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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1920 Excerpt: …of the Arrakanese naval power by the infusion of a foreign element. These were the Portuguese adventurers and their half-caste offspring. As early as 1517 the first Portuguese ship had touched at Arrakan and received an invitation to trade. In 1532 a closer intercourse sprang up: big ships of the foreigners began to visit the country, and, though Portuguese ad-they at first Pandered the coast venturers in villages, friendlier relations were Arrakan.., i-, soon formed. Portuguese soldiers of fortune took service under the local Rajah and rose to great influence and power. The Portuguese traders made some settlements on the coast, especially at Dianga (22 miles south of Chatgaon town) and Syriam, at the mouth of the Pegu river. But these were private men unauthorised by their sovereign’s representative in India. Their main occupation was piracy in the Bay of Bengal, varied by service as mercenary soldiers and private trade in salt and such other com Early history of Arrakan in Phayre’s History of Burma, 77-79, 172. Fathiyah, Continuation, I54b-i56a, 164a, 176a &-b, (previous encounters between the Arrakanese and the Mughal governors). Riyaz-us-salatin is silent. Stewart’s History of Bengal, Sec. vi. CH. XXXII. PORTUGUESE ADVENTURERS. 223 modities. Their power, by reason of its isolation from the government of their mother country, was easily broken by the local princes, and they failed to found any independent colony in these parts. In 1607 the king of Arrakan took Dianga and massacred the foreign settlers. The most notorious of these pirates, Sebastian Gonzalves. Tibao, seized Sondip and two other islands at the head of the Bay of Bengal and created a reign of terror at the mouths of the Ganges by the range and boldness of his depredations, t…
