Templo Romano

Once a part of the Roman Forum, the remains of the temple, dating from the 2nd or early 3rd century AD, are a huge piece of play right in the city. It is one of the best-preserved Roman temples in Portugal, and likely about the Iberian Peninsula. Even though it’s commonly known as the Temple of Diana, there is no consensus regarding the deity to which it had been committed, and a few archaeologists think it might have been committed to Julius Caesar.

Capela dos Ossos

Among Évora’s most well-known beaches is also among its very frightening. The columns and walls of the mesmerising memento mori (a reminder of departure ) are lined with all the bones and skulls of some 5000 individuals. This is the solution discovered by three 17th-century Franciscan monks to its overflowing graveyards of churches and monasteries.

Sé

Guarded by means of a set of granite countertops, Évora’s fortress-like medieval palace has incredible cloisters along with a museum packed with ecclesiastical treasures. It was started around 1186, throughout the reign of Sancho I, Afonso Henriques’ kid; there was a mosque here earlier. It was finished about 60 decades later. The flags of Vasco da Gama’s boats were lucky in 1497.

Cromeleque dos Almendres

Set in a gorgeous picture of cork and olive trees stands this enormous, spectacular oblong of standing stone, 15km west of Évora. It’s the Iberian Peninsula’s main megalithic group along with also an outstanding place to see. The website is made up of massive oval of several 95 curved granite monoliths — a few of which can be engraved with all symbolic markings — disperse down a demanding slope.

Anta Grande do Zambujeiro

The Great Dolmen of all Zambujeiro, 13km southwest of Évora, is Europe’s biggest dolmen. Below an enormous sheet-metal protective shield at a field of wildflowers and yellow broom, stand seven stone and also a’final slab’ that joins the room with all the corridor. Each is 6m high and collectively they form a massive room around 5m in diameter.

Gruta do Escoural

About 27km west of Èvora, the Escoural Caves include several cave paintings and stone carvings that date back over 13,000 decades. One-hour guided visits help illuminate a few of the puzzles of those faintly observable works. Tours normally happen at 10.30am and 2.30pm Tuesday to Saturday, but you have to book ahead. Contact at least 24 hours beforehand.

Igreja de São João

The little, magnificent Igreja de São João, that faces the Templo Romano, was set in 1485 by a single Rodrigo Afonso de Melo, rely of Olivença and also the first governor of Portuguese Tangier, to function as his family’s pantheon. It’s still independently owned, by the Duques de Cadaval, and especially well maintained.

Aqueduto da Água de Prata

Jutting into town from the shore is the beguilingly called Aqueduto da Água de Prata, made by Francisco de Arruda (better known for Lisbon’s Tower of Belém) to deliver clean water into Évora. It was finished from the 1530s. In the close of the aqueduct, on Rua do Cano, the area feels just like a majestic village, with homes, stores and cafes built into its ideal arches, like nestling from the bottom of a mountain.

Praça do Giraldo

The city’s most important square has witnessed some powerful minutes in Portuguese background, such as the 1483 implementation of Fernando, Duke of Bragança; the people burning of victims of the Inquisition in the 16th century; and fiery debates on agrarian reform in the 1970s. Nowadays it is still the town’s attention, host to dramatic activities like sitting in sunlight and drinking coffee.

Museu do Évora

Welcome into the cathedral, in what was the archbishop’s palace (built from the 16th century), is the elegant museum. The cloistered courtyard shows Islamic, Roman and Roman remains. In glossy rooms upstairs are Episcopal furnishings plus a bunch of Flemish paintings. The most memorable is Life of the Virgin, that a 13-panel series initially a portion of the cathedral’s altarpiece, made by unidentified Flemish artists operating in Portugal around 1500.

Palácio Cadaval

Just northwest of this Igreja de São João is your 17th-century facade of a far old palace and castle, as shown by both strong square towers which mount it. The Palácio Cadaval was awarded to Martim Afonso de Melo, the governor of Évora, by Dom João I, and it also functioned to time as a royal house. Now the rooms have a selection of illuminated manuscripts, Arraiolos rugs and 18th-century paintings of Portuguese royals.

Jardim Público

To get a beautiful tranquil stroll, visit the light-dappled public gardens (using a tiny outdoor cafe) south west of the Igreja de São Francisco. Within the walls of this 15th-century Palácio p Dom Manuel is your Galeria das Damas, an indecisive hybrid of Gothic, Manueline, neo-Moorish and Renaissance styles. It is open whenever there are temporary art exhibitions.

