Location: Batalha, Leiria District Map
Tel. 244 765 497
Open:
Apr- Sep: 9am- 6pm daily
Oct- Mar: 9am- 5pm daily
Closed: 1 Jan, Easter, 1 May, 25 Dec
The Monastery of Santa Maria da Vitória, better
known as the Monastery of Batalha and also known as the "Templo da
Pátria", is a former Dominican monastery located in the village of
Batalha, in the district of Leiria in the Centro region, province of
Beira Litoral, in Portugal.
It was built in 1386 by King João
I of Portugal as a thank you to the Virgin Mary for the victory
against Castilian rivals in the battle of Aljubarrota. This
monastery of the Order of São Domingos was built over two centuries
until around 1563, during the reign of seven kings of Portugal,
although the first Dominican friars lived there since 1388.
An example of Portuguese late Gothic architecture, or Manueline
style, it is considered a world heritage site by UNESCO, and on July
7, 2007 it was elected as one of the Seven Wonders of Portugal. It
has been classified as a National Monument since 1910.
It
has, since 2016, the status of National Pantheon.
At the start of the work on the Monastery of Batalha, a small temple
was built, whose traces were still visible in the early 19th century. It
was in this building – Santa Maria-a-Velha, also known as Igreja Velha –
that mass was celebrated, giving support to the shipyard workers. It was
a poor work, done with few resources.
In schematic traces, the
evolution of the shipyard itself and the degree of progress of the works
are known. It is known that the initial project corresponds to the
church, the cloister and the inherent monastic dependencies, such as the
Chapter Room, sacristy, refectory and annexes. It is a model that is
similar to that adopted, in terms of internal structure, by the great
monastery of Alcobaça.
The Founder's Chapel, a funerary chapel,
was added to this initial project by King D. João I himself, as was the
funerary roundabout known as Capelas Imperfeitas, on the initiative of
King D. Duarte.
The smaller cloister and adjacent dependencies
would be due to the initiative of King D. Afonso V, with D. João II's
lack of interest in the building being noted. He would receive royal
favors again with D. Manuel I, but only until 1516 or 1517, that is,
until his decision to decisively favor the Jerónimos Monastery factory.
The monastery was restored in the 19th century, under the direction
of Luís Mouzinho de Albuquerque, according to the design of Thomas Pitt,
an English traveler who had been to Portugal at the end of the 18th
century, and who had made the monastery known throughout Europe through
of your engravings. In this restoration, the Monastery underwent more or
less profound transformations, namely the destruction of two cloisters,
next to the Imperfect Chapels and, in a context of the extinction of
religious orders in Portugal, the total removal of religious symbols,
seeking to make the Monastery a glorious symbol of the Avis dynasty and,
above all, its first generation (the so-called Ínclita Geração de
Camões). The current configuration of the Founder's Chapel and the
popularization of the term Batalha Monastery (celebrating Aljubarrota)
to the detriment of Santa Maria da Vitória dates from that time, in an
attempt to definitively eradicate the designations that recall the
building's religious past.
National Pantheon
In 2016, the
Monastery of Santa Maria da Vitória, in Batalha, gained the status of
National Pantheon, without prejudice to the practice of religious
worship, together with the Monastery of Jerónimos (Lisbon), similar to
what happened in 2003 with the Monastery de Santa Cruz (Coimbra) in
relation to the original National Pantheon since 1966 in the Church of
Santa Engrácia (Lisbon).
In the Monastery of Batalha are buried
D. João I, D. Filipa de Lencastre, the infant D. Henrique, the infant D.
João, D. Isabel, D. Fernando, D. Afonso V, D. João II, D. Duarte and
also the Unknown Soldier.
Areas
main chapel
The chancel
appears to be of a later finish, with its crowned triumphal arch, and
the work phases of the side chapels can also be considered two. In the
area of the cloisters, it is possible that the work had progressed
more quickly than in the body of the temple. The north and west
galleries would have already been raised, but it was Huguet who finished
those on the south and east sides (all of them with seven spans),
respecting the previous layout, however, with vaults in cross with large
keys joined by a longitudinal chain, without corbels. , resting in thin
columns on either side of the walls.
