Facts about Portugal
Capital Lisbon · Europe
10 topics · about 20 minutes
Portugal occupies the western edge of the Iberian Peninsula, with borders that have barely moved since the thirteenth century, making it one of the oldest nation states in Europe. From a small Atlantic base it launched the sea voyages that opened European routes to India and Brazil, and it kept the last of that empire until 1999.
The Tagus divides the country in two. North of it the land is green, hilly and densely settled, rising to the Serra da Estrela and cut by the terraced valley of the Douro where port wine grapes are grown. South of the river the Alentejo opens into wide plains of cork oak and wheat, and the Algarve coast at the southern tip is a line of cliffs and sheltered coves. The Azores and Madeira, both volcanic Atlantic archipelagos, are autonomous regions of Portugal.
Lisbon spreads over hills above the Tagus estuary and is the capital and largest city, with Porto at the mouth of the Douro the industrial and commercial center of the north. Coimbra holds one of the oldest universities in Europe, Braga is the religious capital, and Sintra’s palaces sit in the wooded hills west of Lisbon. Tourism, concentrated in the Algarve, Lisbon and Madeira, has grown into one of the largest sectors of the economy.
- Population
- 10.6 million
- Area
- 92,212 km²
- Capital
- Lisbon
- Currency
- Euro (EUR)
- Official language
- Portuguese
- Highest point
- Mount Pico, 2,351 m
The Portugal course
Geography of Portugal
A green, hilly north and a hot open south, split by the Tagus.
History of Portugal
Caravels to India and Brazil, an earthquake that levelled Lisbon, and a coup with carnations.
Language of Portugal
The sixth most spoken language on Earth, and most of its speakers are in Brazil.
Culture of Portugal
Fado, saudade, and blue tiles covering everything from churches to metro stations.
Economy of Portugal
Cork, wine and tourism, and a bailout exit that reshaped the housing market.
Politics of Portugal
A semi-presidential republic where a directly elected president can dissolve parliament.
Nature & Wildlife of Portugal
Iberian lynx back from the brink, and whales in deep water off the Azores.
Food & Cuisine of Portugal
Salt cod said to have a recipe for every day of the year, and one very famous custard tart.
Landmarks of Portugal
A Romantic palace painted in red and yellow, and a monastery built on pepper money.
People & Society of Portugal
A country that exported people for a century and now takes them in.
Geography of Portugal
Mainland Portugal covers the western strip of Iberia, bordered only by Spain on land and by the Atlantic along its whole western and southern coast. The Tagus, the longest river on the peninsula, splits it into a mountainous, wetter north and the low, hot plains of the Alentejo, with the Algarve cliffs at the southern end.
The Serra da Estrela reaches 1,993 meters and is the highest range on the mainland, though the true summit of Portugal is Mount Pico in the Azores at 2,351 meters, a volcano rising straight out of the Atlantic. Cabo da Roca west of Lisbon is the westernmost point of continental Europe, and the country’s exclusive economic zone, counting the islands, is one of the largest in the European Union.
History of Portugal
The county of Portugal broke from León and was recognized as a kingdom in 1143, and the Reconquista of the south finished in 1249, fixing borders that have hardly changed since. Under Henry the Navigator and his successors Portuguese ships worked down the African coast, and Vasco da Gama reached India by sea in 1498 while Cabral landed in Brazil in 1500.
The 1755 earthquake and tsunami destroyed much of Lisbon and shook Enlightenment Europe’s confidence in providence. The royal court fled to Brazil ahead of Napoleon in 1807, Brazil declared independence in 1822, and the monarchy fell in 1910. António de Oliveira Salazar’s authoritarian Estado Novo ran the country from 1933 until the near-bloodless Carnation Revolution of 25 April 1974, after which the African colonies became independent.
Language of Portugal
Portuguese is a Romance language descended from the Latin of the northwest of Iberia, closely related to Galician across the Spanish border. It is spoken by more than 250 million people, but only about four percent of them live in Portugal; Brazil holds the great majority, with Angola, Mozambique and other former colonies making up much of the rest.
European Portuguese reduces unstressed vowels heavily, which makes it sound clipped and consonant-heavy next to the more open Brazilian variety, and Portuguese speakers generally understand spoken Spanish more easily than the reverse. Mirandese, spoken near the northeastern border, has held official recognition as a second language of Portugal since 1999.
