150 every day through him, many Christians returned from Kochi to the great Kingdom of Quilon, which stretches as far as the coast opposite Ceylon and in which some twelve thousand Christian homes were scattered among the gentiles, and there are some churches in the interior. Most of them need to be taught our doctrine and christened. They are only Christians by name, for Saint [Thomas] in his day christened all those who said they wanted to be. The King of Quilon saw that he was christening a lot of people and converting them to his faith, so he started to grow wary of this, saying that they would rebel and so he began to impede it. Thus, Saint Thomas left, persecuted by some of them and by the gentiles. He headed to Coromandel and reached a large city called Maliapor, where he was martyred and is buried, something I will talk about in due course. This was how henceforth these Christians remained in the kingdom of Quilon with that church and obtained some duty revenue from pepper and other duties. These Christians were left without any doctrine, nor a priest to christen them. For a long time, they were only Christians by name, they then gathered together and their council decided to send some of them out across the world to search for the sacrament of christening. Five men set out to travel the world with this purpose and at great expense. They reached Armenia where they found many Christians and a patriarch who governed them. When he saw their intention, he sent a bishop andfive or six priests back with them to christen them, say mass and teach them. These bishops would spendfive or six years there and upon their return, another would go for the same period of time, and thus, they managed to get by for a long time. These Armenians are white men. They speak Arabic and Chaldean, they are Christians, they pray for hours on end, but I do not know if they pray their entire office like our friars and they have their tonsures round the opposite way: where they should be shaven they have hair,
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