Chapter Room
It was up to
the same master Huguet to finish the famous Chapter Room where, since
1921, it is permanently evoked the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and
Portuguese hero, illuminated by the “Flame of the Fatherland” of the
Monumental Lamp, executed by Lourenço Chaves de Almeida and designed by
the Master Antonio Goncalves.
Its architecture, with a square
plan, is covered by a single-flight star vault. This vault is, in fact,
a work of remarkable Gothic construction technique, being formed by
sixteen radial ribs, eight launched from the walls, the remaining ones
launched from the exterior secondary keys, converging on a large central
key of vegetal decoration, developed in two crowns. The exterior face of
this room, facing the cloister gallery, is formed by a central portal
with a deep tear – with five archivolts on the outside and four on the
inside –, the opening decorated with radiant mushrooms. On each side
there are two large broken openings, each filled with two twin windows
with a flag cut and laced according to flaming Gothic precepts. They are
overshadowed by an eyepiece.
The chapter room has figurative ornamentation worthy of note: the
dominant program is Mariological, with the representation of an
Annunciation on the right and the angel on the left in the south window
facing the crast in two capitals. Our Lady holds a bowl with her right
arm ― her neck is decorated with a necklace of pendants in the shape of
a hand (apotropaic signs) ― and the angel the typical phylactery wrapped
around her body.
Another well-known iconographic element is the
representation, in one of the corbels, of what is supposed to be, with
good reason, the master stonemason, in a portrait formula (the
expression of the face is notoriously individualized). Dressed in an
early 15th century costume, a tunic belted with a sash, a turbaned hat
and a pendant, he holds a ruler in his left hand and the other hand
rests on his right knee.
Founder's Chapel
One of the most
important buildings adjacent to the monastery and which indelibly marks
its «royal» character, being very enlightening as to the intentions
involved, is precisely the so-called Capela do Fundador. It is a
construction located to the right of the temple, leaning against the
outer flank of the south nave, through which the entrance is made. It
has a square plan, in which an octagon is inscribed in the center, which
develops in volume upwards, at the level of its second floor – an
octagon that also functions as a lantern. This chapel was designed by
Master Huguet and was still under construction in 1426, being completed
shortly after the death of the monarch, who was transferred there, along
with the queen's body, a year later (1434).
From the outside, it
imposes itself as a homogeneous mass, accentuating the horizontality of
the frontispiece of the temple. It offers three free faces, each of
which is rhythmic by two buttresses, and where three large windows are
torn, with which the axis is wider than the others. At the top, the
exterior of the central octagon stands out, from which eight arched
flying buttresses start, supported on the exterior buttresses, which
extend in pinnacle piers beyond the terrace. The ensemble is finished
off by a frieze of flaming gratings. Originally, the octagon was crowned
by a large needle spire, which fell in the 1755 earthquake.
Inside, light bursts in from the large windows on the façade and from
the crevices of two fires on each face of the central octagon. It is a
diaphanous light, which particularly shines on the center of the
monument, where the mausoleum of the king and queen stands. The vault is
complex, formed by crossing arches that, starting from drumsticks
embedded in the walls, intertwine in central keys, from which the ribs
dump their weight on the drumsticks on the outer face of the central
octagon, thus composing a kind of ship or ambulatory.
The octagon
itself, in the center of the building, is formed by eight composite
pillars, with stacked columns and opens through eight pointed arches
with a soffit decorated with trilobed cairels. Its interior has «two
floors»: the lower floor corresponds to the pillars and arches, while
the lantern windows are on the upper floor. The vault of this central
body is also starred, with eight main arms, eight terceles and sixteen
secondary ribs, supported by eight radial keys and a central key of
large diameter, showing the lacework, in the middle of which the arms
are inscribed in relief. real. Solid arches are ripped from the walls
that house the tombs of the princes of Avis: D. Pedro, his wife and D.
