Portuguese conquest of Goa: Portuguese naval forces under the command of Afonso de Albuquerque, and local mercenaries working for privateer Timoji, seize Goa from the Bijapur Sultanate, resulting in 451 years of Portuguese colonial rule.
Portuguese conquest of Goa
The Portuguese conquest of Goa occurred when the governor Afonso de Albuquerque captured the city in 1510 from the Sultanate of Bijapur. Old Goa became the capital of Portuguese India, which included territories such as Fort Manuel of Cochin, Bom Bahia, Damaon, and Chaul. It was not among the places Albuquerque was supposed to conquer. He did so after he was offered the support and guidance of Timoji and his troops.
Afonso de Albuquerque
Afonso de Albuquerque, 1st Duke of Goa, was a Portuguese general, admiral, statesman and conquistador. He served as viceroy of Portuguese India from 1509 to 1515, during which he expanded Portuguese influence across the Indian Ocean and built a reputation as a fierce and skilled military commander.
Timoji
Timoji was a privateer and pirate who served the Vijayanagara Empire and the Portuguese Empire, in the first decade of the 16th century. He claimed to have been born in Velha Goa and escaped the city in 1496, during the conquest by the Adil Shahi dynasty of Bijapore. After his support in the 1510 Portuguese conquest of Goa, he was appointed aguazil of the city, for a short time.
Sultanate of Bijapur
The Sultanate of Bijapur was an early modern kingdom in the western Deccan and South India, ruled by the Muslim Adil Shahi dynasty. Bijapur had been a taraf (province) of the Bahmani Kingdom prior to its independence in 1490 and before the kingdom's political decline in the last quarter of the 15th century. It was one of the Deccan sultanates, the collective name of the kingdom's five successor states. The Sultanate of Bijapur was one of the most powerful states on the Indian Subcontinent at its peak, second to the Mughal Empire which conquered it in 1686 under Aurangzeb.