5 
Whether the chank fishery was included in this rent 
we have no means of knowing. Eventually when the 
new comers took actual possession of the Tinnevelly 
coast line—the Pescaria or Fishery coast as they called 
‘t__and settled agents and troops at the principal ports, 
the chank fishery was certainly made to contribute to 
the revenue, being farmed out to a group of wealthy 
merchants. 
With the definite seizure of the coast in 1532 the 
status of Kayal rapidly changed. The Parawas who by 
the terms of the treaty of 1532 were now the sworn allies 
of the Portuguese and had sealed the compact by going 
over in a body to the Roman Catholic faith, required the 
protection of the guns of the Portuguese ships and moved 
from Kayal now left two miles inland by the growth 
of deltaic deposits and founded Pinnakayal on the sea- 
shore about two miles distant. The local Muhammadans 
left about the same time and founded the new port of 
Kayalpattanam originally called Sonagapattanam (ge: 
“The Muhammadans’ Port”), five miles to the south of 
Pinnakayal. 
Pinnakayal thus became the head-quarters of Portu- 
guese domination on this coast and so remained till about 
1580, when they were transferred to Tuticorin. Unfor- 
tunately no information as to the importance of the chank 
fishery during Portuguese supremacy is available— the 
Dutch who took possession of the coast towns in 1658 
purposely destroyed the records of their predecessors 
wherever these fell into their hands. 
Under the Dutch the chank fishery had considerable 
value ; it was leased out regularly to renters, the shells 
being forwarded by sea to Bengal as in the days of the 
Portuguese. 
Father Martin, a French missionary who wrote an 
account of the pearl fishery carried on in 1700 off Tuti- 
corin, mentions that at that time the “ conch-shell fishery 
was also theirs (the Dutch) within the same limits as 
the pearl-fishery and yielded a considerable profit.” 
The Portuguese during at least the first 50 years of 
their domination exercised much greater and more effect- 
‘ve control over the coast than did their successors the 
Dutch. They completely crushed the power of the coast 
Muhammadans and were able to defy the lieutenants of 