Fernando. The tombs inside the broken back niche with countercurve
exterior archivolt, have fronts in relief decorated with the coats of
arms of the princes, framed by floral ornamentation, being in its
entirety one of the first and most profuse sets of large family heraldry
existing in Portugal. , in accordance, by the way, with schemes
certainly imported from England. Other empty solid arches provided for
more tomb depositions, but they were discarded given the decision of D.
Duarte to build a new pantheon, being filled only in 1901.
Pantheon of D. Duarte
The Pantheon of D. Duarte, also known as
Capelas Imperfeitas, was planned taking into account a rigorous reading
of the will of D. João I, with that monarch choosing to create his own
funerary space. Thus, D. Duarte began the construction of a roundabout
behind the chevet. In any case, the works, also carried out by Huguet,
were not completed, since its construction began roughly in 1434, the
monarch having died four years later, leaving them incomplete. But the
route was certainly outlined and the works of the following reigns were
slowly trying to finish the building, but the main thing remained to be
done: the launch of the large central vault. Contrary to what one might
think, this operation would not raise major technical problems since the
gap to be covered was a little larger than the one existing in the
Chapter Room.
It was, in fact, a building with an octagonal
central body and an axis entrance (articulated with the transept by a
vaulted atrium), around which seven radiant chapels were arranged.
Arising from the large polystyles that make up the structure, an
octagonal body would rise with large windows, vaulted and properly
supported by flying buttresses, intended to configure a wide space with
a completely unified centered plan. The existing chapels open onto the
precinct through large, broken arches, each with a straight choir and a
three-sided prismatic top, with a single window with two lights on each
face and a ribbed vaulted roof. Between the chapels, serving as
reinforcement, there are six small areas of triangular plan, without
access, lower than the chapels and decorated on the outside with a large
window.
In the chapels, a later finish and more care was given to
the one that was intended to receive the mausoleum of D. João II and D.
Leonor, having the works sponsored by the queen. The date of this
intervention is difficult to determine and can be quite late. In any
case, the decoration of this section reaches truly astonishing
proportions, being a unique example in Portuguese Gothic. The ribs are
ribbed, with secondary ribs with a sculptural function only, but with
small keys on an inverted cusp, decorated with trepanated plant motifs,
the larger keys being laced, presenting, in turn, the royal arms and the
«corporate body» of D. João II (the pelican) and Queen D. Leonor (the
shrimp).
Refectory
The Refectory is covered by broken barrel
vaults with four sections marked by toral arches and supported by
corbels on the surrounding frieze.
Royal Cloister
The Royal
Cloister has a single floor with seven sections per wing, consisting of
broken arches, with different openings, with lace flags supported on
carved columns, between buttresses with ledges, topped by pyramidal
pinnacles. It has galleries covered by cross vaults with ogives with a
longitudinal chain, based on fasciculated half-columns with plant
capitals on two floors, and finishing in a platband laced with
fleurs-de-liz. On the corner, an octagonal turret with a pyramidal top
was built. Inside, there is a fountain with a lobed basin and two
staggered polylobed bowls, the first with semi-vegetarian masks. It has
a vaulted roof with arches and a chain, supported by fasciculated
pillars.
Cloister D. Afonso V
The D. Afonso V Cloister has two
floors, the first of seven sections per wing marked by buttresses
between broken double arches resting on faceted columns grouped
transversally on a wall. It has arched vaulted galleries with ogives
with robust toral arches, supported by smooth conical corbels. The
second floor has a porch supported by prismatic columns on a parapet and
diagonal buttresses that rise to the eaves.
The importance of the
Batalha shipyard gave rise to other shipyards that reflect the
contributions of late Gothic, almost always the result of the
recruitment of officers or secondary masters who worked there.
