City Fort and Cividade Mount

Category: Civil Architecture > Museum

District: Viana do Castelo > Paredes de Coura > Cossourado e Linhares > Cossourado

Location

The Forte da Cidade and Monte da Cividade stands in the parish of Cossourado, within the municipality of Paredes de Coura, in the district of Viana do Castelo. Its elevated position, characteristic of ancient fortified settlements, offers a comprehensive perspective of the surrounding landscape, marked by valleys and elevations typical of the Alto Minho region. The surrounding natural environment and the tranquility that pervades the site invite contemplation and an understanding of the ancestral relationship between the site and the territory.

Memory of a Strategic Past

The name "Monte da Cividade" evokes the presence of an ancient Castro settlement, a fortified Iron Age settlement, ancient in its existence. These sites were meticulously chosen for their privileged strategic position and the defensive ease they provided, allowing communities to control the region's paths and resources. The designation "Forte da Cidade" could emphasize the robustness of its defensive structures or the importance this site held as a residential and protective center. It is a testament to the ingenuity of ancestral populations in building safe and self-sufficient spaces.

Vestiges and Interpretation

This site, as a structure of civil architecture, preserves traces of the life and strategies of remote communities. Monte da Cividade holds the marks of defensive walls, foundations of dwellings, and other elements that composed the daily life of its former inhabitants. The nature of the site, resembling a museum space, suggests that actions of interpretation and valorization of the archaeological finds and the history that defines it have been implemented. It is an invitation to discover the layers of time that shaped this landscape and to imagine the lives that unfolded here over the centuries.

License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.pt