Estômbar is a town 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 below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
of
Estômbar e Parchal, in the municipality (''
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 ...
'') of
Lagoa, Portugal. The population in 2011 was 4,985, in an area of 24.21 km². It is situated just west of the city of Lagoa itself. Its civil status was raised to that of a town on August 16, 1991.
Estômbar is mainly as a bedroom community for
Portimão
Portimão () is a city and a municipality in the district of Faro, in the Algarve region of southern Portugal. The population in 2011 was 55,614, in an area of 182.06 km2. It was formerly known as Vila Nova de Portimão (). In 1924, it was ...
, and many of its residents travel daily across the Rio
Arade to work in the neighboring municipality.
Inhabitants are known as ''Estombarense''.
History
Estômbar is one of the oldest parishes in the
Algarve
The Algarve (, , ; from ) is the southernmost NUTS II region of continental Portugal. It has an area of with 467,495 permanent inhabitants and incorporates 16 municipalities ( ''concelhos'' or ''municípios'' in Portuguese).
The region has it ...
. The whiteness of its buildings makes it the most Moorish-looking settlements in the ''concelho''. Sanabus (or "Shombos"), its name at the time of the Arab occupation, constituted an important inland center with a castle called Abenabace, captured by the troops of King
Sancho I in 1191. A number of important figures have called Estômbar their home over time, such as the poet
Ibn Ammar, and the notorious bandit hero,
Remexido, as well as members of the nobility and the clergy.
Because of its favorable position (up to the late 20th century it included the present ''
freguesia
''Freguesia'' (), usually translated as "parish" or "civil parish", is the third-level administrative subdivision of Portugal, as defined by the 1976 Constitution. It is also the designation for local government jurisdictions in the former Por ...
s'' of
Ferragudo and
Parchal
Parchal is a town and a former civil parish in the municipality ('' concelho'') of Lagoa, Portugal. In 2013, the parish merged into the new parish Estômbar e Parchal. The population in 2011 was 4,019, in an area of 3.86 km². It is situated ...
along the Rio Arade), Estômbar was formerly a very prosperous economic center. Although based mainly on an agricultural economy, it also gained importance and wealth with the development of the salt industry and of trade on the Rio Arade. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries it also was a center of fish canning which led to urban growth especially near the river bank. Today its economic life is mostly tied to the support of the tourist industry (e.g., civil construction and public works).
It was the seat of its own civil parish of Estômbar, but in 2013, the parish merged into the new parish
Estômbar e Parchal.
Historic sites
*Convento do São Francisco, also known as the “Convento do Praxel”
*
Igreja Matriz (Estômbar), also known as the “Igreja de Santiago" (or "São Tiago”)
Scenic/recreational sites
*
Parque Municipal das Fontes
Notable people
*
Remexido or Remechido, the nickname of José Joaquim de Sousa Reis (Estômbar, 19 October 1796 – Faro, 2 August 1838), a civil servant and wealthy land tenant who became a notorious guerrilla leader of the Algarve in Portugal, defending the rights of king Miguel to the Portuguese throne and the antiliberal absolute monarchy in the Kingdom of Portugal.
Notes
{{DEFAULTSORT:Estombar
Towns in Portugal
Lagoa, Algarve