Mosteiro de Santa Maria, Alcobaca 
Sunny cloisters & orange trees at Alcobaca. Photo © Paradoxplace.com.
Exterior of Alcobaca Monastery. Photo by Rui Ornelas.
Exterior by night. Photo by Pedro & Aiste.
Transept of the monastery church, with royal tombs of the tragic couple.
Photo © Paradoxplace.com.
Detail of the tomb of Don Pedro. Photo by Rui Ornelas.
Another tomb detail. Photo by Pedro & Aiste.
Fountain in the cloisters. Photo by Pedro & Aiste.
In the Middle Ages, the Cistercian Mosteiro de Santa Maria (St. Mary Monastery) in Alcobaca was one of the richest and most prestigious in Europe and the largest church in Portugal.
History
The Mosteiro de Santa Maria was founded in 1178 to honor a vow made by Portugal's first king, Afonso Henríques, before he faced the Moors at Santarém. Alcobaça, at the confluence of the Alcoa and Baça Rivers, was built to show his spiritual indebtedness to St. Bernard of Clairvaux, who rallied many Crusaders into battle against the infidel.
The transept shelters the Gothic tombs of two star-crossed lovers, the Romeo and Juliet of Portuguese history. At an early age King Pedro I was forced to marry Constanza, the Infanta of Castille. But she died shortly after the marriage ceremony, crating the opportunity for Dom Pedro to escape with his true love, Inês de Castro, to the city of Coimbra. Pedro's father, King Afonso IV, believed the family of Inês to be a threat to his own kingdom and had her murdered.
Shortly after the death of his father, a bereaved Dom Pedro revealed that he had married Inês in a secret ceremony in Bragança, making her the rightful queen, and took revenge on her killers in a quite gruesome manner. He exhumed her body, presented the embalmed corpse at court with a crown on her head and demanded that all his courtiers individually pay homage to her decomposed hand.
Today, their ornate tombs face each other so that on Judgment Day his first sight will be of his beloved Inês. Though damaged, their sarcophagi are the greatest pieces of sculpture from 14th-century Portugal.
Over the centuries, the monks of Alcobaca made significant contributions to Portuguese culture. In 1269 they were the first to give public lessons to their flock and later they produced the authoritative history on Portugal in a series of books.
In 1794, Lord Beckford visited the Abbey and commented that he found some 300 monks "living in a very splendid manner!" But monastic life at Alcobaca was soon to end. In 1810, the invading French troops looted the great abbey of many treasures, including its noteworthy library. Whatever items still remaining were then later stolen in 1834 during an anti-clerical riot and the extinction of religious Orders in Portugal.
Alcobaca Monastery was designated a World Heritage Site in 1989 because "Its size, the purity of its architectural style, the beauty of the materials and the care with which it was built make this a masterpiece of Cistercian Gothic art."
What to See
Today, the monastery, in spite of its baroque facade and latter-day overlay, remains a Cistercian monument to simplicity and majesty. Above the 327-long (98m) nave, quadripartite vaulting is supported on transverse arches. These rest on towering pillars and columns. The aisles, too, have stunning vertical lines and are practically as tall as the nave itself.
The Cloisters of Silence, with their delicate arches, were favored by Dinis, the poet king. He sparked a thriving literary colony at the monastery, where the monks were busily engaged in translating ecclesiastical writings.
Aside from the tombs and cloisters, the curiosity is the kitchen, through which a branch of the Alcoa River was routed. As in most Cistercian monasteries, the stream was instrumental for sanitation purposes: chroniclers suggest the monks fished for their dinner in the brook and later washed their dishes in it. The kitchen itself was huge: it was said eight oxen could be simulataneously spit-roasted there. The kitchen is matched by an equally huge refectory.
Finally, in the 18th-century Salon of Kings are niches with sculptures of some Portuguese rulers. The empty niches, left waiting for the rulers who were never sculptured, lend a melancholic air. The tiles in the room depict, in part, Afonso Henríques's triumph over the Moors.
Quick Facts
| Location: | 516 Mosteiro Alcobaça, Alcobaca, Portugal |
| Contact: | 26/258-39-09 |
| Hours: | Daily Apr-Sept 9am-7pm; Oct-Mar 9am-5pm |
| Cost: | 3€ |
Map
Below is a location map and aerial view of Alcobaca Monastery. Using the buttons on the left, zoom in for a closer look or zoom out to get your bearings. Click and drag the map to move around. For a larger view, see our Portugal Map or get our free Google Earth download.
Sources
- Frommer's Portugal, 19th Edition
- Alcobaça - Wikipedia
- Alcobaca: Another Cistercian Masterpiece - Bellatrovata
- Monastery of Alcobaça - UNESCO World Heritage List
