Goa was ruled by a break-away branch of the Kadamba dynasty belonging to native Kannada language speakers of Karnataka.

A Igreja de Nossa Senhora da Ajuda or The Church of Our Lady of Help (i.e. Auxiliatrix Christianorum or Perpetual Succour) was built on the banks of the Mandovi River in 1565.

Ribandar is associated with the later life of Antonio Francisco Xavier Alvares (1836–1923), a disgruntled Catholic priest that left for the Syrian Orthodox Church, and was made Metropolitan of Goa, Ceylon and Greater India.

Alvares consecrated Joseph René Vilatte (1854–1929) and thus is the person from whom most Old Catholic bishops in the West claim apostolic succession.

Shri Gurunath V. Shetye (1923-2018) was the founding principal of Bal Bharati Vidyamandir, the first high school in Ribandar and nearby villages after Goa liberation.