By: CHRIS GRAEME
WITH BUSINESS being slack and the holiday season in full swing, one can take the time to discover some places in Lisbon that there normally isn’t the time to visit. One place often left off the list of museums and monuments in Lisbon is the monastery complex of São Vicente de Fora.
Not only does this ensemble of 16th, 17th and 18th Century buildings afford spectacular panoramic views of Lisbon from its top, but São Vicente de Fora also takes the visitor on a voyage of discovery around 500 years of royal and social history.
A six-euro ticket gets you in to see one of the best examples of Renaissance wood panel painting in Europe outside of Italy, while the sacristy is a breathtaking artistic statement in religious devotion.
Not only this, the museum affords one of the best examples of 18th century azulejo tiles in the city, depicting all aspects of social life in Portugal at the time, from a doctor’s visit to a hunting trip by the aristocracy as well as La Fontaine’s fables.
There is also a fabulous collection of vestments and mitres as well as priceless gold rings set with rubies and emeralds the size of walnut, which were worn by Lisbon patriarchs and bishops over the centuries.
The complex’s main claim to fame is that it is the burial place of the Bragança dynasty, which ruled Portugal for over 250 years from the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1640 until the 1908 Regicide and its demise in 1910.
Inside the mausoleum rest the mortal remains of King João IV, King Manuel II (the last King of Portugal whose body was shipped from exile in England) and King
 A white statue of a hooded woman kneeling at King Carlos I’s tomb |  |
Carlos I, as well as the Crown Prince Luís Felipe and Queen Amélia, who Salazar once invited to take the throne in Portugal during the 1930s (so they say).
Notice the rather mournful white marble statue of a hooded woman kneeling in front of the tomb of Carlos I and his son Luís Felipe.
Burial site
There is an amazing set of show cases depicting everyday Lisbon objects (pots, pans, hammers, bowls, ceramic plates, scissors, knives and forks) from the 16th to 18th centuries, which were unearthed from one of the city’s early rubbish dumps. It amazingly includes pieces of silk and cotton from men and women’s clothes, including sleeves, buttons, hair pins, gold and silver thread used for dress decoration, which all somehow survived including traces of their dye pigments from
 The sacristy is a breathtaking artistic statement in religious devotion | |
nderneath centuries of debris.
Particularly poignant is the glass beaded necklace that once belonged to an African slave, who died and was buried outside the walls of the city in an unmarked grave. The complex is called São Vicente de Fora because it lies outside the old city walls.
Founded in 1147, this beautiful set of buildings and cloisters was built on the burial site of former crusaders, and later between 1582 and 1629 under the guidance of the Italian Renaissance master Felipe Terzi.
During the 1755 Great Lisbon Earthquake, the main dome and roof collapsed on worshippers and it was later rebuilt in a Baroque style in what was to be the first example of its kind in the country.
After completing your visit, stop to take tea or coffee in the adjoining café garden with its purple bougainvilleas before visiting the tombs of poets, explorers, writers and singers in the National Pantheon.
What: São Vicente de Fora
Where: Calçada de São Vicente, Alfama
When: Mon-Sat, 9am-12.30pm and 3pm-5pm
Cost: Four to six euros
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