s works of the temple were initiated before the year 957, as evidenced by a document where this is donated to Lorvão Monastery. It was rebuilt in the last decades of the twelfth century, in an unknown date in the reign of Sancho I of Portugal. Its ordination occurred in 1206, but it is believed that the articles are still be extended for several years. At least two constructive campaigns in the Romanesque style, were made at that time.

Outside the church stand out from the major portals and south side, valuable works to understand the Romanesque Coimbra. The main portal of four archivolts, it seems later and with the participation of high artistry artists together with other less talent. Here the capitals contains a number of reasons, both vegetal and animal, some derived from the Old Cathedral of Coimbra, as the reason of facing birds. The columns of the main entrance are also profusely decorated with geometric reliefs shaped spiral and plant motifs. The elegant south portal probably belongs to the late twelfth century, consisting of several archivolts without decoration, surrounded by a frame-shaped vine, capitals and columns with plant motifs.

Church of Santiago: the south portal detail.
The interior of the church has three naves and three chapels at the head. In the fifteenth century was added, north side of the church one quadrangular chapel, with a portal in Gothic style with an interesting alfiz decorated.

Although it has undergone several changes over the centuries, the most radical intervention took place in the sixteenth century when it was built a second church on the early church, to serve as the city’s Mercy Church. This addition, built in the 1540s, was removed in the restoration work of the first half of the twentieth century.

An important mutilation of the church occurred in 1861, when the enlargement of the current street Visconde da Luz. In this work was lost much of southern and main chapel absidíolo.

The Monastery of Santa Clara of Coimbra was founded in the 1280s by Mor Dias as a house of the Order of the Poor Clares. This early monastery was dissolved in 1311, but in 1314 it was refounded by Queen Isabel, wife of King Dinis I. Queen Isabel was admired for her pious and charitable nature, and her fame led to her canonisation in 1626. The palace of the Queen, of which only ruins remain, was located near the monastery.

The works sponsored by the Queen started in 1316 on the same spot of the previous foundation and gave rise to the ensemble that exists today. The first architect associated with the monastery was Domingos Domingues, who had worked on the cloisters of theMonastery of Alcobaça. His work was continued after 1326 by Estêvão Domingues, who had worked on the cloisters of Lisbon Cathedral. The church was consecrated in 1330 and shows the influence of the Alcobaça building in its floorplan and many other architectural details. Queen Isabel died in 1336 and was buried in the monastery in an impressive Gothic tomb. A large cloister was built to the south side of the church within the same 14th century.

Already in 1331 the monastery and church were flooded by the nearby Mondego River. The site of the foundation proved to be unsuitable, as the monastery was repeatedly invaded by the waters of the river in the following centuries. The sisters of the monastery responded by elevating the floor levels of the monastic buildings to reduce the damage caused by the floods. In spite of the problems, the monastery was frequently enriched by donations. In the early 16th century, under King Manuel I, the church was decorated with Sevillian tiles and several painted altarpieces.

Around 1612, as the river flooded the monastery every year, the nuns built an elevated pavement in the church half way to the roof. Finally, in 1647, as the frequent floods made life in the monastery impossible, King John IV ordered the nuns to abandon the structure. The last nuns left the ensemble in 1677, as a new monastery, called Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Nova (Santa Clara the New) was built on a hill nearby. The Gothic tombs of Queen Isabel and other royal princesses were transferred to the new building.

As the centuries passed, the old monastery fell into ruin and became partially covered by the mud and water of the Mondego. Its historical and architectural importance led to it being declared a National Monument in 1910, and some conservation works were done in the first half of the 20th century. After 1995, a large archaeological campaign by theInstituto Português do Património Arquitectónico removed the mud and water from the ruins, which were found to be in a remarkable good state of conservation. The excavations allowed for the recovery of a large number of architectural and decorative fragments and a better understanding of the monastery plan. In 2006 the building of an interpretation centre and new tours were announced. This phase of the project, whose cost was estimated at 27 million euro, was completed in April 2009.

