Monastry of Jerónimos

The Royal Monastery of Santa Maria de Belém, belonging to the Order of Saint Hieronymus, was founded by King Manuel I in 1496 and started to be constructed in 1501-1502. The objectives of political affirmation, propaganda and national glorification defined the grand scale of this building, the artistic quality of the architectural project and the successive acquisitions of exclusive and superb artworks. The extensive facade is over 300 meters long and follows a principle of prominent horizontality. The church and the cloister represent one of the most impressive achievements of the late Gothic European architecture, marked by the naturalistic decorative solutions of the Portuguese “Manueline” style. The monastery was established at the old Restelo beach, located between the city of Lisbon and Barra do Tejo, an area that underwent radical transformations throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. The construction of the monastery asserted the then maritime strategic importance of the place — from there Vasco da Gama and Pedro Álvares Cabral sailed to India and Brazil. Furthermore, the monastery’s location evoked the figure Prince Henry the Navigator, who had established there a chapel that provided assistance to seafarers. The monastery became part of the national heritage in the 19th century, classified as a National Monument in 1907 and listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1983.