It is located on the left bank of the Mondego river, Rua Baixo, parish of Santa Clara, in the city and municipality of Coimbra, central Portugal
In the old Rossio de Santa Clara de Coimbra, on the left bank of the Mondego River, there is one of the most emblematic monuments of national Gothic, the Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Velha, of which only its beautiful church remains.
The Clarissa nuns founded it in the distant year of 1286, and found themselves at the head of the D. Mor Dias brotherhood, a noblewoman who was linked to the Donas Monastery, a female annex of the Santa Cruz de Coimbra Monastery.
The intervention of D. Isabel de Aragão, wife of D. Dinis, revived the order of the Poor Clares and developed the monastery: the Holy Queen ordered the construction of a new church and the expansion of the convent's facilities.
Saint Isabel of Aragão would be transferred and buried in the monastery of Coimbra on July 11, 1326 (she died in Estremoz on July 4, 1326)
The royal architect Domingos Domingues was supervising the construction site in 1316, and the church was consecrated on July 8, 1330.
A year later, a new threat befell the monastery, the Mondego River overflowed its banks and flooded the entire monument.
Between 1612 and 1615 a floor was built dividing the body of the church into two floors, the lower one being constantly under water while the Clarissa nuns continued their normal lives on the upper floor.
Existence in the monastery became unsustainable and the Poor Clares abandoned it definitively in 1667, and moved together with the tomb of the Holy Queen to the new monastery of Santa Clara, built throughout the 17th century on the slope of Senhora da Esperança hill.
The Santa Clara-a-Velha church is an important monument, both for its construction quality and for its high planimetry and higher-than-normal elevation and the rear floor, and the waters do not allow us to perceive its overall nature.
Externally, the church forms a vast rectangle covered with a gabled roof and rests on a continuous line of cantilevers, with the slender bell tower with a triangular finish protruding from its volume.
Its body is made up of three naves divided into seven sections and completely covered by a vault with transverse arches on the sides, while the central one is covered by a broken barrel vault and reinforced by toral arches.
The headboard is tripartite, now without its vaulted covering, several windows with double slits and three rose windows run along the side walls and the tops of the convent, illuminating its austere interior.
In 1613, Bishop-Count D. Afonso de Castelo Branco ordered the construction of an ornamental Mannerist tomb arch in white Ançã limestone on the upper floor in order to accommodate the silver tomb of Saint Isabel of Aragon.
A sacred space undoubtedly linked to the name of the Holy Queen, the Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Velha welcomed other illustrious characters from Portuguese History.
Before being transferred to Alcobaça, Inês de Castro was buried here, D. Duarte's wedding took place in this church, on the eve of the fateful Battle of Alfarrobeira, Infante D. Pedro, Duke of Coimbra and regent of the kingdom during his nephew's minority (the future D. Afonso V) was here in 1449 to commend his soul to God.
From the 1990s onwards, a project was carried out to restore and enhance the monument, where Gothic architectural structures were discovered in a good state of conservation, revealing a vast and extremely rich collection.
Currently, the Portuguese Institute of Architectural and Archaeological Heritage (IPPAR) has carried out several excavation campaigns around the monastery's perimeter, having uncovered the remains of the elegant 16th-century cloister and other monastic dependencies.
The Clarissa nuns founded it in the distant year of 1286, and found themselves at the head of the D. Mor Dias brotherhood, a noblewoman who was linked to the Donas Monastery, a female annex of the Santa Cruz de Coimbra Monastery.
The intervention of D. Isabel de Aragão, wife of D. Dinis, revived the order of the Poor Clares and developed the monastery: the Holy Queen ordered the construction of a new church and the expansion of the convent's facilities.
Saint Isabel of Aragão would be transferred and buried in the monastery of Coimbra on July 11, 1326 (she died in Estremoz on July 4, 1326)
The royal architect Domingos Domingues was supervising the construction site in 1316, and the church was consecrated on July 8, 1330.
A year later, a new threat befell the monastery, the Mondego River overflowed its banks and flooded the entire monument.
Between 1612 and 1615 a floor was built dividing the body of the church into two floors, the lower one being constantly under water while the Clarissa nuns continued their normal lives on the upper floor.
Existence in the monastery became unsustainable and the Poor Clares abandoned it definitively in 1667, and moved together with the tomb of the Holy Queen to the new monastery of Santa Clara, built throughout the 17th century on the slope of Senhora da Esperança hill.
The Santa Clara-a-Velha church is an important monument, both for its construction quality and for its high planimetry and higher-than-normal elevation and the rear floor, and the waters do not allow us to perceive its overall nature.
Externally, the church forms a vast rectangle covered with a gabled roof and rests on a continuous line of cantilevers, with the slender bell tower with a triangular finish protruding from its volume.
Its body is made up of three naves divided into seven sections and completely covered by a vault with transverse arches on the sides, while the central one is covered by a broken barrel vault and reinforced by toral arches.
The headboard is tripartite, now without its vaulted covering, several windows with double slits and three rose windows run along the side walls and the tops of the convent, illuminating its austere interior.
In 1613, Bishop-Count D. Afonso de Castelo Branco ordered the construction of an ornamental Mannerist tomb arch in white Ançã limestone on the upper floor in order to accommodate the silver tomb of Saint Isabel of Aragon.
A sacred space undoubtedly linked to the name of the Holy Queen, the Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Velha welcomed other illustrious characters from Portuguese History.
Before being transferred to Alcobaça, Inês de Castro was buried here, D. Duarte's wedding took place in this church, on the eve of the fateful Battle of Alfarrobeira, Infante D. Pedro, Duke of Coimbra and regent of the kingdom during his nephew's minority (the future D. Afonso V) was here in 1449 to commend his soul to God.
From the 1990s onwards, a project was carried out to restore and enhance the monument, where Gothic architectural structures were discovered in a good state of conservation, revealing a vast and extremely rich collection.
Currently, the Portuguese Institute of Architectural and Archaeological Heritage (IPPAR) has carried out several excavation campaigns around the monastery's perimeter, having uncovered the remains of the elegant 16th-century cloister and other monastic dependencies.
The Classification of the Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Velha
The Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Velha has been classified as a National Monument since June 16, 1910.
