1885.—"The village (of Wai in the Moluccas) is laid out in rectangular plots.... One of its chief edifices is the Gredja, whose grandeur quite overwhelmed us; for it is far more elaborately decorated than many a rural parish church at home."—H. O. Forbes, A Naturalist's Wanderings, p. 294.
GOA, n.p. Properly Gowa, Gova, Mahr. Goven, [which the Madras Gloss. connects with Skt. go, 'a cow,' in the sense of the 'cowherd country']. The famous capital of the Portuguese dominions in India since its capture by Albuquerque in 1510. In earlier history and geography the place appears under the name of [Sindābūr] or Sandābūr (Sundāpūr?) (q.v.). Govā or Kuva was an ancient name of the southern Konkan (see in H. H. Wilson's Works, Vishnu Purana, ii. 164, note 20). We find the place called by the Turkish admiral Sidi 'Ali Gowai-Sandābūr, which may mean "Sandābūr of Gova."
1391.—In a copper grant of this date (S. 1313) we have mention of a chief city of Kankan (see [CONCAN]) called Gowa and Gowāpūra. See the grant as published by Major Legrand Jacob in J. Bo. Br. B. As. Soc. iv. 107. The translation is too loose to make it worth while to transcribe a quotation; but it is interesting as mentioning the reconquest of Goa from the Turushkas, i.e. Turks or foreign Mahommedans. We know from Ibn Batuta that Mahommedan settlers at Hunāwar had taken the place about 1344.
1510 (but referring to some years earlier). "I departed from the city of Dabuli aforesaid, and went to another island which is about a mile distant from the mainland and is called Goga.... In this island there is a fortress near the sea, walled round after our manner, in which there is sometimes a captain who is called Savaiu, who has 400 mamelukes, he himself being also a mameluke."—Varthema, 115-116.
c. 1520.—"In the Island of Tissoury, in which is situated the city of Goa, there are 31 [aldeas], and these are as follows...."—In Archiv. Port. Orient., fasc. 5.
c. 1554.—"At these words (addressed by the Vizir of Guzerat to a Portuguese Envoy) my wrath broke out, and I said: 'Malediction! You have found me with my fleet gone to wreck, but please God in his mercy, before long, under favour of the Pādshāh, you shall be driven not only from Hormuz, but from Diu and Gowa too!'"—Sidi 'Ali Kapudān, in J. Asiat. Ser. I. tom. ix. 70.
1602.—"The island of Goa is so old a place that one finds nothing in the writings of the Canaras (to whom it always belonged) about the beginning of its population. But we find that it was always so frequented by strangers that they used to have a proverbial saying: 'Let us go and take our ease among the cool shades of Goe moat,' which in the old language of the country means 'the cool fertile land.'"—Couto, IV. x. cap. 4.
1648.—"All those that have seen Europe and Asia agree with me that the Port of Goa, the Port of Constantinople, and the Port of Toulon, are three of the fairest Ports of all our vast continent."—Tavernier, E.T. ii. 74; [ed. Ball, i. 186].
GOA PLUM. The fruit of Parinarium excelsum, introduced at Goa from Mozambique, called by the Portuguese Matomba. "The fruit is almost pure brown sugar in a paste" (Birdwood, MS.).
GOA POTATO. Dioscorea aculeata (Birdwood, MS.).