About
Melo
I write to make the mystery of things visible. I write to be. I write without reason: to better describe Melo, we borrow the words of Vergílio Ferreira (1916-1996), since the life and work of the Portuguese writer, born here, uniquely mark the village erected on the northern slope of the Serra da Estrela.
Melo will forever be the home of Vergílio Ferreira - who chose to be buried here, with a coffin facing the Serra da Estrela mountain range. The village's central square is the starting point of the Vergiliano Literary Route (the phrases that open this text are inscribed there), with passages through other emblematic points – from the already deeply altered house where he was born, to Vila Josephine, the yellow house where he grew up in and stayed when he returned to the village (Here I am. In the big, deserted house. Forever). His busts, statues and words scattered on the streets of Melo mark the landscape of this village in the municipality of Gouveia.
Still, Melo has more to offer. With origins in time immemorial, the locality had considerable political importance (charter of King D. Manuel I in 1515, seat of the municipality until 1834) and preserves significant patrimonial heritage, such as the Ethnological Museum, the Chapel of Nossa Senhora da Conceição, the House of the City Council, the pillory and the Paço of Melo, noble fortified residence that belonged to the founders of Melo. This classified property, believed to date back to the 13th or 14th centuries, resists in ruins, without losing a trace of its original grandeur.
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