Aldeia da Terra

The performer Tiago Cabeça has generated this wondrous mini world of Portugal moulded in clay and peopled with funny and irreverent characters. You’ll discover recognisable Alentejo vision — temples, painted-white villages, cathedrals — as well as the insides of small houses and lanes in which Cabeça’s personalities are recorded in all their cute, big-eyed whimsy.

Largo da Porta de Moura

The Moura Gate Sq stands only north of the palace. Near here was the first entrance into city. At the center of the square is a strange-looking, globular 16th-century Renaissance fountain. One of the elegant mansions round the square would be Casa Cordovil, constructed in Manueline-Moorish design. Take a look throughout the path to the west in the extraordinary knotted Manueline stone door of the Igreja do Carmo.

Menir dos Almendres

If you are headed outside to Cromeleque dos Almendres, it is well worth stopping en route in the Menir dos Almendres, just one rock almost 4m high, with a few dim carvings towards the top. To get there, you will pass through the little village of Nossa Senhora de Guadalupe and adhere to the road leading west from town. After about 2km, start looking for the little parking space to the leftside. From that point, it is a brief walk (300m) along a dirt path to the menhir.

Universidade de Évora

Just beyond the walls into the northeast is that the university’s most important building (Colégio do Espírito Santo), a descendent (reopened in 1973) of their first Jesuit institution situated in 1559 (which shut once the Jesuits got shooed out by Marquês de Pombal at 1759). Indoors are arched, Italian Renaissance–fashion cloisters, the Mannerist-style Templo do Espírito Santo and gorgeous azulejos (hand-painted tiles).

Convento dos Lóios

The former Convento dos Lóios, to the best of Igreja de São João, has tasteful Gothic cloisters topped with a Renaissance gallery. A national monument, the convent has been converted to some interrogate pousada (upmarket inn) in 1965. If you would like to ramble around, wear your wealthy-guest saying — or have dinner during its upmarket pub.

Igreja de São Francisco

Évora’s best-known church is a huge Manueline-Gothic architecture, finished around 1510 and committed to St Francis. Legend has it that the Portuguese playwright Gil Vicente is buried here.

Exuberant nautical themes observing the Age of Discoveries deck the walls and reflect the positive, flourishing disposition of the moment. It is all topped by a combination of Christ’s dome and order.

Casas Pintadas

Painted in the garden walls of the open-vaulted gallery are a set of odd 16th-century murals which were formerly part of a noble’s house. Recently revived, these paintings portray animals imagined and real, like birds, hares, foxes, a basilisk, a mermaid and a harpy. Access is through the Fórum Eugénio de Almeida.

Fórum Eugénio de Almeida

At a building that once housed the Holy Office of Inquisition, this center of culture and arts hosts a few of Évora’s most thought-provoking art displays throughout the year. Also a part of the base is your Casas Pintadas, a little assortment of outdoor murals confronting a tiny garden.

Coleção de Carruagens

Section of this Eugénio de Almeida Foundation, this pint-sized museum houses an interesting group of older carriages. It is hidden from the Sé and can be mostly overlooked by the majority of visitors.

Termas Romanas

Within the entry hall of this câmara municipal (city hall) are far more Roman vestiges, just found in 1987. These impressive Roman bathrooms, including a laconicum (heated area for steam bathrooms ) using a superbly maintained 9m-diameter circular pool, could have become the biggest public construction from Roman Évora. The complex also comprises an open-air swimming pool, also found in 1994.

Ermida de São Brás

The crenellated, pointy-topped Arabian Gothic Ermida de São Brás goes from about 1480. It is possibly an early job of Diogo p Boitaca, considered the originator of the Manueline style. It had been assembled under orders from Dom João II, on the grounds of a little leprosarium where plague victims were treated. It keeps irregular hours (and is generally closed).

Igreja da Nossa Senhora da Graça

Down a street off Rua da República is the most inquisitive baroque facade of the church, topped with four ungainly rock giants — like they have strayed from a mythical narrative and landed a spiritual construction. An early illustration of this Renaissance style in Portugal is located at the cloister of this 17th-century monastery adjoining door. The church is seldom open.

Casa Cordovil

Among many elegant mansions across the Largo da Porta de Moura square foot (and modern with all the strange-looking, globular 16th-century Renaissance fountain in the center of this ) is Casa Cordovil, constructed in Manueline-Moorish design.