Ruins

The floorplan of the church of the Monastery of Santa Clara reveals the influence of the Monastery of Alcobaça. The church nave has a nave and two aisles and is fully covered with stone vaulting, something rare in mendicant monastic foundations in Portugal, which usually used wooden roofs over the nave. Another influence of Alcobaça is seen in the vault types: pointed barrel vault in the nave and groin vault in the side aisles. The structure of the columns of the nave also resembles Alcobaça. The nave is illuminated by tallmullioned windows of Gothic design and three rose windows. Unlike Alcobaça, the church of Santa Clara lacks a prominent transept.

The nave used to be divided in two parts, one of public access and the other reserved for the nuns, separated by a dividing wall. An elevated choir, now lost, used to house Queen Isabel’s tomb. The apse of the church has three chapels of polygonal shape, the central chapel being the largest. The central chapel has lost its stone roof and used to be illuminated by three windows.

A portal on the South façade of the church connects it with the cloister ruins, which have been preserved up to the level of the double columns of the arches. The capitals are decorated with vegetable motifs. Also visible are the remains of a Gothic fountain with a circular basin.

The excavations also revealed the foundations of the chapter house, refectory, a smaller cloister and the old Palace of Queen Isabel.

Artwork

During the centuries the monastery and church were decorated with religious works of art that are now dispersed. The Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Nova, to which the nuns were relocated in the 17th century, houses three Gothic tombs which were also relocated from Santa Clara-a-Velha, including that of Queen Isabel. Her tomb, dated from circa 1330, displays her full-size recumbent figure over the lid and is by Aragonesesculptor Mestre Pero.

Many works of art of the monastery are now in the Machado de Castro Museum in Coimbra. Painted altarpieces include a triptych [1] of circa 1486 about the life of Clare of Assisi and a painted triptych commissioned to Flemish painter Quentin Metsys in 1517. Others pieces of sculpture [3] and metalwork [4] in the museum testify to the wealth and prestige of the monastery.

Nothing remains of the early Romanesque monastery. It is known that it had only one nave and a high tower in the façade, as typical of the Augustinian-Romanesque constructions, but none of those elements subsisted. In the first half of the 16th century, the Monastery was completely renovated by King Manuel’s order, this monarch having assumed the Monastery tutelage.

The whole monastic complex, the church and the tombs of King Afonso Henriques and of his successor, King Sancho I, were rearranged and transferred to the main-chapel in 1530, where they still lie in a sculptural work by Nicolau Chanterene. The architect Diogo Boitacwas responsible for the layout of the Manueline church and the Chapter house with its basket-handled and ribbed ceilings. Marco Pires gave continuity to the work, with the completion of the church, the Capela de São Miguel (St. Michael’s Chapel) and the Claustro do Silêncio (Cloister of Silence). The main portal, built between 1522 and 1525 under Chanterene, is the most emblematic piece of the whole monastic ensemble, harmonising the artistic elements of the Manueline with other features from Renaissance inspiration.

Through the whole 16th century, worked at Santa Cruz de Coimbra the most respected architects, sculptors and painters, such as Diogo de Castilho, Machim and Jean of Rouen, Cristóvão de Figueiredo and Vasco Fernandes besides the already mentioned Chanterene, Boytac and Diogo Pires the Younger. The sacristy dates back to the 17th century and keeps some notable 16th century canvases.

Saint Anthony of Lisbon was a member of the community of canons regular, and after his ordination, he was placed in charge of hospitality for the monastery. It was in this capacity that he welcomed the remains of the Franciscan protomartyrs, whose remains were being transported back to Assisi, after their deaths in Morocco. This led to his decision to leave the security and ease of the life of a canon for that of the newly founded Franciscans.

The Monastery of Santa Clara of Coimbra was founded in the early 14th century near the river Mondego by Queen Elizabeth of Portugal, wife of King Dinis I. The queen was greatly admired during and after her life for her pious and generous nature, and was canonised in the 17th century.

Through the centuries, the church and monastic buildings were repeatedly flooded by the Mondego. In the 17th century, under the rule of King John IV, it was decided that a new monastery was to be built for the religious community. Construction works began in 1649, and the church was finished by 1696. All nuns as well as the Gothic tombs of Queen Elizabeth and other royal princesses were transferred to the new monastery, therefore called “Santa Clara-a-Nova” (Saint Clare-the-New).

