The history of human settlement in Vila do Bispo

Megalithic Landscapes

Megalithic culture is the tradition of erecting large stones, most probably for ceremonial purposes. The first menhirs in Vila do Bispo were erected around 6,500 years ago as anthropomorphic sculptures, pioneering manifestations of man in the landscape. 

These first structures are an early example of humanity appropriating nature, establishing territories, cultivating them, transforming them and delineating them with identity markers of cultural property. Man becomes the measure of all things.  

Hard Rock, menhir at Moinho da Fonte, Raposeira, Vila do Bispo Museum, 2024 © Ricardo Soares

Vila do Bispo is home to the largest concentration of menhirs on the Iberian Peninsula, an exceptional megalithic territory that still has around 300 menhir remains. Our menhirs may turn out to be the first and oldest megalithic monuments in Europe and are at the origin of a phenomenon that, from south to north, culminates in more complex architectures such as the Almendres megalithic enclosure (Évora), the Carnac alignments (French Brittany) or Stonehenge (England). A phenomenon closely associated with astronomy, menhirs appear isolated, aligned or organised in megalithic enclosures as markers of celestial events that guide the cycles of nature, namely the terrestrial, solar and lunar cycles. 

Menhir do Padrão, the first stone of Stonehenge, 2016 © Ricardo Soares
Menir do Padrã, Raposeira, 2013 © Ricardo Soares

In these times, the sun and the moon determined the routines of life, day and night, the seasons and the tides. Farmers, shepherds, fishermen and shellfish gatherers depended on celestial calendars in their daily lives. All over the world, megalithic monuments have been built orientated to the stars, with the first full moon rising after the spring equinox standing out. Menhirs are magical, religious instruments for measuring astral time, symbolically linking terrestrial landscapes with celestial landscapes.

Heavy metal with fire and sword

The Copper (or Chalcolithic) and Bronze Ages, between the third and second millennia BC, saw profound changes in prehistoric societies. Settlement expanded into sparsely occupied regions and large settlements were built with walls and moats. Large-scale trade emerged, with new goods and exotic products. Metallurgy emerged with the first gold and copper, followed by bronze and iron alloys. 

Heavy Metal, Bronze Age Warrior, Vila do Bispo Museum, 2024 © Ricardo Soares

Around 4,000 years ago, in Vila do Bispo, the shell middens (a dump for human waste) were still active, the menhir cult still persisted and agriculture was significant, as evidenced by the remains of tools from this period. But new practices have been uncovered by local archaeologists. At the beginning of the Chalcolithic period, collective funerary depositions were practised in the tomb of Pedra Escorregadia in Vila do Bispo, with diverse offerings. A funerary stele (a stone or wooden slab erected as a monument) found at Figueira in Budens from the end of the Bronze Age is notable. It depicts a warrior armed with a shield and spear, a contemporary of Homer’s heroes and the Trojan wars. The growing social hierarchisation of these societies is evident in the Pedra Escorregadia tomb, a funerary monument dedicated to a restricted human group, perhaps a “social elite” from the early Metal Age. In the Figueira stele, we see the introduction of Mediterranean-influenced ideologies and the rise of unique individuals among the local elite, who took on the role of military and religious leaders, almost demigods, just before the first urban societies. Discovered by José Formosinho in the late 1940s, this is an iconic piece of Vila do Bispo’s past, currently housed in the Lagos Municipal Museum.

Domus, the house of the people

The Romans established a settlement in the Boca do Rio estuary, in the first century AD dedicated to fishing, fish processing, salt extraction and the export of fish sauces to Lusitania and other provinces of the Roman Empire. With significant development in the third century AD, it remained active until the middle of the fifth century AD. A Roman villa with thermal baths was built on the beach for the owners, and was occupied for almost five centuries. 

Domus, collection of the Roman villa of Boca do Rio, Budens, Vila do Bispo Museum, 2024 © Ricardo Soares

An extensive factory area inland was on the right bank of the then-navigable estuary. With a riverside harbour, it had warehouses and various production units, with tanks(cetariae) used to produce fish and shellfish pastes, and sauces preserved in brine. Generally known as garum, these foods and condiments were highly valued, exported, and appreciated throughout the Roman world. In 1755, the tsunami generated by the great earthquake of 1 November uncovered the impressive ruins of the Lusitanian-Roman villa of Boca do Rio. In 1878, Estácio da Veiga, a pioneer of Algarve archaeology, carried out extensive excavations at the site, revealing a group of buildings with mosaics, which he interpreted as a bathhouse. Work followed in 1896 with Santos Rocha and in 1933 with José Formosinho, which resulted in the collection of various materials destined to enrich the museums they were founded at the time, in Figueira da Foz and Lagos, respectively.

