INTRODUCTION
My researches on the Portuguese presence in Burma (since 1989 entitled Myanmar) attempted to throw a better understanding of sources others than Portuguese manuscripts and coeval chronicles, rarely dealt with by historians. I have been looking particularly into cartographic sources, archeological data, and Burmese documentation.
This article deals with an archeological finding: the burial place of Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa, a Portuguese who, around 1600, was supposedly proclaimed king of Pegu, a kingdom in lower Burma. There are two major factors of interest in this finding: firstly, that the existence of the tomb irrevocably confirms sixteenth century descriptions about its existence; secondly, that this vestige has been solely referred to in reports of regional historical surveys without the essential comparison with the mentioned sources, which, in their turn, were published without confirmation by different historians and researchers.
The intention of the article is to expand the understanding of this subject, assembling information from different sources not previously coherently collated.
A tombstone which lies in the Oratório de Santa Catarina dos Mártires (Oratory of St. Catherine of the Martyrs), in Alenquer, reads the following:
"Este capítulo é de Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa, comendador de Cristo, natural de Guimarães a quem os naturais do Reino de Pegu elegeram por seu Rei."
("This chapter [house] is [the burial place of] Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa, commendator of the [Order] of Christ, native of Guimarães and whom the natives of the Kingdom of Pegu elected as their King.")
Nevertheless, there is no proof of Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa ever being king of Pegu. Neither is there proof of his place of birth. However, it is almost certain that he fought alongside the Portuguese adventurers who attempted to gain territorial control of Burma, from 1600 to 1603. Comparatively analyzed and duly interpreted, this inscription may enable us to throw light on the past contacts between Portugal and Myanmar. On the other hand, it will have little historical meaning if taken as an unquestionable truth without being placed in a proper context.
§1. THE "KING OF PEGU" IN PORTUGUESE HISTORIOGRAPHY
The figure of Salvador Ribeiro has been featured in a scattered number of articles in minor publications. Most of these articles were printed in Guimarães, the presumable place of birth of this man, and in Alenquer, where he most likely died (or, at least, where he was buried) if one is to believe the time-worn tombstone and its adjacent tablet's lapidary inscriptions and the chronicles of the Franciscans, to whom belonged the oratory which shelters these momentoes.
Before dealing with the biography of Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa I feel it pertinent to mention a few authors and works who made reference to his life and deeds.
In 1617, while Salvador Ribeiro was still alive, Father Manuel de Abreu Mouzinho ouvidor (teller) in Goa, published in Castilian the Breve Discurso en que se cuenta la conquista del Reyno de Pegu en la Índa de Oriente, hecha por los Portugueses desde el año de mil y seiscientos hasta el de 1603 (A Short Discourse where is told the conquest of the kingdom of Pegu in Oriental India, made by the Portuguese from the year one thousand six hundred till 1603). It was finally re-edited in Portuguese as an autonomous volume in 1990. During the following centuries this short text was reprinted several times in Portuguese, mainly as a complement to Fernão Mendes Pinto's Peregrinação (Pilgrimage) which describes in several chapters sixteenth century Burma. Abreu Mouzinho's eloquent description of Salvador Ribeiro's deeds transformed the once-upon-a-time obscure adventurer to a mighty character with international projection.
More recently, British and Burmese researchers alike took a keen interest in this Portuguese who was said to have been king of their colony (Burma which was under British rule from 1866 to 1948) and country.
An English translation by A. MacGregor of Abreu Mouzinho's Breve Discurso, was published in 1926 in the "Journal of Burma Research Society" entitled A Brief Account of the Kingdom of Pegu.
During the 1960s the Burmese historian Vivian Ba did extensive research in Portugal. An article of her published in July 1960 in "The Guardian" of Rangoon, describes in general her findings and in particular, the presence of Salvador Ribeiro in Burma. It was Vivian Ba who told me about the whereabouts of Salvador Ribeiro's tombstone and lapidary plaque in Alenquer of which I had previously found references in Franciscan reports and in documentation housed in several Portuguese archives.
