In June 2024, the municipalities of Almeida, Marvao and Valença do Minho presented an official request for inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage List for the Raia fortifications. This handover took place in the presence of the Mayor of Valença, José Manuel Carpintaria, the presidents of the municipalities of Almeida and Marvão, António Machado and António Vitorino, respectively, the President of the National Commission of UNESCO, Ambassador José Moraes Cabral, the Vice-President of ICOMOS Portugal, Ana Paula Amendoeira, the coordinator of the application, Professor João Campos, the president of the Vauban association, Alain Monferrand and other technicians from these three municipalities involved in the application.
At our 2024 IFC annual meeting in Namur, it was decided to present a motion of support from the IFC for the candidacy of the Raia fortresses in Portugal for inclusion on the UNESCO World Heritage List. The IFC Board was entrusted with drafting this motion and sending it to the Fortifications Interpretation Centre and to Almeida, who are supporting this entire candidacy in a network. You will find this letter of intend below, which we invite you to relay and adopt.
ALMEIDA – MARVAO – VALENCA DO MINHO CANDIDATE TO UNESCO
The International Fortress Council (IFC) hereby strongly supports the candidature of « Fortalezas Abaluatadas da Raia » in Portugal for UNESCO World Heritage status, which is being promoted by the municipalities of Almeida, Marvão and Valença do Minho.
« The Portuguese heritage of bastioned fortifications of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries is considerable. Covering the internal borders with Spain as well as the coast or the Portuguese colonies, this fortified heritage includes fortifications that are still intact and very well preserved. In Portugal, after those of Evora and Elvas, already classified by UNESCO in 1986 and 2012, we can mention in particular, those of Almeida, Marvao, Valença do Minho. «
The proposal presented by Portugal is based on very solid historical and architectural documentation, the result of numerous studies coordinated over the years in the three cities by the teams of Professor Joao do Campos and his Centro de Estudos de Arquitetura Militar (Centre for Military Architecture Studies – CEAMA) which is located at the Santo António outer gate of the bastion in Almeida.
The importance of this classification is based on its heritage value and relevant as a testimony to the history of Europe: After the restoration of Portugal’s independence between sixteen forty and sixteen sixty-eight (1640-1668), the biggest financial investment was concentrated in renovating the fortifications of towns and cities located near the border. In addition, it became necessary to hire foreign military engineers – mainly Dutch and French – who mastered the Modern Fortification. In 1647, the Military Fortification Class was formed to train Portuguese military engineers to continue the works and projects during all the seventh century.
The three candidate fortified cities are emblematic of the « Raia », a new fortified system designed to protect the century-old border of Portugal with Castile and which in its design and construction presents great analogies with the devices designed in France by Vauban such as the « pré carré » facing the Spanish border in Flanders.
It is very important that most of this Fortifications could underline the great interest of the possible international classification of the network of seventeenth-century fortifications on the border between Portugal and Spain. In a first phase, refers to Almeida, Marvão and Valença, but also on others that may be added to them (and potentially cross-border), once the nature of exceptional universal value is considered to be part of the network.
For all these reasons and noting in particular that the candidacy, collectively supported by local authorities and their elected representatives, has set itself the objective of building a network to which other cities and fortifications can be added, the IFC General Assembly voted unanimously in favour of supporting this candidacy from Portugal during the annual meeting in Namur (B) in 2024. The IFC Board will send this motion to all his 15 members to support this candidacy.
Andreas Kupka M.A. (Chairman), Marc Gayda (vice-chairman), Jeroen van der Werf (Gnl Secretary)
Several national associations have also offered their support for this application with official letters. Notably, we can mention : APAC (Portugal), Association Vauban (France), DGF (Germany), FFGL (Luxemburg),…