Pêro de Anaia or Pedro d'Anaya or Anhaya or da Nhaya or da Naia (died March 1506) was a Castilian- Portuguese 16th-century knight, who established and became the first captain-major of the Portuguese Fort São Caetano in

Sofala Sofala, at present known as Nova Sofala, used to be the chief seaport of the Mwenemutapa Kingdom, whose capital was at Mount Fura. It is located on the Sofala Bank in Sofala Province of Mozambique. It was founded by Somali merchants. This name wa ...

, and thus the first colonial governor of Portuguese East Africa (Mozambique).

Background

According to chronicler

João de Barros João de Barros () (1496 – 20 October 1570), called the ''Portuguese Livy'', is one of the first great Portuguese historians, most famous for his ''Décadas da Ásia'' ("Decades of Asia"), a history of the Portuguese in India, Asia, and southea ...

, Pêro de Anaia was the son of Castilian nobleman Diego de Anaya, who fought in the Castilian civil war of the 1470s for the Beltraneja party, alongside King

Afonso V of Portugal Afonso V () (15 January 1432 – 28 August 1481), known by the sobriquet the African (), was King of Portugal from 1438 until his death in 1481, with a brief interruption in 1477. His sobriquet refers to his military conquests in Northern Africa. ...

.Barros (v.2, p.360) He moved or was exiled to

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

at the conclusion of that war. His son Pêro de Anaia became a knight of the Portuguese king's household.

Expedition to Sofala

In early 1505, King

Manuel I of Portugal Manuel I (; 31 May 146913 December 1521), known as the Fortunate ( pt, O Venturoso), was King of Portugal from 1495 to 1521. A member of the House of Aviz, Manuel was Duke of Beja and Viseu prior to succeeding his cousin, John II of Portugal, a ...

assigned Pêro de Anaia the duty of establishing a permanent Portuguese fortress and

factory A factory, manufacturing plant or a production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. T ...

in the East African town of

, at that time a reluctant vassal of the

Kilwa Sultanate The Kilwa Sultanate ( fa, پادشاهی کیلوا) was a sultanate, centered at Kilwa Kisiwani, Kilwa (an island off modern-day, Kilwa District in Lindi Region of Tanzania), whose authority, at its height, stretched over the entire length of t ...

and major entrepot for the

Monomatapa The Kingdom of Mutapa – sometimes referred to as the Mutapa Empire, Mwenemutapa, ( sn, Mwene we Mutapa, pt, Monomotapa) – was an African kingdom in Zimbabwe, which expanded to what is now modern-day Mozambique. The Portuguese term ''Mono ...

gold trade. In late March 1505 Anaia set out with his own ship, the ''Sant'Iago'' (also called the ''Nuncia'') as part of the 7th Portuguese India Armada commanded by D. Francisco de Almeida. However, Anaia's ship floundered in the

Tagus The Tagus ( ; es, Tajo ; pt, Tejo ; see #Name, below) is the longest river in the Iberian Peninsula. The river rises in the Montes Universales near Teruel, in mid-eastern Spain, flows , generally west with two main south-westward sections ...

estuary upon departure, and he was forced to return to

Lisbon Lisbon (; pt, Lisboa ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 544,851 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km2. Grande Lisboa, Lisbon's urban area extends beyond the city's administr ...

. A new expedition was quickly assembled, and Anaia set out again on 18 May 1505, this time at the head of his own six-ship

squadron Squadron may refer to: * Squadron (army), a military unit of cavalry, tanks, or equivalent subdivided into troops or tank companies * Squadron (aviation), a military unit that consists of three or four flights with a total of 12 to 24 aircraft, de ...

bound for Sofala, carrying much building equipment. After arriving in

in early September 1505, his squadron more-or-less intact, Pêro de Anaia secured permission from the ruling sheikh Isuf of

for permission to erect a Portuguese fortress and factory in the island-city.

Captain of Sofala

By November 1505 the perimeter of the Portuguese Fort São Caetano of Sofala was essentially finished and Pêro de Anaia opened the royal credentials assuming the title of ''Capitão-Mor'' (Captain-Major) of the fortress and garrison. Fort São Caetano was first permanent Portuguese

colony In modern parlance, a colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule. Though dominated by the foreign colonizers, colonies remain separate from the administration of the original country of the colonizers, the ''metropole, metropolit ...

East Africa East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territories make up Eastern Africa: Due to the historical ...

, and the kernel of what was to become the Portuguese colonial province of

Mozambique Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...

. Consequently, Pêro de Anaia, being the first 'Captain of Sofala', is generally considered the first Portuguese colonial governor of Mozambique. As per his instructions, in late January or early February 1506, Pêro de Anaia dispatched four of his ships to

Portuguese India The State of India ( pt, Estado da Índia), also referred as the Portuguese State of India (''Estado Português da Índia'', EPI) or simply Portuguese India (), was a state of the Portuguese Empire founded six years after the discovery of a se ...

. He placed the remaining two

caravel The caravel (Portuguese: , ) is a small maneuverable sailing ship used in the 15th century by the Portuguese to explore along the West African coast and into the Atlantic Ocean. The lateen sails gave it speed and the capacity for sailing win ...

s under his son,

Francisco de Anaia Francisco is the Spanish and Portuguese form of the masculine given name ''Franciscus''. Nicknames In Spanish, people with the name Francisco are sometimes nicknamed "Paco". San Francisco de Asís was known as ''Pater Comunitatis'' (father of ...

