The Indian missionary, St. Thomas, an apostle, a Manichaean, or an Armenian merchant (La Croze, Christianisme des Indes, tom. i. p. 57 - 70), was famous, however, as early as the time of Jerom (ad Marcellam, epist. 148.). Marco-Polo was informed on the spot that he suffered martyrdom in the city of Malabar, or Meliapour, a league only from Madras (D'Anville, Eclaircissemens sur l'Inde, p. 125), where the Portuguese founded an episcopal church under the name of St. Thome, and where the saint performed an annual miracle, till he was silenced by the profane neighborhood of the English (La Croze, tom. ii. p. 7 - 16.).