Alcafozes is a village in the

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

of Idanha-a-Nova and Alcafozes,

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

Idanha-a-Nova Idanha-a-Nova ( ), officially the Town of Idanha-a-Nova (), is a town and municipality in the district of Castelo Branco, in east-central Portugal. A border municipality with Spain, the population of the municipality in 2011 was 9,716, in an area ...

Castelo Branco District Castelo Branco District ( ) is located in Central Portugal. Its capital is Castelo Branco, which is now also its most populous city, overtaking Covilhã, which was once the largest city, in the late 2010s. It has an area of (4th largest in Por ...

, in

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

. In 2011, it had 202 inhabitants in an area of 56,82 km². Alcafozes is the most important settlement in the immediate vicinity of the internationally renowned music and culture festival

Boom Festival BOOM Festival was a rock music festival held annually throughout SFR Yugoslavia between 1971 and 1978. The festival was held for the first time in 1971 in Maribor and for the last time in 1978 in Novi Sad. The festival featured numerous prominent ...

. A religious event and folk festival in honor of both airmen and aviation takes place every year in the

Our Lady of Loreto The Basilica della Santa Casa () is a Marian shrine in Loreto, in the Marches, Italy. The basilica is known for enshrining the house in which the Blessed Virgin Mary is believed by some Catholics to have lived. Pious legends claim the same hous ...

Shrine in Alcafozes.

History

The settlement was founded in the year 715 by invading Muslims when they decided to build shelters for their

livestock Livestock are the Domestication, domesticated animals that are raised in an Agriculture, agricultural setting to provide labour and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, Egg as food, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The t ...

in the area. Its name comes from

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

for "land of oorishcages". Previously, as in the rest of Portugal,

Lusitanians The Lusitanians were an Indo-European languages, Indo-European-speaking people living in the far west of the Iberian Peninsula, in present-day central Portugal and Extremadura and Castilla y Leon of Spain. It is uncertain whether the Lusitanians ...

Romans Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of Roman civilization *Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...

Suebi file:1st century Germani.png, 300px, The approximate positions of some Germanic peoples reported by Graeco-Roman authors in the 1st century. Suebian peoples in red, and other Irminones in purple. The Suebi (also spelled Suavi, Suevi or Suebians ...

and

Visigoths The Visigoths (; ) were a Germanic people united under the rule of a king and living within the Roman Empire during late antiquity. The Visigoths first appeared in the Balkans, as a Roman-allied Barbarian kingdoms, barbarian military group unite ...

had passed through and settled in the area too. Specially in

Idanha-a-Velha Idanha-a-Velha (Idanha "the old") is a village in the civil parish (''freguesia'') of Monsanto e Idanha-a-Velha, in the municipality of Idanha-a-Nova (Idanha "the new"), central eastern Portugal, and the site of ancient Egitânia, a former bisho ...

(called Egitânia in the past) which is located further north from Alcafozes. Its ''Misericórdia'' Church is a building of the late nineteenth century with bell tower on the South side. It has three altarpieces and pulpit, in neo-

rococo Rococo, less commonly Roccoco ( , ; or ), also known as Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and dramatic style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpte ...

and neo- neoclassical styles. Nearby is the Cross of San Marcos, consisting of three crosses in

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

, an abundant mineral in the entire region. At

Easter Easter, also called Pascha ( Aramaic: פַּסְחָא , ''paskha''; Greek: πάσχα, ''páskha'') or Resurrection Sunday, is a Christian festival and cultural holiday commemorating the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, described in t ...

, there is a play of the

Passion of Christ The Passion (from latin language, Latin , "to suffer, bear, endure") is the short final period before the death of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus, described in the four canonical gospels. It is commemorated in Christianity every year during Holy ...

in which the emphasis is given to the

biblical The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) biblical languages ...

character of Veronica, always performed by a local. Veronica was a pious woman of

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

who, moved by the suffering of

Jesus Jesus (AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Chris ...

to carry the cross, gave him her veil. Jesus accepted the offering and after using it returned it to Veronica. And, as the legend goes, the image of his face was miraculously imprinted on it. In 1810, during the

Peninsular War The Peninsular War (1808–1814) was fought in the Iberian Peninsula by Kingdom of Portugal, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom against the invading and occupying forces of the First French ...

