Igreja de São Roque & the Chapel of St John the Baptist
Why is it significant?
The façade in front of you is almost disappointingly plain, a flat stone front facing a small square with a bronze lottery seller. Step inside, though, and the plainness was a trick: gilded wood, painted ceilings and, in the side chapels, a blaze of marble and gold.
Key Facts
| Place | Igreja de São Roque & the Chapel of St John the Baptist |
|---|---|
| Address | Largo Trindade Coelho, 1200-470 Lisboa, Portugal |
| Geo Coordinates | 38.71360, -9.14340 |
| Part of Walk | Pessoa's Lisbon: Poets, Bookshops and Lookouts of Chiado & Bairro Alto |
| Generated | Generated |
The façade in front of you is almost disappointingly plain, a flat stone front facing a small square with a bronze lottery seller. Step inside, though, and the plainness was a trick: gilded wood, painted ceilings and, in the side chapels, a blaze of marble and gold.
This is the Igreja de São Roque, the first Jesuit church in Portugal, built from the 1550s on the spot of an older shrine to Saint Roch, protector against the plague. From here the Jesuits ran schools and sent missionaries to Brazil, India and Japan. Their preachers and teachers shaped Portuguese writing for two centuries, until Pombal expelled the order from Portugal in 1759.
Now find the chapel on the left near the altar, the Chapel of St John the Baptist. King João V, rich with Brazilian gold, ordered it in the 1740s from the best architects in Rome. It was assembled there, blessed by the Pope, taken apart, and shipped to Lisbon in pieces. Lapis lazuli, agate, amethyst, porphyry, gilded bronze... and the pictures on its walls look like paintings, but walk close and you will see they are mosaics of tiny stones. It has been called the most expensive chapel in Europe.
Remember where that gold came from: the mines of Brazil, worked by enslaved Africans brought across the Atlantic, many of them through Lisbon's own port. The splendour and the cruelty are the same story. And remarkably, the chapel and the church survived the earthquake of 1755 that destroyed so much of the city below.
So the walk ends the way Pessoa might have liked, with something that looks like one thing and turns out to be another, a plain church that hides a jewel box, paintings that are really stones. Behind the church is the Museu de São Roque, if you want more treasures. Otherwise Largo do Chiado and Rua Garrett, where you started, are a five minute walk downhill... and the bronze chair beside Pessoa may finally be free.