St. Paul's Church (Malacca)

According to the work “Décadas da Ásia” by the Portuguese historian and writer Juan di Barrush, the church of St. Paul was built in 1521 and was consecrated in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Grace (Nossa Senhora da Annunciada). The church was built by the Portuguese fidalgo Duarte Coelho in gratitude for the salvation during a storm in the South China Sea ^[1] .

In 1548, the bishop of Goa, Joan Afonso di Alburgerge handed over the temple to the monastic order of the Jesuits . The temple was popular among the Portuguese colonists due to the fact that it served for some time as St. Francis Xavier , who used the temple as a base for his missionary trips to Southeast Asia. In 1548, Francis Xavier founded the school of St. Paul at the temple, which is considered the first European school in Malaysia ^[2] . On March 22, 1553, the Jesuit Alvaro Pereira transferred the remains of the deceased Francis Xavier from the Chinese island of Shanchuan to Malacca, and until April 15, 1553, the body of Francis Xavier was in the temple.

In 1556, the temple was significantly expanded. The second floor was attached to the temple. In 1590 a bell tower was built, and the church itself was renamed the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In 1592, a tomb was arranged in the middle of the nave, in which various famous personalities were buried, including the second bishop of Funa Pedro Martins (+ 1598), the captain of Malacca and the son of the Portuguese governor Don Miguel di Castro (+ 1577), the Jesuit Pedro Martinis , Captain-General António Pinto Fonseca (+ 1635) and Belgian Jesuit brother Theodor Mantel (+ 1593) ^[3] .

In 1641, after Malacca came under Dutch control, the temple was transferred to the Dutch Reformed Church and re-consecrated in honor of the Apostle Paul. The church was considered the main temple of the Reformed Church in Malacca until 1753, when the larger Church of Christ on Red Square was built in the city (this church is currently used by the Anglican Church ). The Church of St. Paul was abandoned and gradually began to collapse. From the end of the XVIII century the nave of the temple began to be used for burials. In the second half of the 18th century, the temple began to be used as a defensive structure as part of the former Portuguese fortress Formosa. The Dutch destroyed the wall of the altar was destroyed, the altar was raised and a cannon was placed on it, the trunk of which in the resulting arch was directed towards the sea. The windows of the temple were walled up. In 1824, Malacca came under British control and the ruins of the temple began to be used as a powder warehouse.

In 1924, archaeological excavations were carried out in the old Portuguese tomb, which was located in the middle of the main nave. Repeated archaeological research was carried out in 1930 by the Malacca Archaeological Society. In the same year, Portuguese stone gravestones were installed along the walls of the nave.

In 1952, a statue of St. Francis Xavier was erected near the entrance to the temple in honor of the 400th anniversary of his stay in Malacca. On the day the statue was consecrated, a branch of a casuarina tree near it fell on it and broke off the statue’s right hand.

• De Witt, Dennis (2013). Historical Tombstones and Graves at St Paul's Hill Malacca. Malaysia: Nutmeg Publishing. ISBN 978-983-43519-4-6 .

• "The ruins of St. Paul's Church. " The historicical city of malacca