COUTO, Diogo do. Lisbon 1542 — Goa 10.12.1616. Portuguese Historian of Colonial India. Son of Gaspar do Couto and Isabel Serrão del Castro. Educated by Jesuits, then 1559-69 and, after brief visit to Portugal again from 1571 in military service in India and the East, remaining the rest of his life in India. Married 1571/72 Luisa de Melo. In 1595-1616 state historian of Portuguese India, in Goa. Friend of Camões, helped him with the Lusiads.
Publications: Continuation to the Decadas da Asia of —> J. Barros, covering the years 1539-1616: Decadas 4-7 published in Lisbon 1602-16, Decada 12 1645, Decada 8 ed. by J. da Costa & J. de Mendoça 1673 and Decada 10 1778 (decadas 9 & 11 were lost, apparently stolen).
– The History of Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to 1600 A.D., as related by João de Barros and Diogo de Couto. Translated and edited by D. Ferguson. 445 p. JRAS-CB 20:60, 1908.
– O soldato prático, written 1611, publ. in 1790, new ed. by M. Rodrigues Lapa. Lisbon 1937.
Sources: Grande Enc. Port. e Bras. 7; Wikipedia with portrait.
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