Between the early seventeenth century— when the book by Abreu Mouzinho was published— and the mid-twentieth century— with the article by Vivian Ba— other essays analyzed this subject, most of them closely following the Breve Discurso but not adding much more to its substance. Most of these writings are from authors' fellow countrymen to Salvador Ribeiro, who 'romantically' describe the mysterious adventurer as a national hero. These texts were mostly printed during the late nineteenth century and the early twentieth century. Examples of these are: Alenquer e o seu Concelho (1873) by Guilherme J. C. Henriques, Portugal Antigo e Moderno (1874) by Pinho Leal, Guimarães: Apontamentos para a sua História (1881) by A. Ferreira Caldas, and the articles Massinga (1898) and Salvador Ribeiro, El-rei Massinga (1909), respectively published in the "Domingo Ilustrado" and "Oriente Português".
§2. LIFE AND DEEDS OF SALVADOR RIBEIRO UNTIL 1600
In Guimarães, where according to Abreu Mouzinho, as the mentioned tombstone Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa was born, the 'hero' was publicly celebrated by having a street named Rua do Rei de Pegu (Street of the King of Pegu). In 1988, the municipality had it changed to Rua dos Bombeiros Voluntários (Street of the Voluntary Firemen), a toponym which is still preserved at present.
Despite these facts, there is no documented evidence that Salvador Ribeiro was born in Guimarães. The phrase of the tombstone "native of Guimarães" corresponds to the more elaborate description of the Breve Discurso, which reports: "natural of Ronfe couto (game reserve), Guimarães district, Entre Douro e Minho province, in Portugal, born in Quintães, herdade (estate) of his father, Fructuoso Gonçalves de Sousa, of "limpo e nobre sangue" ("rightful heir and of noble decent"). Despite this substantial information, research in that town made by Maria Adelaide Pereira de Moraes, Dr. Manuela Alcântara and Dr. Isabel Sousa at the Alfredo Pimenta Municipal Archive, and by myself in a number of archives in Lisbon, brought to light any registers regarding the family or the birth of the "king of Pegu".
It is conceivable that Abreu Mouzinho misleadingly used data from manuscripts deposited in the Guimarães archives as primary sources for his book.
These archives are still the repository of a carta da quitação (acquittance document) from 1585 making reference to a certain Salvador Ribeiro, resident of Guimarães and son of a Gonçalo Anes. The name of Gonçalo Anes is mentioned in another document from 1572 but, bearing in mind that this was a common name in those times, it might not be the same person mentioned in the 1585 carta de quitação, but a homonymous entity. The same applies to Salvador Ribeiro and Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa.
In fact, the 1572 register establishes no connections whatsoever between Gonçalo Anes and a person or persons named Salvador Ribeiro or Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa. It is also pertinent to say that the only register of a Salvador Ribeiro in the Guimarães archives is this one. Further, that the said person is mentioned in carta de quitação as a "cutileiro" ("cutler") and signing it with a cross which reveals him to be illiterate and thus ascertains him not being the Salvador Ribeiro who lived in Burma. It must also be said that nothing supports the identity of either of the two above mentioned persons named Salvador; neither does their alleged nobility. The eventual notation of their names appearing incomplete is also inconclusive. In reality the family name of Sousa is not registered even once in the coeval registers of that freguesia (borough).
It is therefore reasonable to deduce that the identity of Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa was construed in the following manner: that due to the lack of further biographical data and [just] by selecting a Salvador Ribeiro contemporary of the other Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa, the Sousa descent was taken for granted; furthermore, that his place of birth not mentioned in the manuscript, could be established as being the same as that of the freguesia register of a Gonçalo Anes, his alleged father. A man homonymous of Gonçalo Anes being traced in Quintãs, borough of Santiago de Ronfe, was the best thing found in order to establish this link.
