Fort of Feira

Venda do Pinheiro was a freguesia in the municipality of Mafra outside Lisbon in Portugal.

The Tapada Nacional de Mafra was created in Mafra, Portugal, during the reign of king João V, following the building of the Mafra National Palace, as a park for royal and court recreation. Covering over 8 square kilometres, the park holds different species of deer, wild boar, foxes, birds of prey and many others coexisting in an unusually rich and diversified natural habitat. A favourite of the Portuguese monarchy for hunting and other leisure pursuits, the Tapada de Mafra took on a noble connotation that has done much to aid its preservation and continuity. Its natural heritage ensures it is an excellent location for fun environmental awareness and education programmes. The Tapada is also open for walking, mountain biking, horse riding, archery and crossbow shooting activities. On 7 July 2019, the Royal Building of Mafra – Palace, Basilica, Convent, Cerco Garden and Hunting Park (Tapada) was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. With an area of 1187 hectares, surrounded by a 21 km long wall, the Tapada de Mafra has a great diversity of animal and plant species and is an area with regulated (paid) access. The area has been divided into three since 1828, with the first 360 hectares under military administration.

The Anta de Carcavelos, located close to the village of Carcavelos near the town of Lousa in the municipality of Loures in the Lisbon District of Portugal, is a stone age dolmen (burial chamber) or megalithic monument from the Chalcolithic period. It is one of many such tombs that have been identified in Portugal.The Anta was a communal grave consisting of a sepulchral chamber with a polygonal shape. The remains of the tomb consist of six cretaceous limestone slabs that originated in the area, which has several sizeable limestone outcrops. Five of these slabs are believed to have been part of the burial chamber and the sixth part of the corridor. Near the monument there are other slabs of limestone, one of which of could have been the roof of the chamber.Based on earlier identification by Mesquita Figueiredo and Carlos Ribeiro (1813-82), the German archaeologists Georg and Vera Leisner visited the Anta of Carcavelos in 1944 as part of preparing a systematic inventory of the Neolithic tombs of the Lisbon area. They produced drawings but did not carry out any excavations. Hastened as a result of looting at the site, the first excavations were carried out in 1986 and continued again from 1991-94, under the supervision of Gustavo Marques of the Loures municipality. Further intermittent excavation was carried out in 1998 and again in 2005-06 by Florbela Estêvão and Rui Boaventura.From the studies carried out in 1994, many bones were collected, with over 80 adult males and females believed to have been buried there. Various objects were also found such as flint arrowheads, smooth and decorated bell-shaped ceramics, dishes, cylindrical idols, and objects of adornment. The items collected came mainly from the interior of the chamber, but some were also found close to the site. In general, the number of items found was significantly lower than those found at other comparable sites in the area, such as the Anta do Monte Abraão. The evaluation of items found suggested a probable initial use of the dolmen as being in the last centuries of the 4th millennium BCE, with an intensification in its use between 3000 and 2600 BCE, this period having been identified using radiocarbon dating on an adult femur and jaw.Preliminary microscopic analysis of human bones indicates cut marks. This suggests that the bodies could have been disarticulated and/or defleshed prior to burial in the dolmen, which thus served as an ossuary rather than as a repository of bodies. However, archaeologists recognise that further work is required to confirm this.

The Royal and Venerable Confraternity of the Most Blessed Sacrament of Mafra, alternatively, the Royal and Venerable Brotherhood of the Most Blessed Sacrament of Mafra (Portuguese: Real e Venerável Irmandade do Santíssimo Sacramento de Mafra), is a public association of faithful of the Catholic Church, canonically established in the Basilica of Our Lady and Saint Anthony of Mafra, Portugal. The confraternity is one of the oldest institutions in the municipality of Mafra. It organizes the Corpus Christi solemnity and organizes the four traditional processions of the season of Lent in Mafra: The procession of the Passion of the Lord (Portuguese: Procissão do Senhor Jesus dos Passos); The procession of Penance of the Third Order of Saint Francis (Portuguese: Procissão de Penitência da Ordem Terceira de São Francisco); The procession of Seven Sorrows of Our Lady (Portuguese: Procissão das Sete Dores de Nossa Senhora); and The procession of the Burial of the Lord (Portuguese: Procissão do Enterro do Senhor).Over time, the confraternity has been the custodian of several relics. Those include Louis XV of France's coronation shirt, which he wore for the ceremony in Reims Cathedral.The confraternity also holds the largest collection of processional mannequin-style images (Portuguese: imagens de vestir or imagens de roca) in the country. Some of these are still used for religious processions.Part of the confraternity ceremonies and religious functions take place with the sound of the basilica's six historical pipe organs and two Mafra carillons.

