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Cranganore is a large city in the province of Malabar on the mainland, standing near the mouth of a river, by which likewise it is encompassed, inhabited both by idolaters and Christians, and by some Jews who are held in small esteem.

From Cananore you go Cranganore, which is a small fort of the Portuguese in the country of the king of Cranganore, another king of the Gentiles. This is a country of small importance of about a hundred miles extent, full of thieves, subject to the king of Calicut, who is another king of the Gentiles and a great enemy to the Portuguese, with whom he is continually engaged in war.

These thieves divide the spoil they get with the king of Calicut, who gives them leave to go a-roving; so that there are so many thieves all along this coast, that there is no sailing in those seas except in large ships well armed, or under convoy of Portuguese ships of war. From Cranganore to Cochin is 15 miles . Of Cochin.

This is the Josephus Indus, or Joseph the Indian, under whose name there is a short voyage in Grynæus: which properly speaking is only an account of Cranganore and its inhabitants, particularly the Christians and their ceremonies, with some account of Calient, Kambaya, Guzerat, Ormuz, and Narsinga, very short and unsatisfactory. Astl. I. 48. b.

It is even more obscure both in events and chronology than that of the north, but we must not think of the Dravidian countries as uninhabited or barbarous. Even the classical writers of Europe had some knowledge of them. It is said that there was a temple dedicated to Augustus at Muziris, identified with Cranganore.

After the ships were laden, two Indians came to wait upon the general, who said that they were brothers, and Christians, born in Cranganore near Cochin, who were desirous of going to Portugal, and thence to visit the Pope at Rome, and the holy sepulchre at Jerusalem . Being asked by the general what kind of a city Cranganore was, whether it was entirely inhabited by Christians, and whether these Christians followed the order of the Greek or Roman church, one of them gave the following answers.

The priests of Cranganore are not shaven in the same manner with ours, but shave the whole head, leaving a few hairs on the crown and they have both deacons and subdeacons. In consecrating the elements, they use leavened bread and wine made of raisins, having no other in the country. Their children are not baptized till they are eleven days old, unless they happen to be sickly.

A small work entitled Itinerarium Portugallensium, printed at Milan in 1508, after speaking of the island of Sayla, says that to the eastward of this there is another called Samotra, which we name Taprobane, distant from the city of Calechut about three months' voyage. The information appears to have been obtained from an Indian of Cranganore, on the coast of Malabar, who visited Lisbon in 1501.