Saint Monica’s Convent And Saint Mary’s Church

Goa [Velha Goa/Old Goa], Goa, India

Religious Architecture

Saint Monica’s Convent has a special place in the context of Goa’s religious architecture, as it was the only monastic institution for women in the territory. Its large building is located on the north slope of Monte Santo, on the west side of Old Goa near the former Convent of Our Lady of Grace and overlooking the Mandovi River and the road linking Panaji to the old city. The convent was founded on the private initiative of the rich lady and widow Filipa Ferreira. She made vows with Friar Miguel de Anjos and was authorised by Archbishop Friar Aleixo de Meneses to found the convent, of which she became the abbess. As those ecclesiastics pertained to the order of Saint Augustine, the convent adopted the same rule and was dependent on the respective men’s convent of Our Lady of Grace. The first stone was laid on 2 July 1606 and the work was completed in 1627. The convent was dedicated to Saint Monica, mother of Saint Augustine, and the church to Saint Mary. In 1636 a large fire destroyed the dormitories, forcing the nuns to take shelter in the Augustinian College of Our Lady of Popolo next to the Convent of Our Lady of Grace until Saint Monica’s was rebuilt. The reconstruction process was overseen by the Augustinian priest Friar Diogo de Santa Anna and maintained the church’s original building, the choirs and the sacristy. The convent accepted women of European, Asian and mixed origins, and only closed after the last nun died in 1885, 50 years after the religious orders were abolished and the admission of novices forbidden. It was subsequently used as a residence for cathedral canons and at present houses the Mater Dei Religious Institute. Saint Monica’s Convent comprises four large wings with two (and sometimes three) storeys, arranged around a central cloister. The façade is situated in the south wing and extends westward via a single-storey structure, beyond the building’s parallelepiped volume. This large cloister follows the common type of cloisters in Goa, with two-storey galleries with round arches articulated by Tuscan pilasters. Several archshaped buttresses built against the arcades attest to the static instability of the laterite construction with the eaves meeting the wall face. Standing out among the convent’s spaces are the longitudinal refectory and barrel vault, whose coffers bear paintings representing angels and saints. Other spaces are also adorned with murals depicting religious subjects. Since 2001 the Convent has housed the collection from Rachol constituting the current Museum of Christian Art. (>Jesuit Complex, Rachol). The church is situated lengthwise in the south wing, as usual in women’s convents. The single nave and rectangular floor plan develops parallel to the façade, with one of the side walls (in this case the south wall) assuming this function on the outside. Both high and low choirs of the church are thus disguised in the convent’s volumes and not fully exposed over the entrance, as in monastic institutions for men. At Saint Monica’s Church both choirs open onto the single nave via round-arched openings; the lower one is smaller and the upper one considerably larger. The nuns could thus follow religious ceremonies completely removed from the eyes of the community. The barrel vault eventually collapsed; some vestiges remain of the impost and of its profile on the nave walls. The chancel is a shallow space, narrower and lower than the nave. The gilt carved retable has two levels, each with three column-framed niches, and is crowned by three aediculae. The church’s façade stands out on the convent’s south wall due to the grille arrangement of pilasters and entablatures, with rectangular window openings in the panels. This façade’s arrangement follows the usual canons of Goa’s religious architecture, here adjusted to a side wall of the nave. The most obvious consequence is the number of sections. Usually there are three on a gable façade, but here there are five. Two doorways open in the intermediate sections, providing direct access to the nave. Exceptionally, nothing inside the church corresponds to the façade arrangement. Except for the church’s façade, all the rest of the convent’s exterior is very simple and closed, consisting of smooth plastered walls with rectangular windows. Saint Monica’s expresses the solid, shut-in and impenetrable aspect characteristic of women’s convents in Portugal. Saint Mary’s Church is a singular building amid the panorama of Goa’s Christian religious architecture, due to its original function, also unique in the territory: the church of a women’s convent. The convent impresses due to its size and grandiosity; moreover, it is one of the few monastic complexes in Old Goa that is still largely intact

• António Nunes Pereira