Mesão Frio Municipality (Portugal)

Last modified: 2010-08-21 by antónio martins
Keywords: mesão frio | coat of arms (mountains) | mountains: 3 | mountain (black) | snow | grape bunches: 2 | grapes (yellow) | waves: 3 | mesa |
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• About the flag
• Version without the coat of arms
• Presentation of Mesão Frio MSF

• Municipalities of Portugal
• Portugal

• Page about the municipal flag and coat of arms of Mesão Frio at Sérgio Horta’s website (in Portuguese).
  reported by Jorge Candeias, 29 Feb 1999
• Page about Mesão Frio at the Portuguese Municipalities’s Association website (incl. image of the arms)
  reported by António Martins, 18 Nov 2001
• Mesão Frio at the English Wikipedia
  reported by António Martins, 15 Jul 2007

About the flag

It is fairily typical portuguese municipal flag, with the coat of arms centered on a quartered background (town rank), yellow and blue. Flag and arms adopted and published in the official journal Diário do Governo : I Série in 1936.03.26.
António Martins, 15 Jul 2007

The arms are Gules issuant from a campaign Argent wavy charged with a fess wavy Azure three coupeaux Sable snowed Argent between two bunches of grapes Or and on the heart of the chief a bundle of three diminute ears of wheat Or. Mural crown argent with four visible towers (town rank) and white scroll reading in black upper case letters "Vila de Mesão Frio".
António Martins, 15 Jul 2007

Version without the coat of arms

Plain (monocolored) portuguese subnational flags are not allowed to have armless variations: plain flags always carry the coat of arms.
Jorge Candeias, 18 Jul 1999

Presentation of Mesão Frio

Mesão Frio municipality had 4926 inhabitants in 2001 and consists of 7 communes covering 26,85 km². It is part of Vila Real District, traditional province and 1999 ref. adm. region Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro, C.C.R. / NUTS II Norte, and NUTS III Douro.
António Martins, 15 Jul 2007

"Frio" means "cold", so the snow in these arms might be canting; "mesão" does’t have a regular meaning but popular etymology points to either "long month" or "large table" — both probably bogus and neither shown in the arms. Ears and grapes are probably trivial references to local agriculture.
António Martins, 15 Jul 2007

Actually, "mesão" is an orographic term, meaning a large "mesa". And fits well with local geography, with the town built on an elevation overlooking the Douro river.
Jorge Candeias, 17 Jul 2007

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