The Palace of Mafra (Portuguese: Palácio de Mafra), also known as the Palace-Convent of Mafra and the Royal Building of Mafra (Real Edifício de Mafra), is a monumental Baroque and Neoclassical palace-monastery located in Mafra, Portugal, some 28 kilometres from Lisbon. Construction began in 1717 under King John V of Portugal and was completely concluded in 1755. The palace was classified as a National Monument in 1910 and was also a finalist in the Seven Wonders of Portugal. On 7 July 2019, the Royal Building of Mafra – Palace, Basilica, Convent, Cerco Garden and Hunting Park (Tapada) was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The Basilica of Our Lady and Saint Anthony of Mafra is a Roman Catholic shrine and basilica located within the Palace of Mafra, Portugal. It is designated as a Basilica by the privilege of immemorial status. The shrine is dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Anthony of Padua which once fostered religious devotion among the Portuguese nobility. The Basilica enshrines several Baroque artworks and Christian relics from various European kings collected in Portugal over the centuries. It also serves as the main headquarters the Royal and Venerable Confraternity of the Most Blessed Sacrament of Mafra.The basilica was designated as a National Monument in 1910. Since 7 July 2019, the basilica as part of other surroundings was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.Pope Francis officially granted a decree of Pontifical coronation towards the dolorous image of the Blessed Virgin Mary under the venerated title “Our Lady of Solitude” on 10 November 2020. The rite of coronation was executed by the former Archivist of the Holy Roman Church, Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça on 17 September 2023.

Mafra (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈmafɾɐ] ) is a city and a municipality in the district of Lisbon, on the west coast of Portugal, and part of the urban agglomeration of the Greater Lisbon subregion. The population in 2011 was 76,685, in an area of 291.66 km2.It is mostly known for the sumptuous Mafra National Palace inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Built in the baroque style, the Mafra National Palace also inspired Portuguese Nobel Prize laureate José Saramago to write his novel Baltasar and Blimunda (Memorial do Convento). Other points of interest around the municipality include the Tapada Nacional de Mafra, an enclosed wildlife and game reserve, and Ericeira's World Surf Reserve, the second in the world.

The Cave of Salemas is located close to the village of Lousa in the municipality of Loures in the Lisbon District of Portugal. Discovered by archaeologists during the 1950s, the cave appears to have been occupied by humans as a temporary refuge during the Upper Paleolithic and used as a tomb during the Neolithic. Located in a Cretaceous limestone outcrop, the cave is situated about 100 metres north of the Neolithic dolmen known as the Anta do Alto da Toupeira. It is a solutional cave and consists of a winding rift passage about 30 metres long and one metre wide. Although not unique in the area, it is the most developed cave, both in terms of size and depth. It was first explored in September 1959 by L. Albuquerque e Castro and then fully excavated by a team from the Geological Survey of Portugal, headed by O. de Veiga Ferreira, José Camarate Andrade França and Georges Zbyszewski, during two digs in November 1959 and in October- December 1960.The top levels excavated contained Neolithic materials, such as ceramic items, together with human bones consistent with the existence of a necropolis and the bones of small animals. The relatively few tools found suggest that the cave never served as a permanent dwelling for humans. Lower levels contained evidence of Solutrean lithic and bone tools and artefacts of the Upper Paleolithic, together with bones of various fauna. There is evidence that some of the Paleolithic levels were removed in part of the cave during the Neolithic to make way for the necropolis. Animal bones discovered included those of brown bears (Ursus arctos) and cave bears (Ursus spelaeus); leopards (Felis pardus) and Iberian lynx (Felis pardina); hyenas; wolves; and horses.Items collected are stored in Lisbon’s Geological Museum (Museu Geológico). Carbon dating puts the dates of human bones and a tooth from the Paleolithic as being from around 25,000 to 20,000 years ago.

Azueira e Sobral da Abelheira is a civil parish in the municipality of Mafra, Portugal. It was formed in 2013 by the merger of the former parishes Azueira and Sobral da Abelheira. The population in 2011 was 4,316, in an area of 30.63 km².

