Cathedral of Évora, Gothic cathedral in historic center of Évora, Portugal
The Cathedral of Évora is a granite building with two crenellated towers flanking a central section. The left tower has a conical spire, while the right tower has a clock face and arched belfry openings. Between them, a pointed-arch portal with clustered columns sits below a Gothic rose window and a row of narrow arched windows. It stands on a paved square where people walk.
Construction started after the region was taken back from Moorish rule and the building was finished in the early 1200s. Later additions show a mix of architectural styles that developed over the following centuries.
The main portal's marble columns carry large statues of the Apostles, carved in the 1330s, likely by Master Pero and Telo Garcia. Such free-standing Gothic figures are rare in Portugal, where they usually appear on tombs. The cathedral was also the seat of the 16th-century School of Évora of polyphony, with composers Mateus de Aranda and Manuel Mendes.
The cathedral stands on the highest point of Évora's historic centre, on a paved square with a statue and trees. The Sacred Art Museum, open since 1983 and housed since 2009 in the former Colégio dos Moços do Coro next door, holds the treasury. The south tower is the bell tower whose bells have marked the city's hours for centuries.
The 13th-century ivory Virgin of Paradise in the treasury opens into a triptych whose tiny carved panels show nine episodes of her life. The same collection holds the 14th-century Reliquary Cross of the Holy Wood and the crozier of Cardinal-King Henrique, archbishop of Évora and king from 1578 to 1580.
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