The determination of the affiliation and the place of birth of Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa remains conjectural. Since no credible alternative exists, the most rational option seems to maintain as 'open conjecture' Abreu Mouzinho's testimony, in the hope that future research might produce a credible documented solution to this dilemma.
The Nobiliário das Famílias de Portugal (Nobiliary of the Portuguese Families) gives the genealogy of the descendants of this adventurer and, curiously enough, the name of Salvador Dias Ribeiro — and not Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa — in it. That such an appellation refers to the same person seems to be sufficient proof of the similarity of names in a contemporary context and the written allusion that "seus feitos de armas na Índia e especialmente em Pegu." ("his military deeds in India and, especially in Pegu.").
His affiliation and place of birth will probably remain inconclusively ascertained due to the lack of national registers prior to 1580. According to found biographic records the "king of Pegu" was by then already grown up. Equally obscure is all information regarding his childhood, his departure to India which most likely took place around 1587 and the circumstances which might have taken him to venture to Burma.
Before leaving for Pegu, Salvador Ribeiro served for thirteen years as a soldier in the Portuguese State of India. According to Crown records of those times, Salvador Ribeiro seems to have been enlisted on board the Portuguese armadas patrolling the Malabar Coast. According to Abreu Mouzinho his travels on board Portuguese navy vessels took him from Mecca [Makkah] to the coasts of Ceylon [Sri Lanka]. The same source says that by the end of the sixteenth century, Salvador Ribeiro intended to return to Portugal to report to the Crown both the hardship of his duties and the death of two of his brothers killed in battle, in the Orient, fighting for the Portuguese Empire. Determined to return home in one of the naus of the Carreira da Índia ('Route of India') he boarded a vessel heading to Goa but navigation hazards impelled his vessel to the delta of the Ganges, north of the Bay of Bengal, where it dropped anchor on June 1600. From there, the Breve Discurso relates how he proceeded by sea to the southern coast of Burma, disembarking on the port of Syriam, not far from the town of Pegu.
§3. SALVADOR RIBEIRO IN BURMA, 1600-1603
The Breve Discurso's story of the accidental crossing of the Bay of Bengal is unlikely to be true. More plausible was that the vessel in which Salvador Ribeiro had sailed towards Arakan, an old kingdom on the western coast of Burma bordering Bengal. Being outside the range of influences of the Portuguese State of India, Arakan was an elected kingdom by the Portuguese adventurers. Not being under the control of Goan authorities, Portuguese adventurers enjoyed in Arakan an enterprising freedom. Not few were those who chose to settle there surviving as local merchants and even mercenaries of the local king. Filipe de Brito de Nicote was one of the better know Portuguese at the service of the kingdom of Arakan. Salvador Ribeiro was to become his military companion.
In 1600 a military expedition led by the Arakanese king Min Razagri raided Pegu, then the capital of the Second Burmese Empire. The ultimate end of this incursion was to overthrow the rival decadent Burmese Empire. Despite belonging to Burmese ethnics and culture the kingdom of Arakan had never joined the political faction of the Second Empire. In the 1600 military expedition, besides the Arakanese troop contingents a number of Portuguese mercenaries also participated. After the conquest of Pegu, the Arakanese sovereign returned with pomp and glory to his original kingdom, having the precaution to leave an Arakanese garrison in control of the recently conquered city.
It is therefore most likely that Salvador Ribeiro expressely joined the Arakanese troops at the border between Bengal and the Kingdom of Arakan, participating in the Pegu campaign. In fact, Jesuit sources clearly state that several Portuguese joined the Arakanese military in the Pegu campaign. What is certain is that Salvador Ribeiro was in Pegu during the assault and the loot of the city and that he joined the contingent of Portuguese mercenaries led by Filipe de Brito de Nicote becoming, in theory, part of this group of foreign vassals of the Arakanese king Min Razagri.
