. The Inquisition and "its fires...lately lighted at Goa" became his principal target. This was blatant misinformation. The fires had died down long since. Priolkar's book played a pivotal role in forming public opinion in India. Sadly, just about a third deals with Goa's Inquisition proper. A major part consists entirely of Dellon's and Buchanan's narratives. The rest relies mainly on selective secondary sources. Without accessing primary sources, Priolkar asserts "the story of the Inquisition is a dismal record of callousness and cruelty, tyranny and injustice, espionage and blackmail, avarice and corruption, repression of thought and culture and promotion of obscurantism..." Powerful rhetoric, but untrue. I'm sure Priolkar would have changed his tone if he had access to the vast primary archival resource being digitized and posted online today. So too, Goan Catholic writers who substituted motivated rhetoric for facts and analysis in their propaganda offense against Portuguese rule. For instance, Tristão de Bragança Cunha quoted the Archbishop of Evora's reported statement made 1897 that Goa's Inquisition was the worst and vilest of all branches, with inquisitors imprisoning and burning women who resisted them. The available auto-da-fe lists contain the names of just 17 women who were burnt in Goa. Most were poor, elderly widows from deprived sections of society, almost certainly prematurely aged by a life of hard labour. It requires an elastic imagination to believe that they could have tickled an inquisitor's fancies. So, what do these documents tell us? [1] Goa's Inquisition was the premier institution used by Portugal to impose a new identity on its subjects and secure their loyalty through ‘social disciplining'. It attempted to mould diverse and wide-spread subject populations into one nation by being a guardian of religious orthodoxy and imposing a uniform social and cultural code modeled after that in Portugal. [2] Francis Xavier had nothing with establishing the Inquisition in Goa. All he did was write a letter in 1546, 14 years before the inquisitors arrived in Goa, to the king asking him to send the Inquisition to Asia to counter Jewish and Muslim influences. The real reasons were far more complex and the policy took many years to implement. [3] The first inquisitors were sent to Goa primarily to counter the perceived threat from the Cristaos-Novos and Islamic influences, not from gentios. Cristaos-Novos (converts from Judaism and Islam) merchants controlled Portugals' Asian trading network. Rising Ottoman power and long-established Muslim influences in the Indian Ocean and overseas trade routes threatened Portuguese interests. In the first 40 years, 431 persons, 27% of the entire number, were convicted for Islamism, and 284 (18%) for Judaism. It is only after 1600 that cases related to gentilidade (offences related to gentile practices) increased, and the focus passed on to the king's policy of imposing a uniform cultural identity across his diverse and widely-dispersed subject population. It coincides with the arrival of the Dutch navy in Indian seas. It may have been the trigger. [4] Goa's Inquisition could not have operated for 252 years without active support from the State, Church, and elite social groups (naiques). The renting out of its ground floor of the Sabayo Palace to gentios reveals the Inquisition's working relation with them. [5] The Sabayo Palace from which the Inquisition operated was known in Konkani as vhoddlem ghor. We have two plans of the building dated to 1634 and 1779. It was located near the Se Cathedral and the Rua Direita. The building consisted of two main functional areas: the prison, and the administrative area which included residential and commercial spaces. The prison, completed by 1632, was two storeys high with a gallery of small cells, ten feet square. The number of cells vary in the two plans, 85 (1634) and 63 (1779). The cells faced corridors open to the sky. They provided light and ventilation. Very surprisingly, the 1779 plan carries a legend which states that the large rooms (eight in number) on the ground floor were always rented out to the Gentios (Hindus). One of them was a butcher's shop. Correspondence reveals that the inquisitors faced continuous problems over the years in collecting these rents. It not only undermines the security of the prison, but also reflects on the power of the inquisitors. Having to rent out its rooms for revenue? A butcher's shop? Not being able to collect rents? [6] The Inquisition's authority did not extend to non-Christians unless their offences were related to undermining the Christian character of the State and hindering the Inquisition's operations. [7] For converts there was no