Avis Gothic
From the outside, the Monastery also denounces the
intervention of two works. The south portal of the temple, clearly
designed by Afonso Domingues, reveals this simplicity of processes. This
portal, by the way, is important for what it reveals of attachment to
the «Portuguese» layouts: two slender buttresses (the proportions recall
the small and simple side portal of the Igreja Matriz de Santiago do
Cacém), frame a span of four archivolts decorated by repetitive reliefs
in a series of blind arches. The columns are provided with capitals with
plant decoration on «two floors». The door mirror is trilobed, with
criss-crossing fillets. Almost certainly of a later finish is the
triangular gable, very sharp, decorated on the upper surface with
cogulhos and, on the face, by royal heraldry (the shields of D. Filipa
and D. João I, surmounted by the coat of arms of the kingdom, all with
canopys such as crowning).
But Huguet's undertaking was also
responsible for designing most of the frontispieces, carrying with him a
new architectural language, another Gothic.
In fact, there is no
doubt that the Monastery of Batalha will come to be assumed as a
testimony of royal power and the autonomy of a kingdom. It is known how
necessary it was to impose, through legal and diplomatic treatment, the
right of D. João I to the throne. It is also known about the opposition
of D. João's half-brothers and his niece D. Beatriz to his claims; and
it is known to what extent relations with the neighboring kingdom were
problematic. The fact that D. João I ordered the construction of a
pantheon for himself and his family is a sign of this unprecedented
dynastic mystique. The Batalha Monastery was a project to legitimize a
new dynasty, the Avis dynasty: hence the scale of the work – a sign of
financial capacity and the power to achieve.
Indeed, the
Monastery of Batalha differs from the rest of Portuguese architecture
and stands out in the national artistic landscape with its sign of
change. The decoration, the finishing and the finishing, in addition to
the final option of the works, according to what is conventionally
called late Gothic schemes, are its main distinguishing elements. Some
aspects that distinguish this new mode of Portuguese Gothic from the
first dynasty are easy to state, since, overall, the plastic and
ornamental treatment of the building's exterior provides valuable
indications as to what would become, from now on, the orientation of the
building. 14th century architecture of the post-battle period.
Great attention is immediately paid to the decoration of the surfaces.
It is worth noting, the «horizontal» marking of the facades by patterns
made of ledges (cornices or lacrimal), running through the entire
building; the filling of all the openings – windows, crevices – with
flaming lacework – as in the large window on the façade that thus
replaces the usual rose window. It is worth highlighting the way in
which the walls (or even the buttresses) are animated through the
chiaroscuro game of friezes of flaming nets ― for example, the embossed
stilettos on the alfiz or the wall of the window, the grilling of the
terraces and the provided flowered pinnacles. Other new factors can also
be seen: the structural simplification of the elevations; the complexity
of the supports, from pillars to columns – which become increasingly
thin and multiplied, with thin columns and sticks appearing; the
de-multiplication of the elevation frames now showing very varied
profiles in terms of the respective cutout and their intertwining; in
these, the appearance of the countercurved arch; the flattening of the
vaults and the appearance of complex systems of ribs, unfolding the
number of keys and terceletes (as in the stellate vaults); the spread of
plant decoration, but only in concentrated points (such as capitals);
the return to allegorical and narrative figuration (also in concentrated
areas); the exhibition of architecture as architecture, or its
abstraction, being a supporting house or structural theme treated as if
it were a reality in itself, a kind of crystalline and mineral form,
and, above all, the dramatic accentuation of the use of heraldry.
This is called late Gothic, meaning a period in which the different
modes of construction were regionalised, regardless of whether the
architects in question were of foreign origins. These obey orders
determined by local political will, explore new means in the shipyard
where they are called to work and free themselves from the most current
canons of international Gothic, usually called "classical".
As
for the importance of heraldry, it is known that the disciplining of the
Portuguese armorial is certainly the result of the action of King D.
João I, for reasons that are also related to the exercise of power, its
centralization and the call to oneself (and to the House of Avis) of an
outline of concentrated power, which met the needs of legitimation. The
importance given to heraldry in the Monastery of Batalha (an extremely
regulated heraldry, that is to say, executed with precept and without
concessions to any type of inconsistency in codes) is, therefore, the
starting point for a symbolic protagonism of the coat of arms in later
works, this being visible on the exterior of the building (south portal
and axial portal) or other areas of posterior finishing.