Welcome to the Official page of the Presidency of the Portuguese Republic

Mayor of Santarém,
Speaker of the Municipal Assembly,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Portugal meets once again in Santarém.

It is a time for celebrations.

The bell of Cabaças Tower should be rung, following the tradition of the 15th century, calling to assembly the citizens of Santarém.

Portugal has come to Santarém, and the capital of Ribatejo welcomes us on the day when its first charter, granted by King D. Afonso Henriques to the land where he found his “paradise of delight”, celebrates its eight hundred and thirtieth anniversary.

My thanks go to Santarém and to all its inhabitants, for the hospitality with which Portugal, on this day and as it has always done, welcomed us in Santarém.

My thanks as well to the Santarém County Council. Its endeavour and enthusiasm will leave an indelible stamp in these commemorations.

Coming to this city is to keep a tryst set with history.

The origins of Scallabis are lost in time and are legendary.

A city with a past, Santarém witnessed royal births and weddings, acclamations and coronations, torturing of the condemned and the signing of treaties. Here the vanquished invaders wept, for the will of the people.

The conquest of Santarém by the Founder, on the night of 15 March 1147, permitting the advance to Lisbon, and then towards the south, transformed Portugal into a lasting kingdom.

Santarém was then no further a border, “the last western city”, in the words of a notable citizen, the great poet Ibn Bassam. It became a connecting link, a hyphen between the north and the south of this country.

The monumentality of Santarém – where each street is a live museum – is the testimony of a greatness that the course of time has not deleted.

When Almeida Garrett, the master of all travellers, departs up-Tagus in the search for Portugal – searching for a country, in his words, “habitable by all” – he found Santarém:
“... a book of stone where the most interesting and poetic part of our chronicles is written.”

Churches, convents, stately homes, palaces, walled precincts, ancient streets. A vast book of stone which recounts the history of the fatherland – this is how Santarém justifies its title as capital of the Gothic.

Another visitor to this land was Alexandre Herculano, intending to apply an “illustrated system of agriculture”. He was endeavouring to create a new monument which would embody the rebirth of Portugal, a monument built with “the look of soil, the lushness of the fields, profusion in lieu of scarcity in the home of the hard working man”.

Our forefathers gave us the signal. Upstream from the river of history they found a glorious past. But they did not return to Santarém to celebrate that past, less still to mourn the present. They searched here for a new sense so that, downstream, it could enlighten the days of the future.

A sense inspired by not just what we were, but also by what we can become. Here is the Ribatejo looking ahead, occupied with innovative activities, choosing the best practises to invest in agricultural processes.

I particularly salute all those who, throughout so many years, have contributed towards the National Agricultural Fair, a great event which we will be able to visit today.

This is the spirit of our reencounter, today, in Santarém.

A City which is a belvedere: from the height of its hills we can contemplate almost half of Portugal.

Before us, the Tagus, sung by troubadours, entertainers, lovers and poets.

Exiled here, filled with “sad memories”, Camões softened his pain in the reaches of the “pure, smooth and delicate Tagus.” Further on, “cheerful fields, green branches” appeased his nostalgia.

Far away, framing the horizon, the Beira and Estremadura mountains, the lights of Lisbon and the lowlands and olive groves of the Alentejo.

City of bullfights and brave people. The yoke of submission which was at times wished upon us was refused here.

Without fear in the face of a superior opposing force, the city followed the Master of Aviz and King D. João IV. D. António, Prior of Crato, was acclaimed here. Captain Salgueiro Maia, certain that he faithfully interpreted the feelings of the people, started off from these hills.

In this day when we celebrate the Portugal of all the Portuguese, I would like to rescue from oblivion another natural of Santarém, an anonymous inhabitant from Alfange.

The chronicler did not record his name, solely preferring to describe for the coming generations what Queen D. Leonor transformed into an exemplary act.

In that year of 1491 – Portugal was then ruled by King D. João II -, a humble Tagus fisherman found the inanimate body of the unhappy Prince D. Afonso. The heir to the throne had just taken a fall when riding on the margins of the river.

Sorrowful, the fisherman wrapped him in his nets and took him home. There he was found by his desperate parents. D. Leonor, deeply touched by the fraternal gesture, found in those nets her private signal. Shortly after, the nets would be chosen as the symbol of the charitable spirit which the Almshouses all over the country still display as a silent tribute to the Santarém fisherman.

In a festive day, we recall and praise Santarém’s contribution to culture, to art, to freedom and to solidarity. In short, we celebrate Santarém’s contribution to Portugal.

Let us celebrate what has been accomplished. Let us celebrate, above all, what is really intended to be done.

In the land where Friar Gil of Santarém lived we have the duty to celebrate. As a physician, Friar Gil had in his prescriptions a remedy that promised to cure the “fog in the eyes”.

By removing the fog and searching for clarity, we will be fair as to what we are and realists as to what we can and want to be.

Then, taking advantage of past exemplary acts and searching for a new sense, we will accomplish the purpose to continue what D. Afonso Henriques found when he conquered this city: guarantee a future for Portugal.

Ring the bell of Cabaças Tower then, as a sign of public rejoice.