The project of the monastery was entrusted to Father João Turriano, a benedictine monk and royal engineer, who conceived the ensemble in the simple Mannerist style of 17th-century Portugal. Construction works were led by royal architect Mateus do Couto. The church, consecrated in 1696, is of rectangular floorplan, has a single-aisled nave and lacks atransept. The interior is illuminated by a series of (clerestory) windows located on the second storey of the nave.

The two painted Gothic tombs, painted tombs are a rarity

The side chapels and main chapel house a total of 14 altarpieces of gilt carved woodwork (talha dourada) in late 17th-century style. The main altarpiece, in particular, is an outstanding example of the so-called “national” style (estilo nacional). This altarpiece incorporates the tomb of the Saint Queen Elizabeth, founder of the monastery, made of silver and crystal, entrusted in 1614 to the artists Domingos Lopes and Manuel Moreira. The statue of Queen Saint Elizabeth is a 19th-century work by sculptor António Teixeira Lopes.

The main portal to the church, decorated with the royal coat of arms held by two angels, is located at the south façade, as was typical for convents of religious sisters in Portugal. The gate of the convent is a late Baroque work of 1761 attributed to Hungarian architect Carlos Mardel. Mardel is also credited with the design of at least part of the two-storey cloisters of the convent, a masterpiece of Portuguese Baroque architecture.

Coimbra (the Roman Aeminium) is the seat of a bishopric since the 5th century, after neighbouring Conimbriga was invaded and partially destroyed by the invading Suevesin 468. Almost nothing is known of the cathedrals that preceded the Sé Velha in Coimbra. In 1139, after the Battle of Ourique, King Afonso Henriques decided to finance the building of a new cathedral, given the bad shape of its predecessor. The definitive impulse to the project was given by Bishop Miguel Salomão, who helped pay for the works. In 1185, King Sancho I, second King of Portugal, was crowned in the new cathedral, indicating that the building work was in an advanced state. The basic building was finished in the first decades of the 13th century, even though the cloisters were begun only in 1218, during the reign of King Afonso II.

The project of the Romanesque cathedral is attributed to Master Robert, a – possibly – French architect who was directing the building of Lisbon Cathedral at that time and visited Coimbra regularly. The works were supervised by Master Bernard, possibly also French, who was succeeded by Master Soeiro, an architect active in other churches around the Diocese of Porto.

In the 16th century there were many additions to the cathedral. The chapels, walls and pillars of the nave were covered with tiles, the monumental Porta Especiosa was built in the north side of the façade, and the southern chapel of the apse was rebuilt in Renaissance style. The basic architecture and structure of the Romanesque building was, nevertheless, left intact. In 1772, several years after the expulsion of the Jesuitsfrom Portugal by the Marquis of Pombal, the seat of the bishopric was transferred from the old medieval cathedral to the Mannerist Jesuit church, thereafter called the New Cathedral of Coimbra (Sé Nova de Coimbra).

Coimbra Cathedral is the only one of the Portuguese Romanesque cathedrals from the Reconquista times to have survived relatively intact up to the present. The cathedrals of Porto, Braga, Lisbon and others have been extensively remodelled later.

From the outside, Coimbra’s old cathedral looks like a small fortress, with its high, crenellated walls harbouring few, narrow windows. This menacing appearance is explained by the belligerent times in which it was built. There is a tower-like structure in the middle of the western façade with a portal and a similar-looking upper window. Both portal and window are heavily decorated with Romanesque motifs of Arabic and Pre-romanesque influences. The façade is reinforced by thick buttressesat the corners that compensate for the angle of the terrain (the cathedral was built on the slope of a hill).

The north façade has a remarkable, although eroded, Renaissance-style portal called the Porta Especiosa. The three-storey portal was built in the 1530s by French sculptor João de Ruão (Jean of Rouen). From the east side one can see the semicircular apse with its three radiating chapels, the main and the northern chapels are still Romanesque while the southern one has been rebuilt in Renaissance times. Over the transept there is a Romanesque lantern-tower with some Baroque details.

