Batalha Monastery
Mosteiro da Batalha
- UNESCO World Heritage
Interesting facts
- King Manuel I's motto, Leauté faray tam yaserei ("I will always be loyal"), is carved more than 200 times across the arches, vaults and pillars of the Unfinished Chapels.
- The Manueline portal of the Unfinished Chapels rises about 15 metres, a lacework of armillary spheres, ropes and angels completed by Mateus Fernandes in 1509.
- King Edward commissioned the Unfinished Chapels in 1437 as a second royal pantheon, yet only he and his queen, Eleanor of Aragon, were ever buried there.
- Work on the chapels stopped when the crown poured its resources into the new Jerónimos Monastery in Lisbon, so their great vault was never built.
- According to tradition, the chapter house vault was thought so dangerous that condemned prisoners were set to work on it.
- The main portal carries 78 carved figures in six rows of archivolts, including Old Testament kings, prophets, angels and saints, each under its own canopy.
- Batalha probably had Portugal's first stained-glass workshop, started by glaziers from Franconia and Nuremberg; its oldest windows date from the late 1430s.
- On the joint tomb of John I and Philippa of Lancaster, his motto Por bem and hers, Yl me plet, are repeated across the lid, with Garter insignia above.
- Napoleonic troops under Marshal Masséna sacked and burned the monastery in 1810 and 1811, and John II's tomb lies empty because soldiers scattered his bones.
- Abandoned after the Dominicans were expelled in 1834, the ruined complex was saved by a restoration begun by King Ferdinand II in 1840.
Why it is worth it
The Monastery of Batalha is a promise kept in stone. Before the Battle of Aljubarrota in 1385, King John I vowed a great church to the Virgin if Portugal defeated Castile; the victory secured the country's independence, and work began the following year. Officially Santa Maria da Vitória, the Dominican monastery took more than a century to build, through the reigns of seven kings and under some fifteen master builders, and became the burial church of the Aviz dynasty.
The first architect, Afonso Domingues, gave the church its plan and an English flavour — his work has been compared to York and Canterbury, a link strengthened by the king's English queen, Philippa of Lancaster. His successor Huguet raised the nave to about 32 metres while keeping it only 22 metres wide, so the plain interior feels astonishingly tall and narrow, lit by some of the oldest stained glass in Portugal. Huguet also built the Founder's Chapel, where John and Philippa lie hand in hand under an eight-sided star vault, surrounded by the tombs of their sons, among them Henry the Navigator.
The chapter house is the building's boldest moment: a square hall about 19 metres across roofed by a star vault with no central support. It fell twice during construction, and tradition says Huguet spent a night beneath the finished vault to silence his doubters. Today two sentinels stand guard over the tomb of Portugal's unknown soldiers of the First World War. At the east end, the Unfinished Chapels — an octagon with seven radiating chapels, open to the sky — show the Manueline style at full strength: a fifteen-metre portal by Mateus Fernandes carved into a lacework of ropes, armillary spheres and foliage. Work stopped when King John III turned his resources to the Jerónimos Monastery in Lisbon, and the vault was never built.
Batalha was sacked by Napoleonic troops in 1810–1811 and abandoned after the religious orders were expelled in 1834, before a long restoration begun in 1840 saved it. It has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1983 and today stands apart from the small town, facing a broad square with an equestrian statue of the commander Nuno Álvares Pereira.
Getting there
The monastery is in the town of Batalha, about 10 km from Leiria. The nearest major airport is Lisbon Humberto Delgado (LIS), about 100 km to the south.
Plan your visit
We have no confirmed visit data yet. Once it is confirmed, this block also carries the date it was checked.
Nearby places
- Alcobaça Monastery 18.0 km · monastery
- Nazaré Lighthouse 23.1 km · lighthouse
On these lists
From the encyclopaedia
The Monastery of Batalha is a Dominican convent in the municipality of Batalha, historical Beira Litoral province, in the Centro of Portugal. Originally, and officially, known as the Monastery of Saint Mary of the Victory, it was erected in commemoration of the 1385 Battle of Aljubarrota and would serve as the burial church of the 15th-century Aviz dynasty of Portuguese royalty. It is one of the best and original examples of Late Flamboyant Gothic architecture in Portugal, intermingled with the Manueline style. The monastery is a historic and cultural monument and was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1983.
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