Pages: 151 (Illustrated Throughout In B/W & Color)Translated from the Portuguese by Maria Flavia Ribeiro Back of the Book “They would describe in detail the houses they had lived in: the rooms with carved rosewood furniture and the pictures of their ancestors on the walls, the balcao where the mando would be sung, the veranda where one would have his siesta on an Indo-Portuguese chair, the oratory or the throne of light where the rosary would be said before dinner, the kitchen blackened by the smoke of the sorpatels, baked behincas and steamed sannas; the well, the paddy fields, or even the mango, chikoo or jackfruit threes known for the quality of fruit they produced. The house was an inextricable part of their life, heritage and history.’ From the Jacket The courtyard house of Goa harks back to a long tradition of dwellings with a central space open to the skies circumscribed by rooms on all sides, a model as much functional in keeping the house cool in the hot climate, as of sacred inspiration. Along the famed Konkan coast, we find references to courtyard houses from the late medieval period onwards. Indeed, in order to find a suitable precedent to the patio house 0f Goa we need look no further than the domestic and monumental architecture of Vijayanagar. While the churches and sacred buildings of Goa have been the focus of a majority of studies on the built heritage of Goa, in more recent times, there has been increasing awareness that the resplendent houses of Goa are as deserving of careful attention. For visitors returning from Goa, images of the houses with colourful façades and romantic porches are as evocative of their Goan sojourn as those of the magnificent, whitewashed churches.However, to - from Amzon