Monte de Fralães is a former

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 authority ...

, located in the

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

of Barcelos, Portugal. In 2013, the parish merged into the new parish Viatodos, Grimancelos, Minhotães e Monte de Fralães. The population in 2011 was 408, in an area of 1.58 km².Eurostat
/ref> The parish's

patron saint A patron saint, patroness saint, patron hallow or heavenly protector is a saint who in Catholicism, Anglicanism, or Eastern Orthodoxy is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, family, or perso ...

is St. Peter and his feast has been celebrated for four centuries every 15 August by the Confraternity of Our Lady of Health. The actual parish church was in ancient times the chapel of the Correias, a local noble family. Deeply modified, it is today a small and beautiful temple, which has substituted, since 1913, for the former church. It possesses a remarkable 18th-century ''talha'' ( gilt wood) altar. Remarkable also, dating from the 1910s, are the two lateral

retable A retable is a structure or element placed either on or immediately behind and above the altar or communion table of a church. At the minimum it may be a simple shelf for candles behind an altar, but it can also be a large and elaborate structur ...

s which receive the images of the

Sacred Heart of Jesus The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus ( la, Cor Jesu Sacratissimum) is one of the most widely practised and well-known Catholic devotions, wherein the heart of Jesus is viewed as a symbol of "God's boundless and passionate love for mankind". This dev ...

and Our Lady of Health. The parish, that was born in the Mount of Assaia, where there was a very ancient town, a ''citânia'', had some important priests, like Jácome Dias (16th century), João Rodrigues de Carvalho and the writer João Rosa (19th century). Its original name was S. Cristóvão de Silveiros (11th century), as can be seen in the Censual do Bispo D. Pedro. In the 13th century Monte de Fralães (then S. Pedro do Monte) was born, the great conqueror

Paio Peres Correia D. Paio Peres Correia was a Portuguese warrior who played an important role in the thirteenth-century Reconquista. He was born c. 1205, in Monte de Fralães, a civil parish in the municipality of Barcelos. He went to Uclés, then the seat of t ...

. In the 14th century, in the Solar of the Correias (Solar of Fralães), has been created the Municipality of Fralães, known as Honra de Fralães (that included also Viatodos and part of Silveiros); it would be extinguished in December 1836. Varied documentation of this autarchy is conserved in the parish and in Barcelos archives. The pianist and composer Luís Costa was born in Monte de Fralães.

References

Former parishes of Barcelos, Portugal {{braga-geo-stub