OBIDOS, LEIRIA, AND THOMAR
There are many places besides Cintra where ancient strongholds are to
be found. In a land where there was so much fighting every town had
to be protected, and throughout the country you come across old-world
places which but for the tumble-down state of the fortifications can
hardly have changed since the days when Moors and Christians struggled
for supremacy.
One such old town is Obidos, won from the Moors in 1148. I remember
it as I saw it last, perched high on its steep and rocky hill, with
battlements, towers, and the ruins of the castle standing out dark
and formidable against a glowing sunset sky. It is the quaintest
little place in the world, carrying one’s thoughts back to the Middle
Ages, and scarcely a house has crept beyond the shelter of its high,
castellated walls. There are only two narrow fortified gateways,
beneath whose arches the inhabitants pass in and out. Within the walls
are the tightly-packed houses, low and picturesque, and numerous
churches. The narrow, winding streets are full of dark-eyed
children, gaunt pigs, and straying donkeys, while flowers hang in
masses of brilliant colour over every wall and balcony.
In other towns the protecting fortress stands alone on some high
outcrop of rock, while the houses nestle at its foot, as, for instance,
at Leiria. Centuries ago it was a Roman centre of some importance, and
later on Suevis, Visigoths, and Moors held sway there in turn, until
it was finally taken by King Alfonso Henriques in about 1135. More
than a hundred years later King Diniz lived there, and on the site of
the Moorish stronghold he built the great castle the ruins of which
dominate the town to this day.
Surrounded by hills, and standing on the green banks of the River Liz,
Leiria is now a sleepy, picturesque country town, with a cathedral, a
market-square, wide, shady walks skirting the river, and quaint little
streets spanned at intervals by arches. It seems strange now to think
of the stormy days when knights in armour rode up the winding way that
leads to the castle, yet later years have also brought fire and sword
to this peaceful valley. In the Peninsular War, between 1807 and 1810,
the French troops passed through it no less than three times, and under
Marshal Junot and General Margaron it was given over to pillage and
violence.
Some twenty miles or more away, beyond hill-tops clothed with
pine-woods and heather, and valleys rich with olives, figs, and vines,
lies Thomar, another town sheltering beneath a high castle-crowned hill.
This fortress, under whose protection the town first sprang up, was
built by the Knights Templars in the middle of the twelfth century. It
was the special mission of this order of knights to defend the Holy
Sepulchre at Jerusalem, to protect the Christians in that city, and
to fight the Mohammedans wherever they might meet them. The Moslems
in Portugal were the Moors, who made a mighty effort to capture this
Castle of Thomar some sixty years after it was founded. It was a
celebrated siege, and an old inscription, let into one of the walls,
tells the history of it in a few quaint words. Translated, it reads as
follows:
“In 1228, on the 3rd day of July, the King of Morocco came with
400,000 cavalry, and 500,000 footmen, to besiege the Castle for six
days, and destroyed all that he found outside the walls. God delivered
the Castle, its Master and brethren from his hands. The same King
returned to his country with innumerable losses of men and horses.”
On the suppression of the Order of Templars in 1312, King Diniz
established the Order of Christ at Thomar--“for the defence of the
Faith, the discomfiture of the Moors, and the extension of the
Portuguese monarchy,” as the old records put it. It became one of the
wealthiest and most powerful orders of chivalry in Christendom, its
knights fighting in all parts of the world, till in 1523 King John
III. converted it into a purely religious community of monks, and the
heroic days of war and adventure came to an end.
As the years passed by many additions were made to the grim old
fortress. A magnificent new church was added, chapter-houses and
cloisters, dormitories and kitchens. There are no fewer than eight
cloisters, of different dates, styles, and sizes, and all these
oddments of architecture, each one beautiful in its own way, have
mellowed with age into a rambling, fascinating whole.
The town below contains several churches of interest, and many
factories and cotton-mills. The River Nabao runs through it, passing
beneath a fine old bridge, and turning numberless picturesque
water-wheels as it flows along. On its banks poplars rear their tall
heads, willows dip their long branches in the cool stream, and rows of
peasant women may be seen standing in the water, hard at work washing.
They rub and scrub the clothes ruthlessly on hard stones, rinsing
them in the running water; but one feels quite reconciled to see the
garments being worn out and ruined, if only one may be allowed to watch
these charming, brightly-dressed laundresses, and to listen to their
merry talk and laughter.