, to serve a local coastal patrol (The younger Anaia had a commission as ''capitão-mor do mar de Sofala''). The beginnings of Fort Sofala were difficult. The Portuguese soon found out they had little or no means to procure food and other supplies. Moreover, being situated on a

mangrove swamp Mangrove forests, also called mangrove swamps, mangrove thickets or mangals, are productive wetlands that occur in coastal intertidal zones. Mangrove forests grow mainly at tropical and subtropical latitudes because mangroves cannot withstand fre ...

, fevers (probably

malaria Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects humans and other animals. Malaria causes symptoms that typically include fever, tiredness, vomiting, and headaches. In severe cases, it can cause jaundice, seizures, coma, or death. S ...

and/or

yellow fever Yellow fever is a viral disease of typically short duration. In most cases, symptoms include fever, chills, loss of appetite, nausea, muscle pains – particularly in the back – and headaches. Symptoms typically improve within five days. In ...

) quickly overwhelmed most of the Portuguese garrison. To cap their misfortunes, the hapless younger Anaia crashed both the patrol ships on

shoal In oceanography, geomorphology, and geoscience, a shoal is a natural submerged ridge, bank, or bar that consists of, or is covered by, sand or other unconsolidated material and rises from the bed of a body of water to near the surface. It ...

s near Mozambique, leaving Fort Sofala without means of securing external supplies or communication. It was precisely at this moment of great weakness, in late February or early March 1506, that a group of Sofalese nobles who had opposed the Portuguese presence, induced a mainland

Bantu Bantu may refer to: *Bantu languages, constitute the largest sub-branch of the Niger–Congo languages *Bantu peoples, over 400 peoples of Africa speaking a Bantu language * Bantu knots, a type of African hairstyle *Black Association for National ...

chieftain Moconde to lead an assault on the weakened Portuguese fort. Pêro de Anaia defended the fort with his handful of remaining healthy soldiers, bolstered by a number of Swahili auxiliaries. The besiegers were scattered. In the aftermath, Anaia broke into the royal palace and killed sheikh Isuf of Sofala for conspiring in the treachery (it is said the sheikh Isuf, a blind octogenarian, threw his sword at the sound of footsteps, and managed to wound Anaia, before being himself killed.) The next day, a revenge attack on Fort Sofala broke down, when rival Sofalese nobles began to quarrel with each other for succession. Somehow Pêro de Anaia managed to play the role of arbitrator, and secured the installation of Isuf's son, Suleiman, as the new sheikh of Sofala. Suleiman promptly put an end to Sofalese intrigues against the Portuguese. Pêro de Anaia, however, did not survive long. In early March 1506, just a few days after the Bantu assault on the fort, Anaia himself fell victim to the

l fevers and died at

. The Portuguese factor, Manuel Fernandes de Meireles, apparently the only European man immune to the fevers, was elected by what remained of the sick garrison as acting captain of Sofala.

Aftermath

In June 1506, two Portuguese ships of Cide Barbudo and Pedro Quaresma arrived in Sofala, hoping to deliver letters from King Manuel I with new instructions for Anaia. They found Fort Sofala in a terrible shape, most of the garrison dead or dying of fevers and starving for food. Leaving Quaresma behind to bolster the fort and procure relief, Barbudo rushed to

to deliver his report to the vice-roy D. Francisco de Almeida. Hearing of the disastrous conditions, Almeida dispatched Nuno Vaz Pereira to assume the capitaincy of Sofala at the end of 1506 and do what he could to restore its conditions. Pereira was superseded in September 1507 by

Vasco Gomes de Abreu Vasco may refer to: * Basque language, called ''vasco'' in Spanish * ''Vasco'' (album), a two-part EP by Ricardo Villalobos * Vasco da Gama, Portuguese explorer * Vasco da Gama, Goa, a city in India, often called simply Vasco * Club de Regatas Va ...

, who had been sent directly by the king from Lisbon. Abreu took command of Sofala, and directed operations to capture nearby

Mozambique Island The Island of Mozambique ( pt, Ilha de Moçambique) lies off northern Mozambique, between the Mozambique Channel and Mossuril Bay, and is part of Nampula Province. Prior to 1898, it was the capital of colonial Portuguese East Africa. With its ric ...

, which had a much more suitable harbor than the shoals-clogged Sofala. The Captaincy of Sofala was thus enlarged to include Mozambique Island. Much of the European garrison and administration was subsequently transferred to healthier Mozambique, and Fort Sofala was effectively reduced to an outpost, although colonial governors of Portuguese East Africa continued to bear 'Captain of Sofala' as their primary title.

References

Sources

(1552–59) ''Décadas da Ásia: Dos feitos, que os Portuguezes fizeram no descubrimento, e conquista, dos mares, e terras do Oriente.''. * *

Fernão Lopes de Castanheda Fernão Lopes de Castanheda (Santarém, c. 1500 – 1559 in Coimbra) was a Portuguese people, Portuguese historian in the early Renaissance. His "History of the discovery and conquest of India", full of geographic and ethnographic objective i ...

(1551–1560) ''História do descobrimento & conquista da Índia pelos portugueses''

833 edition __NOTOC__ Year 833 (Roman numerals, DCCCXXXIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Byzantine Empire * Arab–Byzantine wars, Byzantine-Arab War: Emperor ...