Battle of Calicut (1502)

The naval Battle of Calicut was a military encounter between the 16 ships (10 carracks and six caravels) of the 4th Portuguese Armada and a fleet led by two Arabic corsairs formed under the orders of the Zamorin of Calicut.

After the fleet of Vasco da Gama reunited with six caravels of the patrol fleet of Vicente Sodré, the Portuguese inflicted a heavy defeat on Calicut. In one of the first recorded instances of a naval line of battle, Gama's spice naus and escort caravels sailed in a line end-to-end, concentrating all their immense firepower as they passed against the twenty large Arab ships of Cojambar, before they could get organized, sinking a number of them and doing immense damage to the remainder. After the battle, the Portuguese returned to Cannanore.