On a cloudy day the great castle sits, at the top of the mountain, like something from a fairytale or dream.
Today we discover Sintra. The town that so enchanted Lord Byron, in 1809, his poetry made it known world-wide.
https://youtu.be/-VZ0cqDJIfs
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage to Portugal
XIV.
On, on the vessel flies, the land is gone,
And winds are rude in Biscay’s sleepless bay.
Four days are sped, but with the fifth, anon,
New shores descried make every bosom gay;
And Cintra’s mountain greets them on their way,
And Tagus dashing onward to the deep,
His fabled golden tribute bent to pay;
And soon on board the Lusian pilots leap,
And steer ‘twixt fertile shores where yet few rustics reap.
XV.
Oh, Christ! it is a goodly sight to see
What Heaven hath done for this delicious land!
What fruits of fragrance blush on every tree!
What goodly prospects o’er the hills expand!
But man would mar them with an impious hand:
And when the Almighty lifts his fiercest scourge
‘Gainst those who most transgress his high command,
With treble vengeance will his hot shafts urge
Gaul’s locust host, and earth from fellest foemen purge.
XVI.
What beauties doth Lisboa first unfold!
Her image floating on that noble tide,
Which poets vainly pave with sands of gold,
But now whereon a thousand keels did ride
Of mighty strength, since Albion was allied,
And to the Lusians did her aid afford
A nation swoll’n with ignorance and pride,
Who lick, yet loathe, the hand that waves the sword.
To save them from the wrath of Gaul’s unsparing lord.
XVII.
But whoso entereth within this town,
That, sheening far, celestial seems to be,
Disconsolate will wander up and down,
Mid many things unsightly to strange e’e;
For hut and palace show like filthily;
The dingy denizens are reared in dirt;
No personage of high or mean degree
Doth care for cleanness of surtout or shirt,
Though shent with Egypt’s plague, unkempt, unwashed, unhurt.
Poor, paltry slaves! yet born midst noblest scenes—
Why, Nature, waste thy wonders on such men?
Lo! Cintra’s glorious Eden intervenes
In variegated maze of mount and glen.
Ah me! what hand can pencil guide, or pen,
To follow half on which the eye dilates
Through views more dazzling unto mortal ken
Than those whereof such things the bard relates,
Who to the awe-struck world unlocked Elysium’s gates?
XIX.
The horrid crags, by toppling convent crowned,
The cork-trees hoar that clothe the shaggy steep,
The mountain moss by scorching skies imbrowned,
The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep,
The tender azure of the unruffled deep,
The orange tints that gild the greenest bough,
The torrents that from cliff to valley leap,
The vine on high, the willow branch below,
Mixed in one mighty scene, with varied beauty glow.
XX.
Then slowly climb the many-winding way,
And frequent turn to linger as you go,
From loftier rocks new loveliness survey,
And rest ye at ‘Our Lady’s House of Woe;’
Where frugal monks their little relics show,
And sundry legends to the stranger tell:
Here impious men have punished been; and lo,
Deep in yon cave Honorius long did dwell,
In hope to merit Heaven by making earth a Hell.
XXI.
And here and there, as up the crags you spring,
Mark many rude-carved crosses near the path;
Yet deem not these devotion’s offering—
These are memorials frail of murderous wrath;
For wheresoe’er the shrieking victim hath
Poured forth his blood beneath the assassin’s knife,
Some hand erects a cross of mouldering lath;
And grove and glen with thousand such are rife
Throughout this purple land, where law secures not life!
https://youtu.be/9N0sUU_0Z9s
Actually Sintra, tiny town that it is, sports three large castles.
Castelo dos Mouros, the Pena National Palace and the Sintra National Palace.
The Castle of the Moors
The Pena National Palace
and The Sintra National Palace
Also in the Center of Sintra lies perhaps the most interesting structure of all. Located in the Quinta da Regaleira Estate...The Masonic Initiation Wells.
https://youtu.be/mhdItKFdC-E
Two matching towers and wells were built in 1904. The wells were never used for water, however.
The walls and walkways inscribed with symbolism from The Knights Templar.
The "Inverted Towers" or "Initiation Wells", as they are known, are built in circles with landings between each ala Dante's Divine Comedy. They are divided into the Nine Circles of Hell. The Nine Levels of Purgatory and The Nine Skies.
The Bottom floor reveals a Compass over a Knights Templar Cross.
One can only imagine the Initiation and Rituals that transpired here...very little is left written to explain their use.
Tomorrow, I will decant the Ginjinha that has been transforming into the lovely tart-cherry flavoured liquor omni-present in Portugal, and then we will bid Portugal, Tchau
(Portuguese for Goodbye)
