Appendix C: The Seaports of Bengal

WHEN Portuguese writers of the sixteenth century speak of a voyage to Bengal they usually refer either to the Great (grande), or to the Little (pequeno), Porto. These names were adopted by writers of other nations (e.g. porto piqueno in Purchas, II. x. 1736), and the missionaries latinised them as Portus Magnus and Portus Parvus (e.g. Hay, 728 ff.). The word porto in these names seem to have been usually taken as the equivalent of the English “port,” and hence modern writers have looked for only two important seaports in sixteenth-century Bengal; when this view is taken, the literature of the period leads at once to the identifi- cation of Hooghly (or Satgaon, which was close to it) as the “Small Port,” and of Chittagong as the “Great Port,” as is done by the authors of Hobson-Jobson. I believe this view to be mistaken. It seems to me that the word porto, in the mouths of seafaring Portuguese at this period, referred primarily to a gap in the coast-line, and not, as landsmen are apt to assume, a town on the sea-shore ; in other words, porto might signify a gulf or estuary, which might contain several seaports. Modern Portuguese dictionaries recognise this meaning of the word, but their authority is not of great importance in a matter of the kind; my view that it is the primary meaning is based mainly on the language of Father F. Fernandus, a Jesuit missionary who was sent to Bengal in 1598 to attempt the reformation of the Portuguese settlements. His letter describing his journey is printed in Hay, 727 ff.

Fernandus embarked at Cochin for the portus parvus (sic enim vocant); the words in parenthesis indicate that he was giving the current name (Porto pequeno) of his destination. After describing various anxieties on the sea voyage, he speaks of a greater danger within the portus, when the ship ran aground; they succeeded, however, in getting off the shoal, and then after sailing for eight days, still in the portus, reached the Portuguese" station " ¹ of Hooghly. It is clear, therefore, that Fernand us meant by portus the river, and not the town, of Hooghly, and I think it is equally clear that he must have taken his nomenclature from ordinary Portuguese, whether sailors on the ship or the men among whom he worked on land ; he cannot have invented these names, and there is no reason to suppose that he did not follow the ordinary usage. Thus Porto pequeno does not neces- sarily signify any single town, but may denote the river Hooghly, on which Calcutta now stands.

After some months’ stay, Fernand us went on to the Portus magnus ; this was not a sea voyage, because he mentions the danger from tigers on the way, and doubtless his boat travelled by some of the inland waterways. He first reached Sripur, which he describes as a " station " belonging to the Portus magnus, and he dated his letter from this place, but he added a postscript to announce his arrival at Chittagong, also a " station " in the Portus magnus. Thus Fernand us certainly did not mean only Chittagong when he wrote portus magnus ; the expression covered both Chittagong and Sripur. The situation of Chittagong is well known ; that of Sripur is fixed by Fitch’s description of his visit to Sonargaon, ² the eastern capital of Bengal (Purchas, II. x. 1737). Sripur was on the " river of Ganges " and was six leagues from Sonargaon ; it was a sea-going port, for Fitch sailed thence on a small ship for Pegu. Thus in the language used by Fernand us the Porto grande extended at any rate from the Karnaphuli river to the immediate neighbourhood of Dacca, and since he was probably using terms in their current meaning, we are not bound to limit the expression to any single port. The use of the expression becomes clear if we look at a map of the Bay of Bengal, and remember that the Portuguese came to Bengal by sea. On the left they would have the estuary of the Hooghly (Porto pequeno) : on the right lay that of the Meghna stretching from the Backergunje district to Chittagong, and the whole of this constitutes the Porto grande. It may well have included numerous other ports in the landsman’s sense of the word, but in any case it included both Chittagong and Sripur. We are not therefore bound to say that Bengal had only two seaports ; it had, and has, two estuaries, with room for an indefinite number of seaports within them, and at the end of the sixteenth century there were at least three of sufficient importance to be noticed by our authorities, Hooghly on the river of the same name, Sripur some distance up the Meghna, and Chittagong.

This primary use of the word Porto was not, however, universal at our period ; Fitch, for instance, definitely identifies the town of Satgaon with Porto Pequeno (Purchas, II. x. 1736), and some other writers can be read in the same way. The change in meaning may, I think, be attributed to the fact that the Portuguese did not to any great extent trade directly with Sripur ; their communications were with either Hooghly or Chittagong, that is, with only one " station " in each porto, and in these circumstances the transfer of the name from the porto to the " station " might easily take place, just as " the Mersey " has become almost a synonym for Liverpool. The passages cited from Fernandus show, however, that up to the end of the sixteenth century the derivative meaning had not been universally adopted, and justify the view that porto may be read as estuary in any case where this interpretation is consistent with the context.

The question will naturally be asked which of these seaports represents the " city of Bengala " described by Barbosa at the beginning of the century. My own opinion is that Barbosa was referring to Sonargaon with its adjacent port, but the question is too intricate to be discussed here, and readers may wisely suspend judgment until the completion of Mr. Longworth Dames' translation of Barbosa.

Notes