Guimarães, in the Minho region of northern Portugal, is celebrated as the cradle of the nation: on a stretch of the old walls, large letters proclaim Aqui nasceu Portugal, Portugal was born here. The municipality has about 156,000 inhabitants and is an important industrial centre, known for textiles and cutlery, but its medieval old town, a UNESCO site since 2001, is one of the most beautiful and best preserved in the country. In 2012 Guimarães was European Capital of Culture.
The birth of a nation
The area has been settled since the Iron Age, as the fortified villages nearby show. The name probably comes from Vímara Peres, the nobleman who reconquered the region for the kings of Asturias in the ninth century. The city's story, however, begins in the tenth century with Countess Mumadona Dias, who founded a monastery and, to protect it, a castle: the town grew up around them.
At the end of the eleventh century Guimarães became the residence of Count Henry of Burgundy, lord of the County of Portucale, and his wife Teresa. Here, according to tradition, their son Afonso Henriques was born; in 1128, at the battle of São Mamede fought just outside the town, he defeated his mother's troops and took control of the county. A few years later he proclaimed himself king: he is regarded as the first king of Portugal, whose independence was recognised by León in 1143.
The castle and the chapel of São Miguel
Guimarães Castle, on the hill called the Colina Sagrada, keeps the layout of the fortress built for Mumadona and rebuilt over later centuries: a crenellated enclosure with towers and a great central keep. At its foot, the small Romanesque church of São Miguel do Castelo is, by tradition, where Afonso Henriques was baptised.
The Palace of the Dukes of Braganza
Nearby stands the Paço dos Duques de Bragança, a fifteenth-century palace built by the first Duke of Braganza, Afonso, son of King John I, in a style inspired by Burgundian residences, with its many brick chimneys. Abandoned for centuries, it was rebuilt between 1937 and 1959, under the Estado Novo, and is now a museum with Flemish tapestries, Persian carpets, furniture and weapons, as well as an official residence of the President of the Republic in the north.
The old town
From the castle you walk down Rua de Santa Maria, the oldest street, lined with medieval houses with wooden and iron balconies, to Largo da Oliveira and Praça de São Tiago, two of the loveliest squares in Portugal, full of cafés and restaurants. Here stands the church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira, heir to Mumadona's monastery, and in front of it the Padrão do Salado, a small fourteenth-century Gothic shrine commemorating the Christian victory at the battle of Salado in 1340. The old tanneries district, the Zona de Couros, joined the UNESCO site in 2023.
The museums
The Alberto Sampaio Museum, in the Romanesque cloister of the collegiate church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira, displays sacred art, goldwork, ceramics and some extraordinary historic pieces: the tunic King John I is said to have worn at the battle of Aljubarrota in 1385 and the silver triptych traditionally taken from the defeated Castilian king's camp. The Martins Sarmento Museum houses the archaeological collection from the area's hillforts, including the Colossus of Pedralva, a huge pre-Roman stone statue, statues of Gallaeci-Lusitanian warriors and the Pedra Formosa, the decorated slab of an ancient ritual bath. The Gothic church of São Francisco has an apse lined with eighteenth-century azulejos.
Surroundings
About 15 kilometres away lies Citânia de Briteiros, one of the most important Iron Age hillforts in the Iberian peninsula, discovered in the nineteenth century by Francisco Martins Sarmento, with the foundations of over a hundred round houses, some rebuilt. On Penha mountain, which overlooks the city and is reached by cable car, there are a sanctuary, woods and huge granite boulders. The former monastery of Santa Marinha da Costa, founded in 1154, is now one of Portugal's finest pousadas.
Festivals
The main festivals are the Festas Gualterianas, in early August, with parades, music and fairs, and the Festas Nicolinas, organised by students between late November and December, with traditional drum processions. Guimarães is linked to Porto by regional trains in about an hour and pairs easily with Braga.