A pioneer researcher in the fields of botany, pharmacology, tropical medicine and anthropology, Garcia de Orta believed that reality could only be legitimate if observed and experimented on. After studying medicine in Spain, Garcia de Orta moved to Goa, where he researched and studied an infinite number of plants that later on became the basis of his masterpiece “Colóquios dos Simples e Drogas e Cousas Medicinais da Índia”, published in Goa in 1563 and became a reference in the West. Garcia de Orta died in 1568, before the inquisition arrived in Goa, nevertheless his remains were later exhumed and burnt along with an effigy. On the 450th Anniversary of Garcia de Orta’s death, Miriam Assor’s talks about the life and work of one of the most illustrious Portuguese Sephardic Jew and his intrinsic relationship to Goa.