Fortification

Mormugão, Goa, India

Military Architecture

Vestiges of Mormugao’s fortified system are situated on an isthmus south of the Zuari River bar, around a large plateau that dominates an extensive surrounding area. The Mormugao stronghold resembles the one in Aguada in several aspects. But there are two fundamental differences: the fact that an attempt was made to build a city in the Mormugao precinct; and the major changes that have occurred therein due to construction of a seaport in the late 19th century. The arrival of the Dutch on the Goan coasts meant it became absolutely necessary to defend the Mandovi and Zuari river bars. The latter, besides leading to important passage points on Tiswadi Island and the lands of Salcette, provided a haven for large-tonnage ships during the monsoon season. After the first Dutch blockades of those bars, a royal order was thus issued to build a fortification in 1620; the first stone was placed four years later. The essential part of the work on the Mormugao system is due to the engineer Júlio Simão. As in Aguada, the central core of this system comprised a fort in a riverside zone joined to a quay by a covered road with bastions and also linked to a fort on a higher slope via two curtain walls or couraças that accompanied the incline. This overlooking position was built after the riverside fort and does not appear in the view of the lands of Salcette drawn by Pedro Barreto Resende for the Livro das Plantas de todas as Fortalezas, Cidades e Povoações do Estado da Índia Oriental... In that report, completed in 1635, the chronicler António Bocarro refers to the main gate of the lower fortification, highlighting the carved stonework front and the large and well-designed houses pertaining to the captain inside the precinct. These two elements still remain in Mormugao, inserted into the port structure built in the 19th century. On the ground floor of the captain’s houses were the soldiers’ quarters and munitions storage. In front of this building was a large gun platform. The upper fort, comparable to the Aguada citadel, was begun in 1638, as indicated in a stone plaque once located on the main gate. Due to the ruinous state of the northeast sector and the lack of on-site archaeological intervention, it is only possible to ascertain with the help of 19th century maps that the form was irregular and triangular, with three bastions with robust outlines. Standing amid the fort vestiges is a cross. Later construction efforts resulted from the decision to move the capital from Old Goa to the Mormugao heights. This decision was proposed by Viceroy Rui de Távora and approved by the main representatives of the city of Old Goa in January 1684, sanctioned by Lisbon. But the project was tenaciously resisted. The main arguments in favour of the move were that it was easier to defend the Mormugao peninsula and that the area was healthier than Old Goa. Those against the move alleged a lack of resources to build a new city and new religious houses. A number of military, urban and residential structures were nevertheless built between 1687 and 1707, despite the resistance. This workyard was the responsibility of the Jesuits Teotónio Rebelo, and later Manuel Carvalho. It is hard to describe its form or chronology, since the structures were almost all demolished during construction of the Mormugao port and the subsequent urban development of the city of Vasco da Gama. But coeval documents and 19th century maps enable us to perceive that the main work was done on the east and northeast side of the peninsula, where a long wall approximately 2,200 metres long was raised. It had interspersed bastions and ended near the main quay, linked to the riverside fort. Various infrastructures were built next to this wall. Constructions or streets were apparently not built on the heights, though this is an issue that could only be made clear by the disappeared plan for the new city in Mormugao. Several other bastions were situated in the more exposed and strategic areas of other parts of the peninsula, to the south and west. According to Pedro Dias, the ensemble comprised 20 bastions, from isolated structures to those included in the system of curtain walls. Most of the urban infrastructures were barely begun; they were later used to provide material for other constructions. In 1878 the governments of Portugal and the United Kingdom signed a treaty envisaging the construction of a mechanised seaport in Mormugao and a railway connecting to the British territory of Hubli across the Ghats range. This initiative had major consequences on Goa’s development. Construction began three years later, enabling the first steamship to dock in Mormugao in 1885 and culminating when the railway line opened in 1888. Even though the new city of Vasco da Gama was only begun 30 years later, the whole continuous process of Mormugao’s urban and port development up to present resulted in a profound disfigurement of the defence system from the 17th and 18th centuries.