Kunjali Marakkar

The 16th century writer Zainuddin Makhdoom II who wrote the Tuhfat-ul-Mujahideen stated in 1524 that the Marakkars had turned against the Portuguese when the latter disrupted the former's trade networks by purchasing spices and commodities directly from local people in Kochi.

[4] In 1525 Portuguese established a fortress in calicut a fleet of Zamorin ships under the command of kutty ahmed ali bombarded the fort.

[5] later that year entered the port of Cochin setting fire to number of Portuguese vessels and returned safely to Calicut.

He was the greatest exponent of the Moorish superstition and enemy of the Christians in all Malabar, and for those taken captive at sea and brought thither he invented the most exquisite kinds of torture when he martyred them.

One of these was Chinale, a Chinese, who had been a servant at Malacca, and said to have been the captive of a Portuguese, taken as a boy from a fusta, and afterwards brought to Kunhali, who conceived such an affection for him that he trusted him with everything.

[citation needed] As he was then at the brink of a hole, the Chief Captain was in risk of falling therein, had not his arm been seized by Padre Fr.

All this time the obstructions in the river, and the deficiency of boats, had kept Luiz da Gama a mere spectator of the scene, unable either to direct or to succour.

The body of the brave Luiz da Sylva had been got into a boat, wrapped in his flag, which a captain had torn from its standard, in order to conceal the fact of his fall.

It is further stated by de Couto, who talked the matter over with Kunhali and his lieutenant, Chinale, when they were in the Goa prison, that the loss of the besieged exceeded 500 men.The sorrow and vexation of Luiz da Gama at the death of his brave captain and the miscarriage of the whole enterprise were unbounded.