turning back from Christianity. The Inquisition assumed the role of a "health court" for Christian souls. The Inquisition's operations extended beyond doctrinal issues into the realm of socio-political affairs. The edict of 1736 was an attempt to influence Christian consciences in minute matters of everyday life. The prosecution of bigamists and sodomites came within the Inquisition's purview because such offences were seen as threatening the social order. So too, the socially under-privileged castes and professions were confined within the boundaries prescribed by State, religion, and society. The Inquisition was used against rival European nations in situations where the military option was not feasible by targeting select individuals, for instance Dellon. Anyone dealing with Muslim States, Portugal's principal rivals in Asia, were similarly prosecuted. When Maratha activity threatened the Estado da India, it was most active in most vulnerable areas and secured bonds of loyalty en masse like in Assolna and Cuncolim, Tivim and Aldona. [8] We see "justice and mercy" in two well-documented cases. Padre Joao da Costa, a Portuguese Capuchin, was a serial sodomite with a long history of abusing young boys. He appeared before the inquisitors in 1666 and again in 1670. After a second trial that lasted nine months, he was convicted. His case papers were sent to Lisbon for a final decision. In December 1673, he was handed over to secular justice and executed. Gabriel, an Ethiopian Falasha Jew enslaved by Arabs, converted to Islam, and was brought to Ahmadnagar. He escaped to Chaul where he converted to Christianity. He returned to Ahmadnagar where he lived as a Muslim for a while before returning to Chaul. In 1595, Gabriel was convicted of heresy, apostasy, and as a relapse. By the rules he should have been executed. However, the inquisitors tried to find out if he had understood the nature of his offence, and still being uncertain, sent his case file to Lisbon for a decision. Gabriel was sentenced to the galleys. We last hear of him in 1597. A decision was still awaited. We must remember that slaves had no rights and were treated as commodities rather than humans. [9] Society at large was the Inquisition's eyes and ears. The Inquisition could never have functioned without the great number of denunciations it received. [10] A primary focus of an investigation was to obtain a confession and abjuration from a guilty person. Reconciled persons demonstrated their sincerity by humbly undergoing the punishments imposed on them. Execution was generally reserved for the impenitent, obstinate, and dogmatic relapses, and serial sodomites. An execution was a public acknowledgement of the Inquisition's failure to bring around a guilty person. [11] Torture and the flames of an auto-da-fe have been successfully implanted in our minds by the Black Legend as an authentic image of a uniquely unrelenting and sadistic Goan Inquisition. However, statistics show Goa's Inquisition in a far more lenient light than that of Evora and Lisbon, or for that matter, contemporary England. [12] Following the General Council's recommendation that converts be treated with "mildness" so that they were not driven away from the Church, in the early years, the Inquisition severely punished transgressing converts only for the second relapse, that is the third time. Similarly new converts were given grace periods after conversion during which they would not be punished. [13] The Inquisition's judicial procedure was governed by well-drafted regulations and implemented by qualified officials appointed after due diligence. Many of its features can be seen in modern courts. [14] Goa had three courts, Civil (for civil matters), Ecclesiastical (for church matters), and the Inquisition which dealt with heresy, apostacy, gentiladade, sorcery, bigamy, sodomy, offences related to Islamism and Judaism, priestly violations (heresy and doctrinal errors, impeding the Inquisition, solicitation in the confessional, sigilism), obstruction the Inquisition's operations, etc. It had no jurisdiction over non-Christians except when they were seen to lure Christians away from faith or impeded the Inquisition. [15] While the Inquisition conducted its trials in great secrecy, it held a very public ceremony to publicize its judgements and especially highlight its motto "Justice and Mercy". This ceremony was the auto-da-fe (literally ‘act of faith'). It highlights the central theme of an auto-da-fe: the abjuration and reconciliation of a heretic who had been automatically excommunicated when taken into custody. At least 182 public autos-da-fe were conducted by Goa's Inquisition. Of these 93 complete lists are available from 1640 to 1773. They give