Idanha a Velha Portugal HD

A small village with a picturesque atmosphere, due to its remarkable set of ruins, it occupies a place of emphasis in the context of the archaeological sites of the Country. It stands in the space where once there was a city of Roman foundation (1st century BC), inserted in the territory of Civitas Igaeditanorum, and was later a Roman town. An inscription dating from the year 16 BCE, where Quintus Tallius, a citizen of Emerita Augusta (Mérida), "willingly gave a watch to the Igeditanos", testifies to the existence in the urban nucleus in that chronological moment. In 105, the town appears mentioned in an inscription of the monumental bridge of Alcantara, important work of Roman engineering, like one of the municipalities that contributed for its construction.

Several vestiges still show this civilizational permanence: among others, the podium of a temple on which the Templar Tower rests; the North Gate and its wall; an exceptional set of inscriptions of various types and varied dispersed estate. During the Visigothic period, under the name of Egitania, the town experienced golden moments of development, having been the seat of the diocese since 599 and the minting center for gold (trientes). They are material testimonies of this period, the baptistery and adjoining ruins of the "Palace of Bishops" and the so-called "Cathedral", with profound subsequent architectural changes.

The Arabs occupied the city until its capture by D. Afonso III, King of Leon, during the reconquest, was already part of the Portucalense County when Portugal was founded. Later D. Afonso Henriques gave it to the Templars. In 1229 D. Sancho II gave him a charter. D. Dinis included it in the Order of Christ (1319), followed by other attempts at repopulation. D. Manuel I, in 1510, institutes to him a new charter of which Pelourinho still is testimony. In 1762 it figured like town, in the region of Castelo Branco; in 1811, it was annexed to Idanha-a-Nova; in 1821 it became the seat of a small county, extinct in 1836.

Intentionally, and throughout the centuries, it was intended to reorganize the entire urban space, revitalizing it in the social, economic, political and cultural domain. But its historical course, of desertification, was traced. Today, Idanha-a-Velha (National Monument) is renewed. A Historical Village carefully adapted for those who live here and for those who visit it.