A Forgotten Empire (Vijayanagar): A Contribution to the History of India c21.s3.t4.39

c21.s3.t4.39

² The following is Barros's account of this affair of "Cide Mercar." After mentioning the terms of the treaty between Vijayanagar and Bijapûr, one of which provided for the reciprocal extradition of criminals and debtors, he writes:— "Crisnarao, knowing that he could catch the Hidalcão in this trap, called a Moor by name Cide Mercar, who had been in his service for many years, and bade him take forty thousand pardaos and go to Goa to buy horses of those that had come from Persia. Crisnaro wrote letters to our Captain . . . on purpose so that the affair might become widely known to all. Cide Mercar, either tempted by the large sum of money in his charge, or swayed by a letter which they say was sent to him by the Hidalcão, when he arrived at a *Tanadaria* called Pondâ, three leagues from Goa, fled to the Hidalcão from there. The Hidalcão as soon as he arrived sent him to Chaul, saying that he bestowed on him this *Tanadaria* as he was an honourable man of the family of Mahamed . . . ; but in a few days he disappeared from there, and they say that the king ordered his murder after he had taken from him the forty thousand pardaos."