Teotónio Rosário de Souza (18 February 1947 – 20 February 2019) was a Goan historian and the founder-director of the Goa-based Xavier Centre of Historical Research (XCHR), at Alto Porvorim. Based in Portugal since 1995, de Souza was Head and chair, Department of History in the Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologias from 1999 to 2014. He has been a fellow of the Portuguese Academy of History since 1983, and of the Sociedade de Geografia de Lisboa since 2000. Personal life Of Goan Catholic origin, de Souza was born in the village of Moira, Goa in the Bardez taluka of Goa. He belonged to the fifth vangodd (clan) of the village and is the 12th generation descendant of Shantappa Kamat, a Goud Saraswat Brahmin who became Diogo de Souza after his conversion to Christianity in 1618. Teotónio de Souza was educated mostly in Goa during Portuguese colonial rule. He belonged to the Goan Jesuits for twenty-six years. He left the priesthood in 1995, with dispensation for laicisation from the Holy See so that he could marry a Portuguese woman named Elvira. He was awarded Portuguese nationality in 1995 and was granted Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) by the Government of India in 2007. On 20 February 2019, de Souza died in Lisbon. Career In History In 1979, Teotónio de Souza wrote his PhD thesis, Medieval Goa: A Socio-Economic History. It challenged the view that Portuguese rule in South Asia resulted in overall prosperity in Goa in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. His work claimed that "Golden Goa" was an expression popularised by art historians, with reference to the baroque church architecture of the early centuries of the Portuguese rule. de Souza was the author and editor of many books and research papers, in both Portuguese and English. His partial memoirs are penned in a book, titled Goa To Me. His favourite area of research includes colonial and post-colonial themes, with particular reference to Portuguese in Asia. His authority in this field has at times been hijacked by people stealing his identity on the Internet. An article entitled "The Goa Inquisition", attributes its authorship to him, on a US-based website called Christianaggression, in 2005. It has since been cited by other communal sites. On his 60th birthday, de Souza was felicitated with a festschrift titled, Metahistory: History questioning History, containing personal tributes and 43 research papers contributed by historians and social