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| Cabo de São Vincente (Cape St Vincent) is Europe’s most southwesterly point. Our distant ancestors knew this bleak promontory, lashed by the Atlantic waves, quite literally, as the end of the world. The Romans dubbed it Promontorium Sacrum, perhaps in deference to its awesome majesty or perhaps referring to an older legend that held that this place was the meeting point for the Gods. |
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| Cabo de São Vincente was named so because for hundreds of years, the mortal remains of St Vincente had lain in a shrine here on the headland. St Vincent had been an early Christian priest who had been martyred by the Romans at Valencia in 304. His body was conveyed to the Cape by boat, accompanied, it was said, by large crows. According to Ibn Idrisi, a renowned Arab geographer, the body of the Saint was laid in a church called the Church of the Crows on account of the fact that crows were always present in the vicinity of the church and circling in the sky above it. |
| These crows were tended by the monks in charge of the church and were said to be able to perform miraculous feats. Frustratingly Ibn Idrisi refuses to tell us what these feats were for fear that he will not be believed. Certainly for many years, Cabo de Sâo Vincente was an important place of Christian pilgrimage, the Muslims were in the main tolerant of Christianity and welcomed pilgrims on account of the trade they brought. In 1175, Dom Afonso Henriques (first King of Portugal) by means of a treaty with the Moors arranged for the remains of the Saint to be transferred to Lisbon. |
| The holy relics were again transported by boat and following the boat were the miraculous crows. St Vincente then became the patron saint of Lisbon, the boat and the crows are visible on Lisbon’s coat of arms. Today St Vincente rests in the Igreja de (church of) São Vincente de Fora in Lisbon. |
| Today one can see the ruins of a 16th century monastery and a modern lighthouse, to the right of which is a small castle believed by some historians to have been the dwelling place of Infante Dom Henriques (Prince Henry the Navigator). |
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Algarve Guide
