A cidade, os conventos e as suas cercas (original) (raw)

Between the early 1300s and the mid-1700s, the city of Tavira saw the foundation of six convents – São Francisco, Graça, São Paulo, Santo António and Carmo. Their disposition, as a ring around the urban centre, delineated the boundary line between the city and the urban world. Their premises, which included a church and other buildings, marked the urban landscape, while their kitchen gardens, which combined a diversity of green spaces, brought the country into the city. During their religious use, the convents acted as structuring elements within the urban space, either by inspiring the construction of new urban areas and the reorganisation of those already in existence, or by acting as obstacles to the city’s growth. With the extinction of the religious orders and the nationalisation of their possessions, these spaces underwent considerable changes. Nonetheless, they kept playing an important role in the city, taking part in the urban reformulations that occurred in the transition from the 19th to the 20th century. The buildings were put to new uses, while their kitchen gardens offered free spaces for the city to expand. More recently, former conventual spaces have been recognised as valuable elements of the city’s heritage, and most of them were subjected to refurbishments that allowed them to be used in ways more compatible with the preservation of their cultural values.