Unesco Heritage Sites
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Alto Douro Wine Region
Wine has been produced by traditional landholders in the Alto Douro region for some 2,000 years. Since the 18th century, its main product, port wine, has been world famous for its quality. This long tradition of viticulture has produced a cultural landscape of outstanding beauty that reflects its technological, social and economic evolution.
Central Zone of the Town of Angra do Heroismo in the Azores
Wine has been produced by traditional landholders in the Alto Douro region for some 2,000 years. Since the 18th century, its main product, port wine, has been world famous for its quality. This long tradition of viticulture has produced a cultural landscape of outstanding beauty that reflects its technological, social and economic evolution.
Convent of Christ in Tomar
 Originally designed as a monument symbolizing the Reconquest, the Convent of the Knights Templar of Tomar (transferred in 1344 to the Knights of the Order of Christ) came to symbolize just the opposite during the Manueline period – the opening up of Portugal to other civilizations.
Cultural Landscape of Sintra
In the 19th century Sintra became the first centre of European Romantic architecture. Ferdinand II turned a ruined monastery into a castle where this new sensitivity was displayed in the use of Gothic, Egyptian, Moorish and Renaissance elements and in the creation of a park blending local and exotic species of trees. Other fine dwellings, built along the same lines in the surrounding serra, created a unique combination of parks and gardens which influenced the development of landscape architecture throughout Europe.
Historic Centre of Évora
This museum-city, whose roots go back to Roman times, reached its golden age in the 15th century, when it became the residence of the Portuguese kings. Its unique quality stems from the whitewashed houses decorated with azulejos and wrought-iron balconies dating from the 16th to the 18th century. Its monuments had a profound influence on Portuguese architecture in Brazil. |
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Form of government: republic with one legislative house
Chief of state: President
Head of government: Prime Minister
Official language: Portuguese (Mirandese, spoken in the vicinity of Miranda do Douro, has official linguistic rights)
Population estimate: (2005) 10,513,000
Total area (sq km):
92,152
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Historic Centre of Guimarães
The historic town of Guimarães is associated with the emergence of the Portuguese national identity in the 12th century. An exceptionally well-preserved and authentic example of the evolution of a Medieval settlement into a modern town, its rich building typology exemplifies the specific development of Portuguese architecture from the 15th to 19th century through the consistent use of traditional building materials and techniques.
Historic Centre of Oporto
The city of Oporto, built along the hillsides overlooking the mouth of the Douro river, is an outstanding urban landscape with a 1,000-year history. Its continuous growth, linked to the sea (the Romans gave it the name Portus, or port), can be seen in the many and varied monuments, from the cathedral with its Romanesque choir, to the neoclassical Stock Exchange and the typically Portuguese Manueline-style Church of Santa Clara.
Landscape of the Pico Island Vineyard Culture
The 987-ha site on the volcanic island of Pico, the second largest in Azores archipelago, consists of a remarkable pattern of spaced-out, long linear walls running inland from, and parallel to, the rocky shore. The walls were built to protect the thousands of small, contiguous, rectangular, plots (currais) from wind and seawater . Evidence of this viniculture, whose origins date back to the 15th century is manifest in the extraordinary assembly of the fields, in houses and early 19th century manor houses, in wine-cellars, churches and ports. The extraordinarily beautiful man-made landscape of the site is the best remaining area of a once much more widespread practice.
Monastery of Alcobaça
The 987-ha site on the volcanic island of Pico, the second largest in Azores archipelago, consists of a remarkable pattern of spaced-out, long linear walls running inland from, and parallel to, the rocky shore. The walls were built to protect the thousands of small, contiguous, rectangular, plots (currais) from wind and seawater . Evidence of this viniculture, whose origins date back to the 15th century is manifest in the extraordinary assembly of the fields, in houses and early 19th century manor houses, in wine-cellars, churches and ports. The extraordinarily beautiful man-made landscape of the site is the best remaining area of a once much more widespread practice.
Monastery of Batalha
The 987-ha site on the volcanic island of Pico, the second largest in Azores archipelago, consists of a remarkable pattern of spaced-out, long linear walls running inland from, and parallel to, the rocky shore. The walls were built to protect the thousands of small, contiguous, rectangular, plots (currais) from wind and seawater . Evidence of this viniculture, whose origins date back to the 15th century is manifest in the extraordinary assembly of the fields, in houses and early 19th century manor houses, in wine-cellars, churches and ports. The extraordinarily beautiful man-made landscape of the site is the best remaining area of a once much more widespread practice.
Monastery of the Hieronymites and Tower of Belém in Lisbon
The 987-ha site on the volcanic island of Pico, the second largest in Azores archipelago, consists of a remarkable pattern of spaced-out, long linear walls running inland from, and parallel to, the rocky shore. The walls were built to protect the thousands of small, contiguous, rectangular, plots (currais) from wind and seawater . Evidence of this viniculture, whose origins date back to the 15th century is manifest in the extraordinary assembly of the fields, in houses and early 19th century manor houses, in wine-cellars, churches and ports. The extraordinarily beautiful man-made landscape of the site is the best remaining area of a once much more widespread practice.
Prehistoric Rock-Art Sites in the Côa Valley
This exceptional concentration of rock carvings from the Upper Palaeolithic (22,000–10,000 B.C.) is the most outstanding example of early human artistic activity in this form anywhere in the world.
Reference: Unesco
For more information, please visit Portugal's Unesco Heritage Page: Link
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