Church of Saint Engracia - the myth and the history

Infanta D. Maria, a devotee of the Portuguese martyr Santa Engrácia, ordered the construction of a temple dedicated to the saint in the last quarter of the 16th century.

The choice of Santa Engracia to patronize the new church is accompanied by the execution of a silver reliquary holding the relics of the Saint, which belonged to the Princess.

From the primitive church, of a single nave, built at the end of the sixteenth century, according to the project of the arq. Nicolau de Frias, there is only one vague description and a drawing.

In the 17th century, after the collapse of the original church, the architect João Antunes designed the project for a new temple, based on a centralized floor plan in the form of a Greek cross, which was a novelty in the Portuguese architecture of the time.

João Antunes designed a bold Baroque project, construction of which began in 1682, but it was not finished, remaining for many years without cover.

With the extinction of religious Orders in 1834, the temple of Santa Engracia was handed over to the Army, which covered it with a zinc dome and adapted it, among other functions, to a footwear factory equipping the military forces, namely during the Great War .

This was the state of the building in the mid-20th century.

View of the Church of Santa Engrácia before the construction of the dome.

Several architects submitted proposals for completion of the building in 1956. The project by Luís Amoroso Lopes was selected but it underwent a number of major changes.

In the early 1960s and in the absence of the initial project by João Antunes, the political regime decided to finish the building and implement the law of 1916, which had determined the adaptation of the temple to a National Pantheon.

In a little more than two years, a concrete double-shell dome, clad in lithium stone, was designed, and the interior was restored with a splendid design on several types of stone.

Another view of the construction of the dome.

At the same time the sculptural program of the building was implemented, executed by two important Portuguese sculptors.

The sculptors were António Duarte (1912-1998) - who made the statues of the main façade - and Leopoldo de Almeida (1898-1975) - author of the statues inside the temple.

Church of Santa Engrácia, works carried out on the dome and in the square surrounding the monument.

Another view of the works in the dome and in the square bordering the monument.

At the same time that the dome was raised and the interior of the temple was restored, in the area surrounding the monument was created a paved area and a stairway access to the front that suited the monumentality of the building.

View of the Church of Santa Engrácia - National Pantheon after the conclusion of the works.