names of 8,190 persons prosecuted, including 91 burnt physically and 113 in effigy. Additionally, the names of 1,232 persons who were sentenced in private autos-da-fe are known. The last public auto-da-fe took place on April 24,1774. [16] The Inquisition's activities in Bardes open interesting insights into its motives. It was most active here as the Maratha threat intensified (1664-1736). The construction and defence of the network of fortifications between Colvale and Tivim between 1635 and 1681 imposed a heavy burden on its inhabitants economically and by way of forced conscriptions of younger men. Food production fell drastically. Many of Tivim's and Aldona's inhabitants migrated to Kanara. Here, like in Assolna (1686) and Cuncolim (1694), it obtained mass formal oaths of loyalty from converts. In 1664, 104 persons from Tivim, 73 from Moira, and 23 from Sircaim abjured em forma (formally). Mapusa saw its highest numbers in 1651 when 16 members of the Braganca clan (Charodo, ganvkars) were sentenced. [17] Aldona features prominently in the first years after conversions, and again as the Maratha wars intensified. In the earlier phase many names that appear in Ghantkar's translation of ganvkari records between 1595 and 1605 can be found. The first Aldonkar to fall foul of the Inquisition was Lourenco Ferrao of the third vangod. He appeared at the auto-da-fe at the Se Cathedral in 1592 for consulting sorcerers and sacrificing goats and roosters at temples. He abjured for light suspicion of heresy, was whipped, and paid a fine of 100 pardaos. He was convicted again in 1607 for worshipping in temples. He now abjured for vehement suspicion and was sent to the polvara for two years. More than 50% of the total (218) were prosecuted in just 12 years from 1700 to 1712, a period of intensified Maratha (Bhonsle) activity. Of the indicted in 1709, 17 died in the prison and were absolved. Another 13 were received dead. [18] At least 287 priests, about 1.5% of the total number, were investigated for various offences. [19] The Inquisition has been accused of causing large scale emigrations. Analysis of historical evidence clearly shows this is untrue. Some influential Brahmans who chose to resist coercive conversion laws were expelled or left Goa from the 1560s. However, the majority remained and rose to prominence as diplomats, interpreters, and mainly in economic and commercial spheres. Major emigrations of Christians spanned a century (1650-1750). This period coincides with the beginning and peaking of Maratha invasions of Goa and the fall of the Provincia do Norte. In 1689, for instance, the viceroy advised the king that Sambaji's invasion of Bardes had caused many natives of Tivim to emigrate to Kanara. By 1784, Kanara contributed to perhaps 20% of the combined Goa-Kanara Christian population, ie about 50,000. [20] During this period of peak Christian emigrations from Goa, the Inquisition focused almost entirely on the Provincia do Norte (71% of cases). It had delegated much of its responsibility of maintaining the social order, though not its judicial powers, to naiques drawn from prominent and influential local Goans. [21] The number of persons investigated, compiled from the 1774 inventory and auto-da-fe lists, is just under 19,000. Socially deprived members of society (castes and professions) comprise the highest percentage. Non-Christians constituted 25%. [22] Details available from 136 auto-da-fe lists reveal 177 were executed and the effigies of a 154 who were absent or dead were burnt. The number sentenced in these autos-da-fe was 11,631. [23] Spiritual instruction and penances, wearing "costumes of infamy" (sanbenito, carocha) were common punishments for Christians. Other punishments included terms in the gun powder factory or galleys, exile, and fines. Whipping was also common, especially for non-Christians. In later years, some non-Christians escaped punishment by converting. About 4% of those investigated were absolved. I'll end this short talk on a personal note. I did not find any Macedos from Aldona on the auto-da-fe lists. -- Goa's Inquisition Facts Fiction Factoids. Alan Machado (Prabhu). Goa 1556. 2022. Rs 700 in Goa Available at Varsha and Broadway (Panjim), DogEars and Golden Heart (Margao). ISBN 978-81-956329-3-0 NOTE: Alan Machado (Prabhu) will speak at the History Hour function of the XCHR at Alto Porvorim, on November 3, 2022 at 6 pm. *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*- Join a discussion on Goa-related issues by posting your comments on this or other issues via email to goa...@goanet.org See archives at http://lists.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet-goanet.org/ *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-