Anjengo Fort

Anjengo Fort stands at Anchuthengu in Thiruvananthapuram district, on a strip of coast above the Arabian Sea. The East India Company built it of laterite in 1695 to guard the port of Anjengo, then an important link in trade between England and the Malabar Coast. The land had been granted after John Brabourne won the pepper trade monopoly from the Rani of Attingal in 1693. The place name means five coconut palms.

The fort was the first territory the British held in India, the site of their first treaty with Travancore, and from 1792 the first British residency. It saw the Attingal revolt and the era of the Anglo-Mysore and Anglo-Maratha wars. An old lighthouse stands beside it, and the Archaeological Survey of India now looks after the site.