Maritime marvel of the yore

Most of the places around the world have more to them than just being geographical locations. Some are packed with history, some with business, some with fabulous flora and fauna, some with art, culture and entertainment and some a combination of all. Kerala, for sure, falls in the last category which is what earned it the globally famous sobriquet, ‘God’s Own Country’. No place in the state encapsulates it better than Cochin.

Though not all that ancient compared to lesser-known places in Kerala itself, Cochin has fascinated historians and chroniclers alike. One reason could be that it has been a happening place, as the 15th century Italian explorer, Niccolo de Conti, once admiringly described it. Historically, it did have competing rivals for fame in Calicut, Ponnani and Kollam. All of them had a much longer history dating back to the days of the Phoenicians and the Pharaohs. Sadly, time and tide of events took a heavy toll on them leaving a void that was promptly filled by Cochin.

What is attempted here is a narrative on some of the places, people and events that made Cochin a ‘happening place.’ Topping the list is Calvathy in Fort Cochin where the Arabs, the first from the west, landed. They found the place and people not overtly hostile. A small patch of open space on the waterfront came handy for their daily namaz. They called it ‘Khaliyath’ which means ‘empty space’. In due course, ‘Khaliyath’ became ‘Kalvath’ and presently ‘Calvathy’.

There are, however, two more versions about the name. According to the Madras Manual of Administration, stone cutting (kalluvettel in local language) was the main occupation of the people and the place therefore took the name after it. The second version is based on a note prepared by an official of the Cochin State, V.K. Raman Menon, according to which the place came to be called ‘Calvathy’ as it was where criminals used to be hanged (‘kazhu ettuka’) or impaled.

The Arabs, however, found the place quite congenial for their spiritual and temporal activities. The space for the ‘namaz’ apart, they put up a mosque nearby on land gifted by the ruling Maharaja. It was one of the oldest mosques in the country (1384), much older than the famed Juma Masjid (1656) in Delhi. As their population and business activities increased, so did the number of mosques, some of the famous among them being the Thurutu palli, Thakyavu palli and Chembitta Palli at nearby Mattancherry. In fact, the area around it was once known as Cochin’s ‘Yemen’, because of the heavy presence of Arabs.

For the trade-minded Arabs, therefore, Calvathy proved logistically ideal. Spices grown in the hinterland were brought into the market here in traditional wooden boats (called vanchi or vallom in local parlance), through the Periyar River, Vembanad Lake and Calvathy Canal and stored in godowns and warehouses lined up on both banks of the canal. Being the entry-exit point, Calvathy served their trade interest. In sum, what they lost in Muziris in the tsunami (1341) was more than gained in Calvathy.

Quite conceivably, life would have been still a lot harder for the Arabs, coming as they did from the dry deserts of Arabia to the relatively cooler and wet tropical clime. How they adjusted to the new environ could be seen in the architecture of the houses they built which had their native characteristics, remnants of which can be seen even today. The general layout of the place, including the main thoroughfare which ran eastwest and doubled as a wind tunnel and the side roads that branched off it, was a replica of their habitat back home.

After the Arabs came the Portuguese. Calicut was their first port of call. Only when they were rebuffed by the Zamorin, did they, under Admiral Pedro Alvarez Cabral, move southwards to Cochin and drop anchor at Calvathy. The first thing Cabral did was to seek an appointment with the Raja of Cochin. An overly generous Raja conceded most of what the visitors asked for in return for help to take on the Zamorin of Calicut with whom he had a running feud.

By the time the Hollanders arrived, Calvathy had become a beehive of business and commercial activity. That didn’t prevent them from destroying much of what the Portuguese had created and rebuilt the town to reflect their architectural idiom and social ethos. But they were wise enough to retain the overall layout of the place. Some of their creations have survived years of assault, natural and man-made, to this day. The more memorable of them find a place in this narration.

When the British arrived and took control of the place, they were no less barbarous. In fact, they outdid both the Portuguese and the Hollanders in sheer savagery. But they also gave a new face to the place and a new life to the people, as detailed in an earlier chapter. What independent India inherited was, therefore, British Cochin minus the Britons.

The change of guard never dimmed Calvathy’s importance. First and foremost, the canal guarded Fort Cochin’s unique identity. It separated it from the mainland till a bridge over Calvathy Canal was built in 1939. Though devoid of any visible structural marvel, the 15-metre-long narrow bridge also became very much part of the island’s history, being for long the only link with the mainland.

Along the canal there were improvised bridges at several places, almost all of which had been named after the businesses around them. Thus, Karipalam was where coal, brought by huge and small vallams, used to be unloaded, stored and sold; Pullupalam, where the market for grass for cattle was located; Kshaurapalam, where barbers used to congregate, and Chirattapalam, where coconut shells were marketed.

Calvathy was witness to two horrendous disasters, a war (1809) and a freak fire (1889), both of which nearly ruined it. The first was when the combined army of Paliath Achan, Sarvadhikarikar of Cochin and Veluthampi Delava of Travancore took on the British authority and nearly captured the Resident, Col C. Macaulay, but finally conceded defeat. The second was when a freak fire in an Indian ship docked near Calvathy virtually destroyed hundreds of thatched houses, godowns, warehouses and office buildings. It survived both and retained its importance well into the twentieth century when business started moving to new growth centres.

Rivalling Calvathy in importance is another landmark not far away from it but with a different history, the Dhobi Khana. An extension of it a few metres away is the Dhobi Street. The former is the place where the Tamil Vannanmars (washermen) are at work and the latter where they live. Anyone in search of heritage sites cannot afford to miss either of them. Perceivably hardworking, they are equally perceivably proud of their lineage, which their spokesman traces to the legendary Veerapandiya Kattabomman, the 18th century Tamil chieftain who took on the East India Company and paid dearly with his life.

There is no proof to establish the lineage. Historical narratives, however, seem to be on their side. For, Kattabomman belonged to a sub-caste of the Nayaka community, called Thothiyans, known for their expertise in dry farming and cloth washing. Originally from Vijayanagara and Telugu-speaking, the members of the community migrated to Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu after the fall of the great Vijayanagara Empire in 1565 and made it their homeland. Later they seemed to have spread out to different parts of South India in search of greener pastures. Perhaps, it is the caste/occupation link that must have emboldened the spokesman to invoke ties with Kattabomman.

There are, however, other versions as to when and why the Tamil-speaking Vannanmars landed in Fort Cochin. One story is that they came at the invitation of the Maharaja of Cochin as the royalty’s sartorial rigours demanded daily use of washed and well-starched clothes for which the services of an army of washermen was needed. This seems unlikely because the royal requirement had by then been taken care of by the local washermen, called Veluthedans, a subcaste of Nairs. Tripunithura and nearby places had a heavy concentration of this community, as elsewhere in the Cochin State and, so, there was no need to bring in outsiders for the job.

Yet another version is that the Tamil washermen were brought by the Portuguese to meet the washing requirements of their families as also of the army. Being large in numbers and habitually heavily clothed, unlike the locals, they required a retinue of washermen that could not be met locally. But if, as widely believed, they arrived in 1720, then, it could not presumably be the Portuguese but the Dutch, who were then ruling the roost, who brought them here.

(Excerpted with permission from MK Das’ ‘Cochin: Fame and Fables’; published by Niyogi Books)