The former Convent of Nossa Senhora da Graça (Our Lady of Grace Church and Augustinian Friary) is nowadays a historic building in the civic parish (freguesa) of Tavira (Santa Maria e Santiago), close to the church of Santa Maria do Castelo.

Under the auspices of the Pousadas de Portugal group, the old building was restored in 2006, and converted into a 36-room historic guesthouse (Pousada do Convento da Graça)^[1]. Restoration brought to light Moorish^[2] artefacts and foundations (see below) from when the southern half of the Iberian peninsula had been under the Almohad Caliphate. Archaeological conservation was supervised by Drs Sandra Cavaco^[3] and Jaquelina Covaneiro^[4], working for the town council. Access is from the hotel’s bar. For the time being, further archaeological investigation has had to be postponed, perforce placing on hold any plans to heat the hotel’s swimming pool. As is plain from the wall-maps in the Tavira Islamic Museum^[5], the hotel is situated within the old barbican of Tavira Castle.

The convent’s church has been converted into a multi-purpose function room, used for weddings, meetings or conferences.

Still visible are some of the decorations.

In 2012 the building was classed as a Monumento de Interesse Público (Monument of Public Interest)^[6].

In the first half of the sixteenth century, Tavira had been the most populous town in Algarve, outstripping Lagos, Faro, Loulé and Silves. Only twenty years earlier, Tavira had been elevated to city status. Trade via the seaport was flourishing.^[7]Armoury was the main industry: the Portuguese royal crown’s troops in North Africa keeping some ten or so workshops busy supplying and repairing armour, spears and rifles.^[8]

This site came into the hands of the Discalced Augustinian Friars in 1542, funded by King John III.^[9]

Austin friary edit

Under Prior Pedro de Vila Viçosa, the Augustinian friars began building their new convent without delay. The convent was extended in around 1568, under Friar João de S. José. It became the main centre of culture and education in Tavira.

Friar Valentim da Luz edit

Ten years earlier, in 1558, a new Friar had been sent to the convent: Valentim da Luz.^[10] Within two years he had been appointed as the convent’s Prior. He had been born in Vila Nova de Foz Côa, in 1524, and had been admitted to the Order of Saint Augustine as a young man. After his novitiate he had travelled to Italy in 1551 accompanying his superior, Luís de Montóia. He had returned to Portugal determined to contribute to ecclesiastical reform.

Like Erasmus and many others, Friar Valentim da Luz dreamed of the Catholic Church rediscovering religious practice centred on man; unshackled by dogmatic particularism or aspirations to secular power. He was shocked with the role adopted by the institution of the Catholic Church in the social milieu of the time: an instrument, seemingly, of the constituted powers, whether civil or ecclesiastical. Embodying this faction was the Holy Office of the Inquisition. People like Friar Valentim, especially those who felt called to represent the Catholic Church, but whose everyday religious practice was more fundamental, were on a collision course with a powerful elite.

On 15 June 1560 Maria de Meneses lodged a complaint. She named witnesses, and they were called to testify. The prior of the neighbouring church confirmed that it was "famous among some people in Tavira that the accused Friar Valentim had claimed one should not pray to the saints". Maria de Meneses’ maid testified that she had heard the accused priest question why there were so many ornaments in churches, and why so much was needed for church repairs, and that he wanted rather that [such money] be shared among the poor." A confrere from the convent added that he had heard the accused Friar Valentim say that Divine Scripture and the liturgy of the Mass would have to be said in each person's own language so that everyone would understand it; that an act with a votive prayer was not intrinsically better than one without; that Erasmus had not made a mistake in this, nor did he find any error in it.

In a similar vein, Friar Valentine was reported saying that scholastic theologians were like frogs from Egypt and that they displaced faith, hope and charity. He was alleged to have exclaimed how much better it would be for priests in their prime to get married; that he yearned for a Church in which the priests were few and learned and married; and that he was bored by so many friars and so many religious orders.

This sufficed to prompt further enquiry. Dr. Luis d'Albuquerque, archdeacon and canon at Silves, sent António de Gouveia to Tavira. He questioned four priests, three women, a seafarer and a shipowner. All were prepared to attest to the "scandalous" content of the friar's preaching.

The testimony was forwarded up the Holy Inquisition’s chain of command. Strongest evidence, word came back, would be that to be heard from the accused at Confession. The defendant needed to be urged to unburden his conscience - without, however, alerting him to prosecution or whistleblowers. Friar Valentim duly came to Confession and was soon to be heard speaking of his convictions. Asked if he had ever exclaimed about so many church ruins, he affirmed he had indeed said this, because in Tavira there were many badly repaired and very damaged religious houses. He accepted his having aired the paradox of soliciting support for church building from the poor while not alleviating their plight.

Various counter-reformation luminaries - among them Jerónimo Osório, shortly to be appointed Bishop of the Algarve - issued learned opinion. The propositions attributed to Friar Valentim qualified as heretical, because of their strongly Lutheran slant.

For his part, now belatedly anticipating the worst, Friar Valentim went on to express remorse in a fuller confession. Whether he was offered the chance to recant the pedagogical - as opposed to the speculative - trespass is not recorded. Regardless, to his accusers this last effort seemed insincere and tardy. A trial took place, he was convicted of heresy and handed over to the appropriate authorities. He was duly burned alive at Ribeira de Lisboa on Sunday 10 May 1562.

School edit

By 1575, the convent had grown in importance. It was here that the new bishop of Silves, Jerónimo Osório, duly founded a School of Moral Theology, Sacraments and Canon Law. It was to serve both clergy and lay people.

