ABSTRACT
The importance of formal ceremonial in both the assertion of political power and the exercise JIL of social control in traditional societies is well attested. Indeed, there is now a certain convergence of opinion among historians, anthropologists and sociologists that symbolic ceremonial is crucial to the successful management of such societies. From an early date, the inductions of viceroys and governors of the Estado da India were notably theatrical, and conformed to a well-established procedure richly resonant with symbolic meaning. The viceroy accepted the keys and after expressing a few words of thanks returned them to the captain of Goa. The induction of a viceroy or governor was undoubtedly a signal event in the life of the city. In the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries viceregal and gubernatorial inductions at Goa invariably followed the standard tripartite sequence of preliminary visitas, then formal entrega and finally ceremonial entrada.
