Photo 146/1(296)

Genre: Landscape Photography

Much used because of the fuel and water by the Arabs of Oman and the Yemen in whose hands was the maritime trade between Calicut and the Red Sea ports, from whence overland caravans reached the Mediterrean. Vasco da Gama was here for 14 days in1498 resting and refitting. Gabral followed in 1500, there being with him a band of Franciscans charged with the conversion of the East. From here, it is claimed, the Christianity was brought to India. This however ignores the presence of the Syrians and Thomean Christians in South India. Affonso de Albuerque (1500) used Angediva as his base for the conquest of Goa and the island has ever since remained a Portuguese possession. In 1663/4 Sir Abram Shipman and the men brought out to take over Bombay was allowed to land pending a reference back to Europe, admittance to Bombay being denied to them.

In 1775, when Abram Parsons, an English merchant was passing the island, it was a penal settlement in which the convicts were taught to spin cotton and yarn from which to make stockings. These the prisoners sold to passing ships. Another traveller of 1783 reported the same. In 1935 the population of Angediva was 6 only, but they did an enormous traffic in bottled Kaju liquor, of great potency, the manufacture of which was prohibited in British India, but not in Portuguese territory. Angediva therefore was a favourite anchorage for the constant stream of country craft sailing up and down the coast.