The story of Cape St. Vincent

For the ancients, this was the end of the world. Standing stones nearby show that the cape was sacred as far back as Neolithic times. The Romans called it the Promontorium Sacrum, the Sacred Promontory, and the geographer Strabo described it as the westernmost point of the inhabited world.

People said the sun sank hissing into the ocean here, a tale Strabo dismissed as common talk. He also wrote that visitors did not stay the night; they slept in a nearby village and came by day, bringing water, since there was none on the cape. Its Christian name comes from Saint Vincent, a martyred deacon whose body, legend says, was brought ashore here, and whose shrine was said to be guarded by ravens.

In 1173 King Afonso Henriques had the relics carried by ship to Lisbon, still escorted by the ravens, a scene shown on Lisbon's coat of arms. Today the cliffs drop about 75 metres into the Atlantic at the southwestern tip of mainland Europe.