A Inquisição de Goa em Fragmentos

Abstract

This work aims to discuss the circumstances surrounding the founding of the Tribunal of the Holy Office and the issues surrounding its research. To this end, the analyses conducted throughout this research focused on four central aspects: 1) the Portuguese colonial background, in order to understand the motivations that guided them in establishing a colonial enterprise in the East; 2) the influence of certain aspects of Portuguese imperial culture on the creation of the Tribunal; 3) the shortcomings and challenges to the conversion process of the native peoples of that region explored by the Portuguese; 4) the documentary problems faced by research attempting to rediscover the Goan Holy Office. The construction of this monograph was based on the hypothesis that the establishment of a Tribunal of the Holy Inquisition in the State of India was influenced by local circumstances involving the need to convert the local population and maintain the religiosity of the Portuguese who were already there, all linked to the duties of one king towards one's subjects, enveloped by a notion of empire that transcends the barriers that exist today between religion and political government. These needs were linked to an imperial ideology that placed the figure of the king as the guarantor of harmony in his kingdom and in the territories subjugated to him, and which should be facilitated by religious, cultural, and social homogenization, which would have motivated the creation, among other bodies, of the Holy Office in Portugal. The method employed in this research consisted of a combination of bibliographic and documentary analysis, observing various authors and sources on the establishment of the Portuguese in that region, their objectives, and the consequent establishment of the inquisitorial body in Goa.