Story

The Monastery of Refojos already existed in the early 12th century, but the municipal review does not fix the foundation. It questions the traditional assignments to Hermínio Fafes and Gomes Soeiro.

The source links the medieval patronate to noble families in the region. Separate two questions: when we know the monastery existed and when it was founded. A documented date of existence does not solve the second question by itself.

Abbot of Refojos and rector of the University of Coimbra, Frei Diogo de Murça wanted to apply the rents of the Monastery to the foundation of two colleges in Coimbra: São Bento and São Jerónimo. The plan meant to extinguish the monastery. The municipal documentation reports the opposition of the religious and the subsequent reconsideration of the Abbot himself. This link shows how decisions on Refojos participated in a broader history of teaching and religious institutions.

The municipal review is in 1555 the acceptance of the new request by Paul IV: keep the Monastery with twelve religious and a prior, rather than follow the first plan of extinction. The same source records the death of Frei Diogo in Refojos, in 1570, and his grave in the Monastery.

In 25 of May 1758, the vicar Manuel Pacheco da Cunha numbered eight places: Cavez, Vila Franca, Ponte, Arosa, Rabiçais, Moimenta, Revorça and Parada. He located the church in the middle of the parish and described six chapels. Names help to recognize a hammock; they are not a current list of administrative places.

São Gregório, in Vila Franca, São Mamede, in Arosa, and Santa Maria Magdalena, in Moimenta, were attributed to the abbot of Pombeiro, with its maintenance linked to the Benedictine congregation of Tibães. São Bartolomeu, on the Bridge, had as patron João Correia, of Guimarães. In São Caetano, in Raviceis at the passage of the chapels, and Santa Luzia, in Revorça, the charge was for the residents. The transcription itself uses the variants Rabiçais and Raviceais.

The report also describes five altars in the matrix and a brotherhood of the Souls. The parish appears as a space of worship and collective organization, with distinct responsibilities. The pilgrimage of São Bartolomeu is mentioned for 23 and 24 of August; they are dates of historical testimony, without functioning as current agenda.

The parish links went beyond the chapels. The vicar wrote that Cavez did not have their own mail and resorted to Raposeira, which was located to a league. He also indicated the absence of fair in the parish. They are clues to think where news arrived and where services were concentrated at that time; they do not describe the current offer nor allow automatically to convert the league into a road distance.

The extinction of religious orders, in 1834, changed the fate of the set of Refojos, keeping the church in the religious function. According to the municipal proposal of patrimonial candidacy, João António Fernandes Basto acquired the Monastery in public haste between 1838 and 1842. In the nineteenth century, the assembly also welcomed municipal services; in 1944, another part received a college with boarding school. Looking at the whole is also to discover how ancient buildings were adapted to administration and teaching.

The document places around 1855 the installation of the city services in the part of the cloisters. For the school area, it registers a new change of ownership in 1959, for the Conciliar Seminary of Braga. The group therefore did not have a single destination after 1834: different parts followed their own stories. The heritage proposal is here a historical source; it does not demonstrate a UNESCO classification nor confirms the current uses of each space.

In June 2020, the Municipality announced the assignment of names to ruins of the village to remember figures of the history of the Monastery. Among them were the Abbot Diogo of Murça, the notchmaker Vilaça and Gueda Mendes, associated with the offer of the medieval chalice. The same decision recovered ancient toponyms from places of Refojos. The toponym thus approximates two memories: people who marked the heritage and names that the inhabitants used to recognize their places.

In the Pereiras, the building of the former House of the House continued to serve as a chain until 1972, according to the Museum of Lands of Basto. After recovered, received Casa da Música. A municipal news of July 2010 already included it among the spaces proposed to know the municipality. The Museum article needs the change from the House to the Monastery in 1835 and the inauguration of the Casa da Música in 2003: the building continued to change its function after not receiving the municipal administration.

The story of the building begins before the chain that remained in memory. The article of the Museum assigns the editor João Gil de Abreu Castelo Branco the order to build the House of the House in 1586. It then admits a reconstruction in the 18th century, in place of the previous building.

The two floors shared functions: jail in the first, Chamber and hearings in the second. This organization gathered administration and justice in the same space. When the House left, the prison remained; when it closed, the building did not disappear. The inauguration as Casa da Música, in 2003, added another use to a construction with several chapters.

The Machado de Castro National Museum identifies this 12th century chalice as an offer by D. Gueda Mendes to Mosteiro de São Miguel de Refojos. The decoration invites to look at parts: in the cup are Christ and the Apostles, under round arches; at the base appear the symbols of the four evangelists. The form indicates unknown authorship and locates the piece in Coimbra. Knowing its provenance allows discovering heritage linked to Cabeceiras which is outside the municipality.