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GPS 39.09527281547775, -9.261185006084842
The Castle of Torres Vedras is located in the parish of Santa Maria, São Pedro e Matacães, town and municipality of Torres Vedras, district of Lisbon, in Portugal.
It rises in a dominant position on a steep and steep hill, surrounded by the urban fabric and trees.
History
Background
The primitive human occupation of the site dates back to the Roman invasion of the Iberian Peninsula, as demonstrated by various archaeological testimonies, such as tombstones, coins and other artifacts, currently in the Municipal Museum, as well as the analysis of the mortar in the masonry of one of the castle's cisterns. Although Pinho Leal dates the primitive fortification of Torres Vedras to the Goths or Alans (Ancient and Modern Portugal), it was the Muslims who rebuilt it.
The medieval castle
At the time of the Christian Reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula, in the context of the conquest of Santarém (1147), the fortification of Torres was taken in 1148 by the forces of D. Afonso Henriques (1112-1185). The following year, the sovereign donated the domains of the village and its castle to D. Fuas Roupinho, a nobleman who was responsible for rebuilding and strengthening the fortification walls.
Thus, in 1184, he is said to have resisted, for eleven days, the siege imposed on him in vain by a column of Muslim troops spread across the region of Santarém, after the unsuccessful attack on that city under the command of the Almohad caliph Abu Yacub Iúçufe I ( r. 1163–1184).
It later received the attention of Dinis I of Portugal (1279-1325), who reinforced and expanded its defenses (1288), and of D. Fernando (1367-1383), who ordered him to repair the village fence (1373 ).
At the time of the 1383-1385 crisis, with its mayor, João Duque, taking sides with D. Beatriz, he was besieged by the forces of the Master of Avis, at the end of 1384. His defense was thus described at the time:
"This place in Torres Vedras is a fortress based on top of a mota formation, which nature created in such an orderly equality as if it were not made, artificially; the village with its fence around the mountain, and in its greatest height is the castle." (Fernão Lopes. Chronicle of D. João I).
The town and its castle were the temporary residence of several kings of Portugal, including D. João I (1385-1433) , which gathered the Council here to decide on the conquest of Ceuta, the starting point of the Portuguese Discoveries.
Under the reign of D. Manuel (1495-1521), the village received the Foral Novo (1510), with the sovereign ordering reconstruction work on the defenses (1516), of which the ogival-arched door, surmounted by the coat of arms, bear witness. of the sovereign, flanked by armillary spheres with the Cross of Christ. These works on the village fence continued in 1519.
From the Philippine Dynasty to the present day
During the Philippine Dynasty, forces under the command of D. António, Prior of Crato, disembarked in Peniche by the fleet of Sir Francis Drake, marching on Lisbon, even taking the Castle of Torres Vedras (1589), being, however, dislodged in then by Manuel Martins Soares and Captain António Pereira, with almost no resistance, forcing D. António to return to exile.
At the dawn of the 17th century, according to the Possession Order of D. João Soares de Alarcão e Melo, Mayor of Torres Vedras (1604), he realizes that the castle walls were in ruins in several sections and that the barbican was dismantled.
In the middle of the 18th century, the 1755 earthquake caused the collapse of the castle's internal buildings, as well as the top of its walls. In a period after 1790, the City Council stopped renting an area next to the castle walls for sowing, due to its advanced state of ruin. Perhaps for this reason of imminent danger, the Council ordered, in 1792, that no one should remove any stone from the walls, houses or cisterns of the castle.
In the context of the Peninsular War, the old medieval castle saw its position revalued when the so-called Lines of Towers were built. At the time, its structure was reused for the installation of artillery and its premises used as redoubt No. 27 of the 1st District of Linhas de Torres (1810).
Later, during the Liberal Wars, sections of the wall to the east and some turrets on the north side were rebuilt, under the direction of Corregidor Lourenço Homem da Cunha de Eça (1830). Used as a barracks for the troops under the command of the Count of Bonfim, it was bombed in December 1846 by Marechal Saldanha, which led to the explosion of the powder magazine and its consequent surrender.
Twenty years later, in 1866, the section of the wall on the Rua dos Polomes side was repaired by sapper soldiers.
Affected to the Municipality of Torres Vedras by decree of July 11, 1940, it received some restoration works (1947), coming to be classified as a Property of Public Interest by Decree published on July 18, 1957.
At the end of the 1950s, new repair work began on its walls, which lasted until the end of the 20th century, comprising consolidation, restoration, improvement and conservation work. In the mid-1980s, archaeological excavations were carried out, under the supervision of the IPPC.
New archaeological works have been carried out in the castle - the last of which in 2001, organized by the Municipal Museum of Torres Vedras. The aim of the excavations was to look for traces in an old medieval dump located in front of the north turret. Among the remains found were several animal bones, which allowed a deeper understanding of the eating habits of the medieval nobility.
Characteristics
The castle features the Gothic and Manueline styles, consisting of the following structures:
A ring of walls with an oval shape, reinforced at the southeast and southwest by semi-cylindrical turrets and by the gate tower, square in shape, protruding from the wall, with a battlement accessed by a stone staircase and topped by wide square merlons torn by arrow slits. The gate, in a broken arch, is surmounted by the coat of arms of D. Manuel and by two armillary spheres with the Cross of the Order of Christ;
Church of Santa Maria do Castelo, implanted alone overlooking within the belt of walls , accessed by a staircase. Next to it, a cistern opens up, where there was once a medieval cemetery;
Alcáçova, with an irregular square plan, dominated by the keep at the Southeast angle, with a semicircular plan, divided internally into a living room. two bodies and two planes with a ribbed vault. This tower has two embrasures and an exterior door, topped by quadrangular merlons. In the south curtain and in the corner of the north curtain, there are access doors to the courtyard of arms, where the old palace was arranged and where the ruins of the Palácio dos Alcaides are located, built on the remains of previous buildings. This rose on two floors that opened onto an interior courtyard. Only the outer walls, the entrance door and, on the ground floor, parts of the walls and floor in stone and brick remain, in addition to the stone corbels that supported the beams of the upper floor; of this remain the stonework of the windows. The skylights of a cistern open onto this patio. There is also a third, with a brick vault.
The village fence disappeared almost completely, even though, in 1830, the west and north sections were reconstructed.