, a battle took place in Alcafozes. In the

Shrine in Alcafozes, a religious event and folk festival in honor of both

airmen An airman is a member of an air force or air arm of a nation's armed forces. In certain air forces, it can also refer to a specific enlisted rank. An airman can also be referred to as a soldier in other definitions. As a military rank designat ...

and

aviation Aviation includes the activities surrounding mechanical flight and the aircraft industry. ''Aircraft'' include fixed-wing and rotary-wing types, morphable wings, wing-less lifting bodies, as well as lighter-than-air aircraft such as h ...

happens every year due to Our Lady of Loreto being the patroness of aviators. It is attended by members of the

Portuguese Air Force The Portuguese Air Force () is the air force, aerial warfare force of Portugal. Locally it is referred to by the acronym FAP but internationally is often referred to by the acronym PRTAF. It is the youngest of the three branches of the Portuguese ...

TAP Air Portugal TAP Air Portugal is the flag carrier of Portugal, headquartered at Lisbon Airport which also serves as its airline hub, hub. TAP – Transportes Aéreos Portugueses – has been a member of the Star Alliance since 2005 and operates on average 2, ...

, air pilots in general and all sort of non-aviation world related people including locals. There is also a gastronomic festival every year, focused on local products like

asparagus Asparagus (''Asparagus officinalis'') is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus ''Asparagus (genus), Asparagus'' native to Eurasia. Widely cultivated as a vegetable crop, its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. Description ...

, ''

Terfezia arenaria ''Terfezia'' (Berber: Tirfas) is a genus of truffle-like fungi within the Pezizaceae family. ''Terfezia'' species are commonly known as desert truffles. Some authorities consider this the type genus of the family Terfeziaceae, although phylog ...

'' and ''

Tricholoma equestre ''Tricholoma equestre'' or ''Tricholoma flavovirens'', commonly known as the man on horseback or yellow knight, is a species of fungus of the genus '' Tricholoma'' that forms ectomycorrhiza with pine trees. It has been treasured as an edible mu ...

''. Until 2013, Alcafozes was its own civil parish (''freguesia'' in Portuguese) but it merged with the neighboring civil parish of Idanha-a-Nova in order to form the newly created civil parish of Idanha-a-Nova and Alcafozes. Until 1933,

was part of the former civil parish of Alcafozes. About 7 kilometers to the north of the village, still in the civil parish of Idanha-a-Nova and Alcafozes, are the premises of the international music and culture festival

which has taken place on the banks of Marechal Carmona Dam (built in 1946) reservoir every other year since 1997.

Geography

Alcafozes belongs since 2013 to the civil parish of Idanha-a-Nova e Alcafozes when its own civil parish was merged into the civil parish of the seat of the municipality, the town of

. In 2011, the now extinct civil parish of Alcafozes had 202 inhabitants in an area of 56,82 km². By road, Alcafozes is about 15 kilometers away from the seat of the municipality (referred to as ''

concelho Concelho () is the Portuguese-language term for municipality, referring to the territorial subdivision in local government. In comparison, the word ''município'' () refers to the organs of State. This differentiation is still in use in Portugal ...

'' in Portuguese), the town of

located to the west of Alcafozes, and 48 kilometers away from the district capital, the city of Castelo Branco located even further to the west of the village. About 15 kilometers away from Alcafozes, to the south, is the town of Zebreira which has about 33% of gypsies, also known as Romani (Portuguese ''ciganos''), among its population. Público, "''Na Escola Básica da Zebreira, em Idanha-a-Nova, 83% dos alunos são de etnia cigana, mas muitos não ficam o ano todo.''", https://www.publico.pt/2018/04/08/sociedade/reportagem/nunca-se-sabe-com-quantos-alunos-comeca-o-ano-lectivo-na-zebreira-1808618

, ancient Egitânia, to the north, is 7 kilometers from Alcafozes by road.

References

{{Reflist Idanha-a-Nova 715 establishments Villages in Portugal Passion plays

History

Geography

See also

References