The Cave of Pego do Diabo (also known as Loca do Gato or Cat's Den) is a small karst cave in a Turonian limestone outcrop located about 250 metres above sea level in the municipality of Loures, about 20 km north of Lisbon in Portugal. The erosion of the outcrop resulted in a set of openings in the rocks wide enough to be exploited by humans. Several archaeological studies have been conducted within the cave, which give insights into the duration of Neanderthal presence on the Iberian Peninsula and to the presence of carnivorous animals during the Paleolithic.The cave consists of a narrow passage about 13 metres long and one metre wide, with a chamber at the end that is about two metres wide. First officially explored in 1965–66 by the Portuguese Speleological Society, it was surveyed in 1976 by the Grupo para o Estudio do Paleolitico Portugues (Group for the Study of the Portuguese Palaeolithic) and at the end of the 1980s by Prof. João Zilhão. About half of the accessible area of the cave has been studied.The stratigraphic profile carried out by Zilhão identified six layers to a depth of about 1.4 metres. The upper layer (Layer A), which was only observed at the end of the cave, is indicative of probable use for funerals. Layer 1 contained a mixture of modern and Pleistocene items while Layer 2 contained artifacts of the Upper Paleolithic associated with animal remains. Layer 3 also had animal remains but with distinct colouration, possibly caused by manganese oxides. There were few archaeological materials in Layer 4 and Layer 5 was archaeologically sterile. Zilhão's research using radiocarbon dating looked for evidence of Neanderthals during the late Aurignacian period (37000-33000 Before the Present). He believed his excavations established a secure terminus ante quem of 34500 years BP for the demise of Neanderthals in the area, although more recent research by Zilhão and others suggests it was earlier than that. This has important implications for the interpretation of the anatomy of the Lapedo child, a complete skeleton found by Zilhão near Leiria in Portugal and believed to be the result of interbreeding between a Neanderthal and a modern human. The dating of the last of the region's Neanderthals to five millennia before the child was borne counters suggestions that Neanderthals could have survived in southwest Iberia until as late as the Last Glacial Maximum (26500 BP). Crossbreeding between immediate ancestors has to be ruled out and the Neanderthal features of the child must represent admixture at the time of contact. Zilhao also considered that his findings had implications for the idea that Neanderthals remained in the Gibraltar area until ca.32-28000 BP. He believed that, as hunter-gatherers living at low population densities, residual Neanderthals could not have survived for several millennia as a separate biological entity.Work by Maria João Valente analysed the fauna of Layers 1 and 2 associated with the Upper Paleolithic. She noted that the cave contained bones of humans, together with those of wolves, bears, and hyenas, the Iberian lynx and other small carnivores and birds of prey, and their prey such as rabbits. She hypothesised that there would have been competition between humans and animals for use of the cave and noted that the consecutive use of caves by human communities and carnivores had been identified elsewhere. However, an alternative interpretation was that human groups could have carried animal bones into the caves.

The Anta do Alto da Toupeira, also called the Anta da Toupeira or the Anta de Salemas, is a Neolithic dolmen, or megalithic tomb, situated in the parish of Lousa in the municipality of Loures, in the Lisbon District of Portugal. It dates back to the Chalcolithic.The Anta is hidden by a clump of trees about 100 metres to the south of the Cave of Salemas. It is one of several archaeological sites within the same area, including the cave. Although probably identified by the 19th-century Portuguese archaeologist, Carlos Ribeiro, it was first studied and drawn on 17 January 1944 by the German archaeologists, Georg and Vera Leisner, but no excavations were carried out until November 1959 when Vera Leisner and O. V. Ferreira made some limited excavations and corrected the previous plan. These led them to describe the dolmen as a polygonal chamber necropolis without the usual entrance corridor associated with similar dolmens in the area. They estimated its dimensions as being 5.5 metres by 5 metres, with a maximum height of two metres. Five limestone slabs of the Late Cretaceous epoch survive on the site, one of which is believed to have been the roof of the tomb. Although further research has yet to be carried out, other archaeologists believe that further excavation could result in the discovery of an access corridor.Excavations have yielded a number of findings but archaeologists are confused as to whether these came from the Anta, from the cave, or, indeed, from a second Anta, which appears to be referred to by the Leisners but has not since been identified. Items found have included a cylindrical idol, an axe of amphibole, a copper chisel, a copper arrowhead, and a pendant. These items are kept at Lisbon’s Geological Museum (Museu Geológico).

The Fort of Mosqueiro, also known as the Redoubt of Mosqueiro (Portuguese: Reduto do Mosqueiro), is one of a group of fortifications in Portugal that made up the Lines of Torres Vedras, which were designed to protect the capital, Lisbon, from possible invasion by French troops during the Peninsular War. It is situated near Bucelas in the Loures municipality in the Lisbon District of Portugal.