Altar of the Most Holy Trinity

This altar in the left/west transept was commissioned in 1622 by Gonçalo Pires de Carvalho, Overseer of Royal [i.e., Public] Works, and his wife, D.ª Camila de Noronha, as their tomb and as the tomb of their household, according to an inscription on the stone step. It was built in the Mannerist style, similar to innumerable retables surviving in Roman churches, such as the Church of the Gesù. It is the oldest surviving altar piece in a Jesuit church in Portugal, remarkable in its precocious use of marbles inlaid with colour. At the centre of the altar piece is a highly dramatic baroque sculpture of Our Lady of Piety, or Pietà, a coloured and gilt woodwork from the 18th century.