Jewish Lisbon Tour

Jewish Full-Day Tour in Lisbon

We will start with a visit to the Sefardim Shaare Tiekwa Synagogue, built by donations of the Lisbon Jewish colony in 1904, whose architect was Ventura Terra. The façade shows a mixture of several motives from different styles, with ten high fists with stained glass windows. The interior paintings from Veloso Salgado can be seen as well as a magnificent silver lamp by Cristofanetti.

Following Rossio and visiting the site where there was the Pessach massacre in 1506 when thousands of “New Christians” were forced to convert and is now recognized by the Portuguese state and the Catholic Church as a Square of Intolerance and a formal apology was offered in the recent past. This also is the square where were located the Inquisition Courts and Inquisition church where the sentences were passed. From here we will cross the Baixa (Lower City) to the Praca de Comercio where stands the statue of King Jose I, erected by the Marquis of Pombal who as the name shows was himself of Jewish origin.

It was under his government as Prime Minister of King Joseph I, from 1750-1777, and by decree, that the distinction between New Christians and Old Christians was formally declared but only passed into law in 1821.

We continue our tour to Alfama, crossing Praça de Comércio this was also a place used by the Inquisition for their public activities), and on to one of Lisbon's oldest quarters (Alfama) into Rua da Judaria in the Old Jewish Quarter, with its narrow cobbled streets. Here we will see only one small reminder of the Synagogue that existed in ancient times as an important commercial area in Lisbon.

An earthquake destroyed much of Lisbon in 1755 wiping out, among other things, the street pattern that made it possible to locate the old Jewish quarters, however, we can see in one church a carved figure of Moses on the arched window. It is believed that a synagogue once existed on this site as well.

The final part of the visit will be through Lisbon's UNESCO Heritage sites, namely the Jeronimos Monastery, Belem Tower, and Monument to the Discoveries. They are all facing the river and are a direct result of the Portuguese golden era, the fifteen hundreds when we started collecting fruits from years of sea crusades to find new opportunities!