he year 1561 is important in Rhodesia for it saw the establishment of the first Christian mission to the Karanga and the martyrdom of the Jesuit priest, Gonçalo da Silveira.

t the time of his arrival in Monomatapa da Silveira was in his middle thirties. He had entered the newly-formed Society of Jesus in 1543; he then laboured in metropolitan Portugal for 13 years after his ordination, during which time many indications of his sanctity were manifest to his friends. In 1559 da Silveira responded to a missionary call to Africa. The priest reached Mozambique in 1560; that September he set out for the Monomatapa’s capital, paddling up the Zambezi in a canoe as far as Tete, and from there walking to the Monomatapa’s court. On Christmas Day 1560 da Silveira celebrated the first Christmas mass ever to be recorded in Rhodesia and the next day, the anniversary of St. Stephen the first Christian martyr, the priest walked down the Zambezi escarpment to meet the reigning Monomatapa, Nogoma.

ogoma was an impressionable youth at the time and very much under the influence of his mother. The priest greeted him and presented him with a painting of the Madonna which enchanted the young man. Before the month was out the Monomatapa, together with his mother and 300 courtiers, had accepted baptism at da Silveira’s hands.

ut the first victory of the Cross in Rhodesia was short-lived. Moslem traders at court, who feared that their position was threatened, persuaded Nogoma that his guest was practising witchcraft, and in March 1561 the young Monomatapa agreed in council that this powerful white sorcerer be put to death.

lthough warned of his danger Father da Silveira refused to abandon his converts. “1 am delighted,” he told a Portuguese trader, “to receive so happy an ending from the hand of God.”

e gave all his possessions away, saving only his cassock, surplice and crucifix, and then waited calmly for the end. Death came to Father da Silveira early on the morning of Sunday, 16 March 1561. The assassins strangled him in the way prescribed for sorcerers. Then they dragged the corpse to the banks of the Musengezi where it crosses the present border of Mozambique and Rhodesia, and threw it into the river.