Portugal had been one of the first Catholic countries to accept the decrees of the Council of Trent. The reforms agreed on were ambitious. In Lisbon on 12 September 1564 Portugal had officially committed itself to Tridentine reform. Various jurisdictional powers were duly distributed to its bishops. Bishop Jerónimo Osório was staunchly in the vanguard of reform.^[11] He regularly undertook visits of his parishes, on such occasions rebuking negligent priests. To improve priestly formation he founded, in addition to that at Tavira, schools of Moral Theology in Faro and Loulé; and Latin schools in Lagos and Portimão. For greater efficiency he transferred the cathedral to Faro in 1577.^[12]

Nineteenth century edit

In 1837, three years after the end of the Liberal Wars, and the enforced closure of religious orders in Portugal, the building was taken over by the army. It became quarters for the Fifth Battalion of Hunters. Thereafter the place was known as Quartel da Graça (Grace Barracks).

On 8 December 1872, local people stoned the barracks, protesting against a newly introduced change to the law regulating measurement of volume, the Revolt of Measures. The military opened fire, killing some of them. The Military Unit was commanded by Colonel José António de Sousa Chagas. At Tavira Judicial Court, presided over by Dr. Leocádio Maria Anderson, he was found guilty of excessive self-defence. Colonel Chagas appealed, with the result that he was summarily dismissed. It came out in evidence that there had been six deaths, all caused by bullets. Most had been too far away from the barracks for them to have seriously harassed the soldiers with stones.^[13]

Meanwhile, the church was used as a garage and repair shop. Much of the original furnishings and decoration was ruined. Early in the 20th century, with more modern accommodation available at Atalaia barracks, the military unit moved out. The building remained a small military hospital until finally decommissioned after the recent Portuguese revolution. The building was left derelict until 2003. In the interim it came into the hands of the Tavira Town Council (Câmara Municipal de Tavira - Município de Tavira).

13th century findings edit

Reflecting Tavira in the era of the Almohad Caliphate are remains generously displayed just beneath the hotel’s bar. The dig in 2006 had extended under what is now covered over by the bar and swimming pool.

It is evident there were more than thirteen houses, some with central patios or an additional chamber. Surrounding a central uncovered patio would have been other chambers, functioning variously as living room, bedroom, toilet or kitchen. These dwellings seem to have varied with regard to flooring, whether stone, ceramic tiles, beaten earth or lime mortar. The quality of mortar used to cover the walls also varied.

Above shallow foundations traces of masonry walls have been found. Upper work would have depended on ‘’tapia’’ : mud mixed with lime and stones. Some roof tiles were discovered on the ground in the houses and also in a room in House 1.

The original structure of some of the rooms appears to have altered, perhaps indicating change in use.

These ruins from when the Almohad Caliphate had charge of Tavira resemble those unearthed also in Cacela Velha, Silves and Mértola. Typical features include a well defined public area: residential buildings around three public thoroughfares, about 1.6 metres wide. These would have accommodated communal services, such as drainage. Drains appear to have been of standard width, with stone lids and sides. Each house had a channel to direct away foul- or storm-water. Respectively, these ran to septic tanks or more sizeable public drainage. Differing from the septic tanks that have permitted comment at Syasa, or at the battlement walkway of House X in Mértola, these ones at Tavira seem to have been actually retained indoors.

Up until the mid-sixteenth century Tavira’s port was one of the busiest in the Algarve. Location had much to recommend it. Though on the coast, the river afforded deep water harbourage at the very heart of a sizeable city. Tavira is relatively sheltered from the winds. An attack would have always had to contend with navigating a passage through channels in the Ria Formosa largely uncharted by the enemy, and susceptible to stranding at low tide. The entire sea approach could be monitored from the castle, that fell only with the 1755 earthquake.^[14]

Tavira is believed to have been pivotal to Mediterranean trade routes from the Iron Age. However it was during the Middle Ages, especially after its conquest from North Africa, that the port assumed unprecedented importance, possibly becoming one of the most busy in the Iberian peninsula. Ships moored here would have arrived from a wide compass, trading food, basic necessities, raw materials, people, cloth, foreign ideas, novel customs and fashions etc.

The archaeological investigation here in 2006 uncovered ceramics indicating Tavira had traded with Lisbon, Seville, and Montelupe in Italy. Commerce had also implicated the Valencian Region (Paterna, Manises) and the Kingdom of Granada. Whether arrived by sea or land, materials dating to this period, of North Alentejo origin, have also come to light.

This building’s impact is substantial, not least because of its proximity to the town’s main square, but also by virtue of its massive façade.

The astonishingly well preserved stonework of church and convent dramatically present a masterclass in the architecture of Renaissance, Mannerism, Estilo Chão (an austere style coming into vogue in the early sixteenth century), and Baroque (mid-seventeenth to early nineteenth centuries). Said to have been one of the earliest two-storey buildings in the entire Algarve Province, its architecture is considered the town’s best exemplar of Baroque. Compared with other Algarve convents by Diogo Tavares de Ataíde, this is one of the most striking. The church itself reveals elements of the Renaissance, Mannerist, and Baroque. The quadrangular cloister reflects Renaissance, round arches opening onto a central court, with columns and capitals pointing to workmanship of the highest quality.

The convent building is mostly Baroque, two towers harmoniously framing its lower main body. Decoration focuses on its large monumental and pleasing façade. The large windows and, in particular, their carved frames, reveal sculpture of quality. The staircase is Baroque.