Once comfortably settled in Syriam these Portuguese adventurers with the help of the local minorities' populations (mainly those of the Mon ethnic) decided to rebel against Min Razagri's authority and, after neutralizing the Arakanese forces stationed in south Burma and the hostile powers who opposed their intentions, built a fortress. The Portuguese fight for military 'independence' coalesced with the uprising of the local minorities (mostly those of the Mon ethnic and language) against the Burmese rulers. The people were exhausted by the systematic destruction of their lands and belongings, a result of the constant fight of the last two decades (1580-1600) between the kingdom of Arakan and the Second Burmese Empire.
This emergence of Portuguese power on the Burmese meridional coast has been described by Abreu Mouzinho. His description of general facts is quite accurate. Placing a special emphasisis on the period between 1600 and 1603, Abreu Mouzinho relates in great detail the battles and skirmishes which took place between the Portuguese of Syriam and their opponents. His narrative vividly corresponds to the political and cultural reality of contemporary Burma.
Unfortunately, the Breve Discurso is less accurate in its accounts of Salvador Ribeiro. Contrary to all other contemporary Portuguese documentation and Burmese sources — even those which defile Nicote's action role during that period in Burma, Abreu Mouzinho undermines Nicote's military and political merits, attributing all laurels to Salvador Ribeiro.
The Breve Discurso implies that Filipe de Brito de Nicote gained much profit and was graced with honours that effectively were due to Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa. Without making proof of the contrary the text denounces as inaccurate other sources such as the letters of the Bishop of Cochin and the correspondence of the Viceroy of the Portuguese State of India, Aires the Saldanha, who attest the bravura and expediency of Nicote. Abreu Mouzinho speculates that the deeds of Salvador Ribeiro can be proved by conjectural letters which either have perished or have not yet been located.
It seems more likely that the adventurous hero of the Breve Dicurso was an attendant or, at the most, personal assistant to Filipe de Brito de Nicote. Nicote uncontestably was the leader of Syriam's 'independant' military organization and the brain behind the initiative of dispatching embassies with the express purpose to obtain support and recognition towards the Portuguese 'ruling' claims in Southern Burma. Implementing this policy, Nicote himself, or his envoys, were received by several rulers of different reigns which constituted, after 1600, the fragmented former Burmese Empire, and by the Viceroy of the Portuguese State of India, in Goa. Many recognized his supremacy over the lands under his control. Abreu Mouzinho invalidates the virtues of these diplomatic efforts calling "absentismo" ("absenteeism") to Nicote's ambassadorial digressions and inflamed the role of Salvador Ribeiro in the erection and defense of the Portuguese fortress at Syriam.
Abreu Mouzinho's reasons for Nicote's absence from Syriam lack credibility. According to him, Nicote was in Arakan as vedor da fazenda (income overseer) of Min Razagri. Other sources clearly mention that Nicote went to Arakan on a diplomatic mission, that he was the commander of the troops who disbanded Min Razagri's retaliation army and that he went as far as to raise several military contingents with the firm intention to invade the Arakanese kingdom.
§4. A PORTUGUESE KING IN PEGU
Despite all reservations regarding the validity of a number of points of the Breve Discurso, it is nonetheless disconcerting how Abreu Mouzinho described Ribeiro de Sousa as "King of Pegu".
It is particularly disconcerting because it directly clashes with contemporary Burmese sources. Can it be that the author was more concerned with details than general facts, thus being inaccurate about these? Although the reverse is usually more common, still, all suppositions remain speculative.
Abreu Mouzinho says that the "Banhas" (Portuguese adaptation of the Burmese word 'bayin', meaning 'minor king') and the "Ximins pegus" (Portuguese adaptation of the Mon word 'Shemin' meaning 'ruler') made known to the king of Toungoo their intention to claim Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa as " seu rei e senhor " (" their king and lord "). The king of Toungoo (a kingdom situated between Upper and Lower Burma) was the brother-in-law and the nomitated successor of the last emperor of the Second Burmese Empire who, before the Arracanese conquest of Pegu, had seized control of the city overthrowing the emperor and finally killing him. Abreu Mouzinho describes Salvador Ribeiro's coronation ceremony, stating that from Toungoo a royal emissary was sent with an escort of five hundred horses and a gold crown. In a public and solemn ceremony that the sound of traditional music instruments and before ground prostrated crowds, the Portuguese adventurer was crowned as "King Massinga of Pegu", an honour conferred on him for having mortally defeated the prince, holder of such a title.
