Mother Church of Saint Anthony, Tiradentes
Igreja Matriz de Santo Antônio
Interesting facts
- The church replaced a chapel of wood and thatch put up around 1702 by gold seekers from São Paulo, soon after gold was found on the Serra de São José.
- Its first walls were raised in wattle and daub, with wooden frames packed with adobe, before the church was gradually enlarged over the eighteenth century.
- The clocks in its two towers were installed in 1788 and still keep time today.
- The pipe organ was brought from Porto in Portugal and is regarded as one of a kind, with a Rococo case and painted decoration.
- A silver oil lamp made in Rio de Janeiro and weighing about 55 kg hangs among the church's treasures of colonial silverwork.
- The inlaid wooden floor of 1774 is marked with numbered burial plots, since members of the brotherhoods were laid to rest beneath the nave.
- Aleijadinho's façade was built in brick rather than the soapstone he preferred, and a stone-balustraded forecourt was added around 1813.
- The national heritage institute compares the gilded carving of the chancel with the celebrated churches of Santa Clara and São Francisco in Porto.
- The soapstone sundial in front of the church, carved in 1785 by Leandro Gonçalves Chaves, has become one of the symbols of the town.
- In 1732 the Brotherhood of the Blessed Sacrament petitioned the Portuguese Crown for money to finish the roof, tiles and altarpieces.
Why it is worth it
In the colonial town of Tiradentes, the Mother Church of Saint Anthony (Igreja Matriz de Santo Antônio) gathers a full century of Brazilian Baroque under one roof. Building began in 1710 and was not finished until 1810, so the church carries the gilded exuberance of the early eighteenth century inside and a lighter, late-colonial façade outside.
The interior is a cave of carved and gilded wood. Between 1739 and 1750 the Portuguese carver João Ferreira Sampaio created the altarpieces, wall linings and throne of the chancel in the Joanine style, named after King João V of Portugal, with twisting Solomonic columns, garlands, shells and scrolls; the ceiling panels are painted in tempera and gold leaf. The choir stalls with spiral columns, by Pedro Monteiro de Souza, date from about 1740, and the inlaid wooden floor from 1774. In the choir loft stands a Portuguese Rococo pipe organ installed around 1788, its case painted by Manuel Vítor de Jesus. The front was redesigned between 1807 and 1810 to plans attributed to Antônio Francisco Lisboa, known as Aleijadinho, the great sculptor-architect of colonial Minas Gerais, with twin bell towers framing the entrance. In the churchyard stands a soapstone sundial carved in 1785. The church was listed as a national heritage monument in 1949.
Tiradentes grew out of a village founded in 1702 during the Minas Gerais gold rush and became a town in 1718 as Vila de São José do Rio das Mortes. In 1889 it was renamed in honour of Joaquim José da Silva Xavier, known as Tiradentes, the hero of the independence movement who was born nearby. Its cobbled streets and whitewashed houses make it one of the best-preserved examples of Portuguese colonial architecture in Brazil.
Getting there
The church stands in the historic centre of Tiradentes, Minas Gerais. The city of São João del-Rei is about 9 km away, and a preserved section of the narrow-gauge Estrada de Ferro Oeste de Minas railway runs between the two towns as a heritage line. The nearest airport is Francisco de Assis Airport (JDF) at Juiz de Fora, about 112 km away.
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From the encyclopaedia
The Mother Church of Saint Anthony is a Roman Catholic church located in Tiradentes, Minas Gerais, Brazil. It is considered one of the masterpieces of Baroque architecture in Minas Gerais.
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