The cloister, built during the reign of Afonso II (early 13th century), is a work of the transition between Romanesque and Gothic. Each of the Gothic pointed arches that face the courtyard encompass two twin round arches in Romanesque style.

The most remarkable aspect of the Romanesque decoration of the Old Coimbra Cathedral is the large number of sculptured capitals (around 380), which turns it into one of the most important ensembles of Romanesque sculpture in Portugal. The main motifs are vegetal and geometric and reveal Arab and pre-romanesque influences, but there are also pairs of quadrupeds (including centaurs) or birds facing each other. There are virtually no human representations, and no Biblical scenes. The absence of sculptured human figures may be because many of the artists that worked in the Cathedral were mozarabic, i.e. Christians who lived in Arab territories and that had settled in Coimbra in the 12th century. These artists were perhaps not used to human representations, which are forbidden in Islam.

From the Gothic era (13th-14th centuries) there are several tombs with laying statues along the lateral aisles, some very much eroded. The most remarkable is that of Lady Vataça Lascaris (or Betaça), a Byzantine that came to Portugal in the beginning of the 14th century together with Elizabeth of Aragon, who was to marry King Dinis I. Her tomb carries the symbol of the Byzantine Empire: a two-headed eagle.

At the turn of the 15th to the 16th century, bishop Jorge de Almeida sponsored a major decorative campaign. The columns and walls of the aisles were covered withtiles from Seville, which bear multi-coloured geometric motifs reminiscent of Arab art. Most have been removed but many remain, specially in the wall to the left of the entrance of the Cathedral, as well as in many chapels and funerary monuments. Another important addition was the huge wooden retable of the main chapel, carved between 1498 and 1502 by Flemish artists Olivier de Gand and Jean d’Ypres. The retable, in Flamboyant Gothic style, illustrates the history of Mary and Christ and occupies the whole space of the Romanesque main chapel. It is the best of its kind in the country. The altar is supported by an altar table in Romanesque style.

The northern chapel (chapel of Saint Peter) has a Renaissance altar by French sculptor Nicolau Chanterene (early 16th century). The southern chapel of the apse was totally rebuilt in high Renaissance style and contains a magnificent retable featuring Jesus and the Apostles. The altar was finished around 1566 and is the work of João de Ruão (Jean of Rouen). In the 1530s, the same artist had built the Porta Especiosa in the North façade.

The transept has a nice baptismal font in Gothic-Renaissance style (1520-1540), from the church of Saint John of Almedina (São João de Almedina). The originalManueline baptismal font from Coimbra Cathedral is now in the New Cathedral of Coimbra (the former Jesuit church of the city).

The New Cathedral was, originally, the church of the Jesuit Formation house of Coimbra, established in the city in 1543. In 1759, the Jesuit Order was banned from Portugal by the Marquis of Pombal, Prime-Minister of King José I.

In 1772, the bishopric seat was transferred from the old Romanesque Cathedral of the city (now called the Old Cathedral of Coimbra) to the vacant, spacious and more modern Jesuit church.

The church architecture was influential in the Portuguese colonial world. The façade of the former Jesuit church of Salvador, in colonial Brazil, (now the Cathedral of Salvador), built in the 17th century, seems inspired by the Jesuit church of Coimbra.

The niches of the façade of the New Cathedral carry statues of four Jesuit saints. The Baroque decoration of the upper part of the façade, finished in the beginning of the 18th century, contrasts with the lower part, which follows a rigid Mannerist style. The church has two bell towers located just behind the main façade and a domeover the crossing.

The interior, covered with barrel vaulting, has one nave with several lateral chapels and a transept with a dome and cupola. Both transept arms and the main chapel of the apse are decorated with huge, magnificent gilt wood altarpieces built between the 17th and 18th centuries which are fine examples of the so-called “national” Portuguese artarpiece style. The lateral chapels of the nave have altarpieces in Mannerist and Baroque styles.

The 17th-century choir stalls of the main chapel were brought from the Old Cathedral, as well as the beautiful stone baptismal font, carved by Pero and Felipe Henriques in late Gothic-manueline style in the beginning of the 16th century.