The details of Abreu Mouzinho's narrative comply with traditional contemporary practices; i. e., that the newly elected king was offered a gold tray with a number of utensils destined for the preparation of betel chewing — betel being commonly offered as a token of great deference — and becoming entitled to travel under a "chapéu branco com cairel de ouro" ("white parasol with a fringe of gold") — an attribute of Buddhist royalty. He was also presented with pieces of orange-coloured damask, roses made of gold and a gastronomic delicacy exclusively tasted by kings. He was also offered gifts from the kings of Ava (a powerful kingdom in Upper Burma), of Jangoma [Chiengmai] (a kingdom those days under Burmese influence whose region now belongs to Thailand) and Prome [Piè or Pye] (an ancient Burmese kingdom near Toungoo).
The description continues, stating that after the return of Filipe de Brito Nicote the "Massinga" altruistically renounced the throne, the title of king and all awarded honours in favour of his companion. Apparently this was in part due to Nicote having returned from Goa in possession of the title of "capitão geral do Sirião e das partes de Pegu" ("Captain-General of Syriam an the lands of Pegu") given by the Viceroy of the Portuguese State of India. This was the equivalent of saying that Nicote was under the tutelage of the Viceroy and ultimately, under the sovereignty of the king of Portugal.
Although there are no proofs to confirm such affirmation there are records of the tacit doação (donation) of the reinos (kingdoms) of Pegu to the Portuguese authorities. In 1608, king Filipe II of Portugal (Felipe III of Spain) assumed himself as king of Pegu in the belief of having been elected as such by the naturais (natives), by proxy of Filipe de Brito de Nicote — and not Salvador Ribeiro. The king based himself in Nicote's statement that, of his own accord, he had renounced the throne in favour of the Portuguese (and Spanish) monarch. Despite this adventurer and mercenary not always keeping to his word of honour it seems that, in this case, his allegations were well founded. Let us not forget that Nicote had, in the past, not only betrayed the trust of the government of the Portuguese State of India but also, after being at the service of the Arakanese king, rebelled against his cause. The fact that the "Captain-General" was indeed considered as a local ruler is corroborated by Mon and Burmese chronicles who unanimously describe him as king of Syriam for a period of twelve years.
Although it is not within the ambit of this article to follow Nicote's career until his death in Syriam, attention must be drawn to the fact that besides archeological evidence in Burma, both local reports directly related to other events and European chronicles and descriptions conclusively reaffirm circumstancial evidence pertaining to that period. Nicote, known as Nga Zinga in the local contemporary reports, remains 'registered' as "King" in the official documentation of Portugal, Spain and Burma, in the reports of Catholic missionaries in the East, and in the Oriental chronicles of Italian, English, Dutch and French travelers, well after the departure of Ribeiro de Sousa to the kingdom of Portugal.
But probably the most important written source about Nicote is an inscription on a Burmese pagoda relating his rule in Syriam and his death by Anaukhpet-lun, the powerful king of Ava, the founder of the Third Burmese Empire and the unifier of Upper and Lower Burma.
By the time Nicote died in Burma, in 1612 or 1613, Salvador Ribeiro had already been back in Portugal for approximately a decade. A document dated from 1607 and entitled Questão àcerca do direito do reino de Pegu e como pode pertecer a Sua Majestade (Quest upon the right to the kingdom of Pegu and how Your Majesty is entitled to it) does not even mention Salvador Ribeiro amongst the names of other Portuguese relevant to the history of Burma and a number of important Burmese high dignitaries and entities. This lengthy and erudite manuscript, which aims to legitimize the Portuguese sovereignty in Pegu on the light of European Laws, clearly defines the rule of Nicote in Burma.
