Sobral de Monte Agraço () is a municipality in the District of

Lisbon Lisbon ( ; ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 567,131, as of 2023, within its administrative limits and 3,028,000 within the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, metropolis, as of 2025. Lisbon is mainlan ...

in Portugal. The population in 2011 was 10,156,Instituto Nacional de Estatística
/ref> in an area of 52.10 km².Áreas das freguesias, concelhos, distritos e país
/ref> The present Mayor is José Alberto Quintino, elected by the

Unitary Democratic Coalition The Unitary Democratic Coalition (, CDU) is an electoral and political coalition between the Portuguese Communist Party () and the Ecologist Party "The Greens" ( Portuguese: Partido Ecologista "Os Verdes" or PEV). The coalition also integrates ...

History

During the

Peninsular War The Peninsular War (1808–1814) was fought in the Iberian Peninsula by Kingdom of Portugal, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom against the invading and occupying forces of the First French ...

, Sobral was on the

Lines of Torres Vedras The Lines of Torres Vedras were lines of forts and other military defences built in secrecy to defend Lisbon during the Peninsular War. Named after the nearby town of Torres Vedras, they were ordered by Arthur Wellesley, Viscount Wellington, c ...

, a line of forts planned by the Duke of Wellington to protect

. In October 1810, a French army led by

André Masséna André Masséna, prince d'Essling, duc de Rivoli (; born Andrea Massena; 6 May 1758 – 4 April 1817), was a French military commander of the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. He was one of the original eighteen Marshal of the ...

approached the Lines, finding that the Portuguese had subjected the area in front of them to a

scorched earth A scorched-earth policy is a military strategy of destroying everything that allows an enemy military force to be able to fight a war, including the deprivation and destruction of water, food, humans, animals, plants and any kind of tools and i ...

policy. After the minor Battle of Sobral on 14 October, the French found they could go no further.

Charles Oman Sir Charles William Chadwick Oman, (12 January 1860 – 23 June 1946) was a British Military history, military historian. His reconstructions of medieval battles from the fragmentary and distorted accounts left by chroniclers were pioneering. ...

writes "On that misty October 14th morning, at Sobral, the Napoleonic tide attained its highest watermark."

Monuments

* St. Salvador Chapel - 13th century Romanesque style * Sobral Main Church - 16th century

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

style * São Quintino Church - 16th-17th century

Manueline The Manueline (, ), occasionally known as Portuguese late Gothic, is the sumptuous, composite Portuguese architectural style originating in the 16th century, during the Portuguese Renaissance and Age of Discoveries. Manueline architecture inco ...

and Renaissance styles * Our Lady of Purification Church - 16th century Renaissance style * Town Hall and ancient jail - 18th century * Fort of Alqueidão - 19th century * Cine-Theater - 20th century

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French (), is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design that first Art Deco in Paris, appeared in Paris in the 1910s just before World War I and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920 ...

style

Parishes

Administratively, the municipality is divided into 3 civil parishes ('' freguesias''): * São Quintino * Sapataria * Sobral de Monte Agraço

Notable people

* José António Freire Sobral (1840 in São Quintino – 1905), a rich farmer and a large exporter of coffee, cocoa and woods who made his fortune in

São Tomé Island São Tomé Island, at , is the largest island of São Tomé and Príncipe and is home in May 2018 to about 193,380 or 96% of the nation's population. The island is divided into six districts of São Tomé and Príncipe, districts. It is located ...

Portuguese São Tomé and Príncipe Portuguese São Tomé and Príncipe or Portuguese Central Africa was a colony of the Portuguese Empire from the discovery of the islands in 1470 until 1975, when independence was granted by Portugal. History The Portuguese explorers João de S ...

. * Fábio Silvestre (born 1990 in Sobral de Monte Agraço) a Portuguese former cyclist

References

External links

Town Council official website

Photos from Sobral de Monte Agraço
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sobral de Monte Agraco Municipality Towns in Portugal Municipalities of Lisbon District Lines of Torres Vedras