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Amadora Municipality (Portugal)

Concelho de Amadora, Distrito de Lisboa

Last modified: 2015-05-16 by klaus-michael schneider
Keywords: amadora | bridge | arches(3) | windsock | propeller | bush | pomegranate |
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[Amadora municipality] 2:3 image by Jorge Candeias, 14 July 1999
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About the Flag

It’s flag is a typical Portuguese municipal flag with the coat of arms centred on a field gyronny of green over white, one of the ugliest coats of arms in Portuguese municipal heraldry, in my humble opinion.
Jorge Candeias, 25 July 1998

Coat of arms

The coat of arms includes a 5-towered mural crown (with an unusual shape; all my sources present it this way, so I guess it’s the way it is used), and a scroll (also unusual) that reads "CIDADE DA AMADORA". The shield is green, has in chef a yellowish airplane propeller and a silver windsock, then an aqueduct and below a pomegranate tree also in that yellowish colour of the propeller with fruits with something red within.
Jorge Candeias, 25 Jul 1998

Meaning:

At the present time Amadora does not have any airfield. However, in the 1920s a small airfield (the 1st in Portugal) was located here. The first air-travel from Portugal to Brazil had is departure from Amadora. The Captain of the airplane was Admiral Gago Coutinho, a well known Portuguese celebrity. This justifies the airplane propeller and a silver windsock on the Amadora’s flag.
Jorge Fernandes, 15 Apr 2003

The arches represent the famous Free Waters Aqueduct (Aqueduto das Águas Livres), which brings water from Sintra hills to Lisboa, stretching some 30 km through these three municipalities. It was finished in the 1770ies and includes the largest masonry only arch ever built, located in the Campolide commune — local coat of arms also displays the aqueduct (like others along its way).
António Martins-Tuválkin, 20 Sep 1998

The tree is a pomegranate tree, one of the Amadora symbols. The explanation is somewhat awkward, and hard to explain in English, but it follows:

  • "Pomegranate" = "Romã" in Portuguese.
  • "Romã", read backwards is "amor" ("love" in Portuguese).
  • "Amadora" is "she-lover", the female that loves ("amadora" is a female noun. In Portuguese, a city usually is a female noun).
Miguel dos Reis, 24 Sep 2001


Version without Coat of Arms

[Amadora municipality plain] 2:3 image by António Martins-Tuválkin, Apr 2010

Presentation of Amadora

Amadora is a dormitory city of Lisbon, one of the smallest portuguese municipalities (24 km²), and one of the most populated (187 000 inhabitants; 175 534 in 2000, cesus data) divided into six communes. It is placed to the northwest of Lisbon, in its district and in the old province of Estremadura, future Lisboa-e-Setúbal region.

Jorge Candeias, 25 July 1998

Nearly every commune has a pomegranate tree eradicated in its arms, most of them having eleven pomegranates. The tree is a symbol of the municipality and the pomegranates are representing its pre-2013 communes.
Klaus-Michael Schneider, 9 May 2015

The former commune was detached from the Oeiras municipality on 11 September 1979. At once was created the municipality of Amadora and the town was promoted to the rank of city.
Francisco Santos, 16 Apr 2003


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