Life, quo vadis

From Roman times, we find ancient buildings and objects associated with those communities’ daily activities, life and death. Our ancestors were concentrated in seaside settlements on the beaches of Boca do Rio and Martinhal, and in scattered farms located in sheltered and fertile inland valleys. The development of these ancient settlements was due to the abundance, variety and quality of the resources provided by the land and sea. From the coast, fish and shellfish, from the countryside, cereals, olive oil, wine, pastoralism and hunting – products that gave rise to the so-called “Mediterranean diet”. In addition to family and community subsistence, the more enterprising landowners prospered on a network of imperial scale, commercialising their surpluses and selling endogenous products along Mediterranean routes. The products travelled by land to the interior of Lusitania. By sea, they sailed north to the Sado, Tagus and Mondego estuaries or east to Mediterranean ports. 

Quo Vadis, Vila do Bispo Museum, 2024 © Ricardo Soares

The preserved fish product garum was packaged and transported in amphorae, many of which were made at the important pottery complex on Martinhal beach in Sagres, one of the largest in southern Portugal, where ten kilns were identified. The pottery would have produced amphorae and other ceramics used in everyday life, such as plates, jars, lamps and beehives. Apiculture has been documented in Sagres for around 2,000 years, specifically through the archaeological discovery of rare clay hives at the Lusitanian-Roman site of Martinhal.

Sit Tibi Terra Levis

At Lomba das Pias, on the western slope of the Boca do Rio beach, there is a necropolis that served the Lusitanian-Roman villa and the people who lived and died there for 500 years. In total, ten burial graves and an older cremation structure were discovered. The investigation of the different types of burials and their respective remains made it possible to establish chronologies between the second half of the third century and the end of the fifth century. In the oldest funerary structure, a votive deposit was recovered, consisting of a coin, a lamp, a small vase and a terra sigillata bowl imported from Tunisia. The set of graves studied so far bears witness to an important transition in Roman funerary practices between cremation rituals and different burial options. These new burial rituals led to religious reforms and Emperor Constantine’s conversion to Christianity at the beginning of the fourth century. 

Sit Tibi Terra Levis, Roman tomb in Boca do Rio, Budens, Vila do Bispo Museum, 2024 © Ricardo Soares

According to Silva Lopes (1841), a grave with the following epitaph was discovered at Cape St Vincent in May 1639:

“This is Posthumius Rufus, who, as a soldier in the battle of Gaius Pompilius, died in the war with the Lusitanians. Gaius Cornelius, his dearest friend and relative placed this sarcophagus in his memory: May the earth be light on you.”

Gaius Pompilius Lena was a Roman military leader who took part in the Lusitanian War, which took place between 155 and 139 BC, pitting the Roman Republic against some tribes from the Province of Hispania Ulterior, known as the Lusitanians. It is not possible for us to know anything other than this Roman soldier perished in the vicinity of the Sacred Promontory, where he was buried by a close friend, Gaius Cornelius.

Saint Vincent the Invincible

Catholic tradition has it that Vincent, deacon of Zaragoza, was martyred in Valencia in 304, during the last official campaign of persecution against Christians, ordered by the Roman Emperor Diocletian and led by Governor Publius Dacian. 

According to legend, Vincent was unyielding in his defence of his faith and was, therefore, cruelly tortured and martyred by fire. After his death, his body was abandoned in a field, where crows protected it from attack by animals and beasts. To get rid of the body once and for all, the Roman soldiers tied it to a millstone and threw it into the sea, but the corpse floated to shore. The miracle was felt by the Christians of Valencia, who recovered the body and buried it in the city’s cathedral. Unshakeable in the face of life’s scourges and indestructible after death, Saint Vincent was given the attributes of “victorious” and “invincible”.

São Vicente, Festas de Sagres, 15 August 2022 © Ricardo Soares

Four hundred years later, in 711, as part of the Islamic invasion of the Iberian Peninsula by the Umayyad Caliphate, the relics of Saint Vincent were moved to a safer location. They travelled to the far southwest of Europe and were deposited in the ancient Promontorium Sacrum, a mystical finisterre known since then as Cape St Vincent. According to Arab and Christian sources, a temple dedicated to the cult of St. Vincent may have existed on the cape between the eigth and twelfth centuries. This small church was known as Kanisat al-Gurab among the Arabs and Ermida dos Corvos among the Christians. 

In 1173, by the will of King Afonso Henriques, the first king of Portugal, the relics of Saint Vincent were transferred once again, this time to Lisbon. Two ravens guarded the boat that made the journey. A small bone of the saint was left in Sagres. It is a phalanx of a finger encased in a silver reliquary, which is kept in the Mother Church of Vila do Bispo and is an object of great devotion among the local community.

Ricardo Soares is the archaeologist at Vila do Bispo Museum.

O Celeiro da História

Sítio das Eiras, 8650-405 Vila do Bispo

Opening times: Tuesday to Sunday, 10 am–6 pm

Did you know…

Domus is the Latin name for “house”, from which the current words “domicile” and “domestic” derive. As synonyms for the house, terms such as “fire” and “hearth” are still used because fire and hearth have always been central elements of habitability and comfort in any home!

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