English
Church of Jesus, Mary and Joseph
Nuvém, Goa, India
Religious Architecture
The church was founded in 1695 by the Margao Gaunkar [freeholder] José Colaço as a subsidiary of that town’s church. It is known also as the Church of the Mother of the Poor. The building has a single nave with a tile roof, chancel with coffered barrel vault and tower to the south, set back from the façade plane, which is of the Bom Jesus type and faces east. The roof and façade type is thus archaic for the construction period. The notable plaster adornment in the nave and its curious octagonal windows are on the contrary in line with the more modern taste introduced in Old Goa from the 1650s on by the structures of the Jesuits’ at Bom Jesus, and of the Theatines and Franciscans. As in Verna several kilometres to the north, the church has an unusual placement: it faces a slope and does not front an open space as habitual in Goa. Also as in Verna, the slope is occupied by a cemetery; between it and the church runs the road to Margao.