Salvador Ribeiro is only rarely mentioned in all the previously referred documents and, those who do mention him, do it in passim. Not withstanding, remains the unlikely and inconsistent hypothesis that two renouncements of sovereignty of the rights to the throne of Pegu might have taken place: firstly, that of Salvador Ribeiro in favour of Nicote and secondly, that of Nicote in favour of king Filipe II of Portugal.
§5. RETURN TO PORTUGAL
Neither Abreu Mouzinho nor any known source mention the reasons which might have led Salvador Ribeiro to leave Burma, in 1603.
Several manuscripts which testify to his return to Portugal mention a number of his military deeds and the secondary role he played in Burma.
Well before the departure of Salvador Ribeiro, the Portuguese authorities lauded Nicote's military achievements in Burma offering him the membership of the Order of Christ and a tença (annuity) of one hundred and fifty pardaus in return for the recognition of the fortress of Syriam to be part of Portugal's Overseas Empire. Several months later the Portuguese State of India awarded Nicote the title of "Captain General of Syriam and the lands of Pegu" dispatched to the fortress a Crown regiment. The name of Salvador Ribeiro is not listed in the regiment's roll because by then he had already returned to Portugal. In 1604 the tença was confirmed to Nicote, in 1607 the title of "Captain General" was granted to him and all his successors. In 1608 Nicote was made a noble of the kingdom of Portugal and granted use of a coat-of-arms.
So far I have been unable to trace any document testifying the presence of Salvador Ribeiro in Portugal, from 1603 to 1607. From 1607 to 1622, the military career of the presumed "King of Pegu" can be clearly traced through number of papeis (papers) and petições (petitions). From these it can be ascertained that his presence in Burma was considerably shorter than Nicote's and his military feats less impressive. In these papeis and petições Salvador Ribeiro merely declared:
1. Participating in the defense of the Portuguese fortress of Syriam,
2. Receiving a wound in his face in local combat, and
3. Killing many Burmese and one of their princes.
There is no trace in these papeis of his acclamation ceremony as "King of Massinga", as described by Abreu Mouzinho. The substantial benefits that such a position might have granted him are in practise contradicted by the late mercês (indulgences) and the minor honours he was later bestowed in Portugal.
After a number of petições, merits were finally awarded Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa. For his thirteen years of service in India and three in Pegu, he was granted in succession the following alvarás (guarantees):
1. The membership of the Order of Christ with a tença of two hundred cruzados, and
2. The promessa de comenda (commendatory promise) of one hundred and fifty thousand reis, paid in India upon his presence in those lands.
Despite Salvador Ribeiro never fulfilling this last condition, a manuscript dated from 1622 stated that he was awarded the comenda (commend) of Santo Eurício [Port.] and São Fins [Port.] from the Bishopric of Lamego [northern Portugal]. This is the last document I found about the "King of Pegu".
[CONCLUSION]
According to a commemorative inscription stone embedded on one of the outer elevations of the building, "1623" marks the end of reconstruction works of the Franciscan Oratory of St. Catherine of the Martyrs, in the town of Alenquer. The small chapter house of this oratory has a tombstone and a lapidary plaque with chiselled inscriptions alluding to Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa.
