E nchanting Óbidos is one of Portugal’s most beautiful destinations and one of Europe’s best-preserved medieval villages or walled towns . Everywhere you turn is a postcard view, and that has inevitably made it one of the country’s most visited sites. But tourism hasn’t ruined its authenticity, with around two thousand people still living in its pretty whitewashed houses with gothic doorways, potted plants and bougainvillea, all inside the crenellated walls of an ancient castle. Many of those people still d
Although the name Óbidos derives from the Latin oppidum , meaning “walled city,” the quaint village dates back to Portugal's Celtic period, and was only later taken over by the Romans in the 1st century AD. They created the Roman city of Eburobrittium, and were followed by the Visigoths and other Germanic tribes in the 5th century. The Moors took it over in the 8th century, and finally Portugal’s first king, Afonso Henriques, conquered it in 1149. It then became property of Portuguese queens until the 1800s
The walls you see surrounding the picturesque village today were built in the 1300s, and although they were partly damaged in an earthquake in 1755, they were completely restored in the early 20th century, starting in 1910.
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