Mangalorean Catholics () are an ethno-religious community of Latin Catholics from the Diocese of Mangalore and the erstwhile South Canara area, by the southwestern coast of present-day Karnataka, India.
Contemporary Mangalorean Catholics descend mainly from the New Christians of Portuguese Goa, who migrated to South Canara between 1560 and 1763, throughout the courses of the Goan Inquisition, the Portuguese–Adil Shahi War & the Mahratta Invasion of Goa and Bombay. They learned Tulu and Kanarese whilst in Canara, but retained the Konkani language and preserved much of their Konkani way of life, which had undergone Christianisation in Goa. Their 15-year-long captivity at Seringapatam imposed by Tippu Sultan, the de facto ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore, brought the burgeoning community close to decimation. Following Tippu's defeat and death in the Siege of Seringapatam (1799) by the British East India Company, the Nizam of Hyderabad & other allies; most of them resettled in South Canara during the Company rule in India, a lesser number sailed to the seven islands of Bombay and its adjacent metropolitan area in the northern Konkan region, for higher studies and in search of superior careers.
Although early assertions of a distinct identity date from the migration period, a fully formed Mangalorean Catholic identity emerged only after liberation from captivity, which has been a mix of Mangalorean and Goan cultures. The younger generation of present days at Poona, Bangalore & the Bombay metro area; and the diaspora in Persian Gulf countries and the Anglosphere, can be described as an increasingly anglo-americanised Konkani sub-culture with a lingering Portuguese Christian influence and design.
Ethnic identity
The community gets its name from the Mangalore Diocesean adherents of the Latin Church in India, located by the southwestern coast of India. It comprises the present day civil districts of Dakshina Kannada and Udipi district in Karnataka state, and Kassergode in Kerala state. This area was collectively referred to as South Canara in British India, and then from the partition until the reorganisation (1956) of states and territories of India.
In 1526, Portuguese in Goa and Bombay arrived in Mangalore, and the number of local converts to Christianity slowly increased. However, a sizeable Christian population did not exist there until the second half of the 16th century, when there was a large-scale immigration of Christians from Goa to South Canara. They were reluctant to learn the local languages of South Canara and continued to speak Konkani, so that local Christians (Padvals) had to learn Konkani to converse with them. After this migration, the skilled Goan Catholic agriculturists were offered various land grants by the native Bednore rulers of South Canara. They observed their cultural Hindu customs in conjunction with the newfound Western Catholic faith, and preserved their lifestyle.
Most migrants were people from the lower economic strata who had been left out of government and economic jobs; their lands had been confiscated due to heavy taxation under the Portuguese in Goa. As a consequence of the wealth and privileges which these Goan migrants enjoyed in Mangalore, they began feeling superior to their landless kindred in Goa. Their captivity at Seringapatam (1784–1799), where many died, were killed, or were forcibly converted to Sunni Islam, led to the formation of a separate and common cultural identity among members of the group, who had previously considered themselves an extension of Goans. They no longer self-identified as Goan Catholics. Historian Alan Machado Prabhu estimates that almost 95 per cent of Mangalorean Catholics have Goan origins.
History
Pre-migration era
All records of an early existence of Christians in South Canara were lost at the time of their deportation by Tipu Sultan in 1784. Hence, it is not known exactly when Christianity was introduced in South Canara, although it is possible that Syrian Christians settled in South Canara, just as they did in Kerala, a state just south of Canara. The Italian traveller Marco Polo recorded that there were considerable trading activities between the Red Sea and the Canara coast in the 13th century. It can be surmised that foreign Christian merchants were visiting the coastal towns of South Canara during that period for commerce; it is possible some Christian priests might have accompanied them for evangelistic work.