Culture of Portugal
Fado, a song form of solo voice with Portuguese guitar that emerged in nineteenth-century Lisbon, is listed by UNESCO as intangible heritage and is built around saudade, a word for longing for something absent that Portuguese speakers treat as untranslatable. Amália Rodrigues remains its defining performer.
Azulejos, glazed ceramic tiles adapted from Moorish work and made in blue and white from the seventeenth century, cover church walls, house facades and railway stations. Football is close to a second religion, with Benfica, Sporting and Porto dominating domestically, and Catholic pilgrimage to Fátima draws large crowds each May and October.
Economy of Portugal
Portugal produces around half of the world’s cork, harvested from oak bark on a nine-year cycle in the Alentejo, and its wines run from port and Douro reds to vinho verde and Madeira. Textiles, footwear, moulds and vehicle components anchor manufacturing, and Lisbon has grown a substantial technology and shared-services sector.
A sovereign debt crisis brought an international bailout in 2011 and severe austerity, and the recovery leaned heavily on tourism plus residency schemes that attracted foreign property buyers. That worked well enough as macroeconomics and badly enough as housing policy that rents and prices in Lisbon and Porto are now the central domestic grievance, and the golden visa rules were curtailed in response.
Politics of Portugal
Portugal is a semi-presidential republic. The 230-seat Assembly of the Republic is elected by proportional representation, and the president, directly elected for five years, is more than ceremonial: the office can veto legislation, refer laws to the Constitutional Court and dissolve parliament, a power used within the last few years.
The country joined the European Economic Community in 1986 alongside Spain and was among the founding members of the euro. The Azores and Madeira have their own governments and assemblies as autonomous regions. Portugal decriminalised the personal possession of all drugs in 2001, treating use as a health matter, a policy widely studied abroad.
Nature & Wildlife of Portugal
Cork oak montado in the south is a working landscape that supports Iberian lynx, Spanish imperial eagle and black stork. The lynx, the world’s most endangered cat two decades ago, has been reintroduced in the Guadiana valley and its numbers across Iberia have risen from a few hundred to several thousand.
Peneda-Gerês in the far north is the only national park on the mainland, holding Iberian wolves and semi-wild Garrano ponies. The Atlantic islands are the wildlife highlight: the Azores sit over deep water that draws sperm whales, blue whales and dolphins close to shore, and Madeira’s laurisilva forest is a World Heritage remnant of a forest type that once covered southern Europe.
Food & Cuisine of Portugal
Bacalhau, cod salted and dried, is the national obsession, and Portuguese cooks like to say there is a different recipe for every day of the year. Grilled sardines are the summer street food, especially during the June saints’ festivals in Lisbon, and caldo verde, a soup of potato, shredded kale and chouriço, is the everyday first course.
Pastéis de nata, custard tarts in flaked pastry with scorched tops, were made by monks at the Jerónimos monastery in Belém and are now the country’s best-known export. Piri-piri chicken came back from the African colonies, cozido à portuguesa is the big boiled meat and vegetable dish, and port, Madeira and vinho verde cover the drinks.
Landmarks of Portugal
The Pena Palace above Sintra is a nineteenth-century Romanticist fantasy in red, yellow and tile, built by Ferdinand II on the ruins of a monastery, and the wooded hills around it hold the Moorish castle and the Quinta da Regaleira with its spiral initiation well. The whole cultural landscape is a World Heritage Site.
In Belém, the Jerónimos Monastery and the Belém Tower were financed by the spice trade and built in the ornate Manueline style, full of carved ropes, anchors and armillary spheres. Porto’s riverside Ribeira district, the university at Coimbra with its gilded Joanina library, and the Óbidos and Guimarães castles complete the usual circuit.
People & Society of Portugal
Portugal has about 10.6 million residents, with the population concentrated along the coastal strip from Braga through Lisbon while much of the interior has emptied out. Emigration ran heavily through the twentieth century to Brazil, France, Switzerland, the United States and Canada, and a diaspora of several million still holds Portuguese nationality.
That flow has reversed. The foreign-born share has risen quickly, driven by Brazilians, South Asians working in agriculture and services, and northern Europeans drawn by climate and tax rules. Fertility is among the lowest in Europe and the population is ageing fast, which puts pensions and health staffing at the center of politics.
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