Tomar & Convento do Cristo
25km
Tomar, once home to the Order of the Knights Templar, is a charming city of great artistic and cultural wealth. The city’s calling card, the Convento de Cristo monastery, is one of the most important Portuguese structures of the Renaissance.
In 1983, UNESCO declared the Templar Castle and Monastery of the Christ Knights of Tomar a “World Heritage of Humanity”; invaluable to the history of the West. Built on a site of Roman religious worship, the whole thing recounts seven centuries of Portuguese history and the great moments of the history of the West.
The church has a circular plan and was built in likeness of the church over the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, by Emperor Constantinus. Around this Templar church a huge monastic complex developed over time, in which the four large cloisters are very special, as well as the Order’s infirmary and the 6 km long aqueduct, which was built by order of the Spanish King Philip II.
From the monastery, you can descend on foot through the Mata dos Sete Montes forest to the historic center. If you take the paved road, you will come across the Ermida de Nossa Senhora da Conceição chapel halfway. This Renaissance gem is by the hand of Portuguese João de Castilho, who also worked on the monastery.
Next, you should also visit Tomar. The old medieval part of town is built in a cross shape, in the direction of the four cardinal directions, with a monastery at each end. In the middle is the square Praça da República, with the Main Church São João Baptista. To the west is the hill with the castle and convent Convento de Cristo. In the streets around the center you will find small stores and the oldest café where you can still taste the delicious local pastries.
