Mussal khel

It is certain that the Pestle dance came into Goa during the time if Kadamba dynasty, established in Goa A.D 980 and 1005. There is a belief that it was first performed before the the gate of fort in their capital of Chandrapur ( modern Chandor), in celebration of the victory  of  the Vijayanagar prince Harihar over the Cholas.

The Christians of Chandor keeps up a tradition by performing this kind of dance annually. Their costumes for the occasion are in Yadavas style. The Shivlinga symbol is brandished and waved in the  dance, dancers with burning torches accompany it. 

It is a dance based on the story the legendary prowess of the  ancient Kshatriya from whom the Christian Chardos of Chandor, as elsewhere in Goa, descend. the mussoll dance is performed near the village mandd (The mandda khuris, from  where the dance begins, derives its name from the nearby ancient site of Chandreshwar temple which now lies in ruins and where the village mandd once stood). It is an enacting of the Kshatriya  story that must have been dramatically exhibited in the sabhamandap of the of the royal temple of lord Chandreshwar  at Cota, whose ruins, to date, are the reminders of splendor of the old city - a story that would have been dramatized with as many variations as the circumstances of the time permitted. Since the conversation of the Kshatriya to a Christianity, the dance has persisted as a continuing cultural expression of the chandor's Chardos.