Portugal, Porto & England

Our History and connection with England is already very old! Since our first king D. Afonso Henriques we have been cooperating. D. Afonso Henriques established a deal with the Crusades in 1147 to help him conquering the city of Lisbon to the Moors.

We established commercial relations with England since the Middle Ages. We trade with England, textiles, wine, wood, leather and fish.

The Porto city Hall in 1432 granted a scholarship with the value of 300 pounds to a friar of the S.Domingos Monastery. Pedro who was also a master in philosophy, with this money could pursue his studies in Oxford! Since then, many important and brilliant Portuguese developed his studies in the prestigious Oxford University. In modern times we have the PARSUK (Portuguese Association of Researchers and Students in the United Kingdom), and many of this students study at Oxford!

I also must write about the most famous marriage that occurred in the city of Porto: In 1367 our king John I marries the English Philippa of Lancaster, that became Keen of Portugal! The marriage was celebrated at the Porto Cathedral. Philippa of Lancaster was an important keen with some political influence, she maintained correspondence with England and had an important role to the reinforcement of the Portuguese-British alliance!

We can observe this marriage, represented in the magnificent tiles of the São Bento Train Station!

In 1642 after the Restoration of the Portuguese Independency, the city of Porto receives the first British Consul. Also the Chaplaincy of Oporto is founded in 1671, when the Rev John Brawlerd, a priest of the Church of England, sent by the bishop of London. He was employed by the British merchants of Oporto to provide religious services for the British community, and to provide for the education of their children.

London was the main destiny for the ships that departed from Porto in the beginning of the XVIII!

In 1703 is signed in Lisbon the Methuen Treaty, a commercial treaty between Portugal and England, that established that Portugal would buy English textiles, and our wines would be bought by England by only 2/3 of the taxes imposed to the French!

So what about Port wine? Port wine exportations to England explode in the XVII. The high taxes on Bordeaux wines, made that the king Charles II forbids the import of French wines. The merchants from Bristol and Plymouth established their commercial agencies in the city of Porto. In 1756 our Prime Minister the Marquis of Pombal, established the first Demarcated Wine Region  -  the Douro Region.

In my visit to the Blenheim Palace, the birth place of Sir wiston Churchill, what do they sell at their shop? Churchill´ s Port wine of course! Churchill was an avid drinker, enjoying champagne, Bordeaux wines and Port wine in particular. Graham's Vintage Character Port, the name previously given to Six Grapes by merchants in the UK, was a personal favourite of Sir Winston Churchill, with invoices from his wine merchant, Hatch Mansfield and Co., indicating it was the only brand of Port the politician had ordered throughout his lifetime.

The British Factory House (Portuguese: Feitoria Inglesa), also known as the British Association House) is an 18th-century Neo-Palladian building located in the northern Portuguese centre of Porto, associated with the influence of Britain in the Porto Wine industry. This building is part of a group of buildings and infrastructures that mark the British presence in the city of Porto, that include the Oporto Cricket and Lawn Tennis Club (founded 1855) and the Oporto British School (1894).