The early seventeenth century restoration of the oratory was financed by several entities. Coeval Franciscan chronicles relate contributions from the king, some noblemen of the court, anonymous patrons and, specially, that of Salvador Ribeiro de Sousa who donated for this purpose the sum of three hundred seventy thousand reis. Most probably, his extraordinary high donation was instrumental in his being later buried in the chapter house adjacent to the cloister and his memory eulogized with an inscription where it is written his having been elected "elected King of Pegu." The tombstone which carries such a statement was originally leveled with the floor of the adjacent chapter house. To the left of this tombstone there is an allusive lapidary slab to Salvador Ribeiro on which was chiseled the following phrase:
"Tem de obrigação missa cotidiana conforme contracto que fez. Pede um Padre Nosso e uma Ave Maria, com responso na missa"
("According to the made contract has for granted a daily mass. Request a Holy Father and a Holy Mary during the mass, with respondence")
Both these lapidary inscriptions were removed and placed on the wall facing the entrance of the chapter house flanking a small altar. Despite this and other efforts to preserve these inscriptions to the maximum they are presently quite deteriorated. It seems that around 1840 they were thoroughly restored and later on this century, possibly during the 1960s according to reminiscences of the local people. A renewed attempt to preserve the inscriptions led the municipal services to fill the grooves of the lettering with a black mortar, which has now mostly fallen.
The small chapter house such as it stands today, is a small chamber barely lit through the archway which separates it from the cloister, its interior being so dark that the reading of the inscriptions is impossible at bare sight.
The ruinous state of the chapter house is enhanced by heaps of stacked old benches, peeling layers of wall paper, rusty buckets and bicycles, and multiple other objects leaning against the tombstone and the lapidary slab. Worst or all, are the miserable conditions of slime and wetness of its walls and floor, partially due to the cloister being used as a water relief of the multiple habitations which surround it, partially due to the infiltrations of a river which runs in its vicinity.
All those who might be interested to see the stone memorials and the quaint Franciscan oratory where the lapidary inscribed references to the "King of Pegu" still barely survive, please note that:
1. This diminutive Franciscan oratory sits-in the lower part of the town near its river and should not be confused with the Convento de São Francisco de Alenquer (Convent of St. Francis of Alenquer) in the upper part of town, and
2. The oratory is now permanently closed. At present, access to it can be obtained either by applying at the town's municipality or contacting professor António Rodrigues Guapo or Fr. José Eduardo Martins, in Alenquer.
I finalize with a word of warning to all those who might still be interested in visiting the site: make haste, otherwise you will most probably see no more than ruins of these ruins.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My research on the Portuguese in Burma has been supported by the Fundação Oriente (Orient Foundation) and the Instituto Cultural de Macau (Cultural Institute of Macao). Regarding this article in particular I would like to express my gratitude to: in Paris, the historian Vivian Ba, member of staff of the Burmese Embassy; in Guimarães, Maria Adelaide Pereira de Moraes of the Alberto Sampaio Museum, and Dr. Isabel Sousa director of the Alfredo Pimenta Municipal Archive; and in Alenquer, professor António Rodrigues Guapo, council member José Maurício, and Isabel Portugal, for her assistance in photographing the convent and its tombstones.
Translated from the Portuguese by: Carlos Figueredo
See: SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY — for the following authors and further titles for authors already mentioned in this article.
BA, Vivian; CALDAS, A. Ferreira; Chancelarias da Ordem de Cristo (ANTT); FURNIVALL, J. S.; GAYO, M. J. da Costa Felgueiras; GUEDES, Maria Ana Marques; HENRIQUES, Guilherme J. C.; IGNATIUS-THIRIZEDAYATKYAW; LEAL, Augusto Soares de Azevedo Barbosa de Pinho; Livro do Tabelião Cristóvão de Azeredo (AMAP); MARTINS, J. F. F.; MELO, António de Oliveira - GUAPO, António Rodrigues - MARTINS, José Eduardo; MOUZINHO, Manuel de Abreu; MOUZINHO, Manuel de Abreu, CAETANO, Maria Paula, intro; MOUZINHO, Manuel de Abreu, MacGREGOR, A., trans.; SARMENTO, J. P. Moraes; SOLEDADE, Fernando da - ESPERANÇA, Manoel da.
* Ph. D. from the Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas (Faculty of Social and Human Sciences) of the Universidade Nova de Lisboa (New University of Lisbon), Lisbon. Researcher on the History of the Discoveries and Portuguese Expansion.
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