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I spent a few weeks in Portugal during the spring of 2006, and one of the most striking things about its many churches and chapels and religious monuments was, well, how dark they were. Not literally — there was plenty of light. But it seemed like every statue of Christ was weeping blood, and every church had a display case of gruesome relics in the foyer; a saint’s pickled eyeballs here, a toe with dessicated skin still clinging to it there. But of all these monuments to pain and death, nothing could match the Capela dos Ossos — the Chapel of the Bones. Located next to the Church of St. Francis in the medieval town of Evora, it’s a large room decorated with the bones of more than 5,000 monks, exhumed from local churchyards to be used as building materials way back in the 16th century.
As you enter, you pass under this doorway. Its inscription, translated from the Portuguese, means ““We bones here, for yours await.” Nice and creepy.
According to legend, the 16th century Franciscan monk who created the chapel did it not to freak people out or scare them, but to prod visitors into a spirit of quiet contemplation. “Life is fleeting!” the bones are meant to imply. “See?!”
On the other side of the doorway, as you exit, is this cheerful little motif, restored in 1810.
The monks who built the chapel got creative with their bones, using them not just to fill wall space, but to create all sorts of decorative patterns. It’s more or less what I imagine a Martha Stewart Halloween special would be like.
Not everyone who visits the chapel is inspired to contemplate the mysteries of death, however, judging from the many graffiti-inscribed skulls that line the walls. Ana Gomes, I hope someone writes on your skull when you’re dead.
As an added bonus, the monks decided to hang two corpses on the wall from a chain — that of a woman and a child. They’ve been there for hundreds of years, and they don’t seem to be going anywhere anytime soon. No one is sure exactly who the unlucky pair are, but rumor has it they were cursed by a powerful man and were refused burial in local cemeteries. (That doesn’t explain how they died, though; methinks it was not of natural causes.)
The strangest part about the Chapel was that it didn’t seem all that creepy. There was something sanitized and touristy about the whole thing, with ropes sectioning off the walls so you couldn’t get too close, and an information kiosk just outside the door. I nearly forgot that I was walking around the house of 5,000 corpses.
You can check out more “Strange Geographies” photo essays on my website.
Comments (18)
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I’d hate to be any one of the people whose bones make up that chapel, though. What a way to spend your final resting place. “Oh yeah, this is where my great-great-great-great-great-aunt Lupe was buried…the 52nd skull to the right over by that organ there.”
posted by Two Worlds on 11-13-2009 at 1:09 pm
bizarre!
posted by Lulu on 11-13-2009 at 1:12 pm
Creepy weird. Don’t think I’d want to go there….the pictures were enough.
posted by Fran on 11-13-2009 at 1:24 pm
Not to say it wasn’t incredibly interesting…just….
posted by Fran on 11-13-2009 at 1:25 pm
They have a similar place (that I’ve visited) in the Czech Republic, at Kutna Hora. A few pictures from my trip if you click my name (well, if I did it right :) )
posted by Gwan on 11-13-2009 at 2:08 pm
I have been there, it was like he said very touristy. I was told that they monks whose bones are in the chaple were told that being buried there assured their salvation.
posted by Megan on 11-13-2009 at 3:05 pm
I’ve been to the similar chapel in Rome, and the atmosphere was peaceful and even reverent.
Now, graffiti on a skull – THAT is REALLY disturbing.
posted by Betsy on 11-13-2009 at 5:12 pm
as always, catholic church would never assume it, but the story was “bit” different: The “walled” bones, skeletons and skulls, belongs to the people “who were not that catholic”, what they call heretic people. in the XVI century, Portugal and Spain had the “holy inquisition”, which was a Vatican’s court to “take care” of the heretics: witches, homosexuals, adultery, atheists, agnostics, etc. So these bones were from the “holy” assassination of them all, by the “holy inquisition”.
what anyone can read there now, as you saw, was that the church was built this way for you to meditate in the ephemeral of life…
which is a “delicious” way to turn the thing around.
posted by tuga on 11-13-2009 at 5:14 pm
just a side and curious note… “Ana Gomes” is a quite popular name in Portugal, however, the most well known “Ana Gomes” is a very polemic European deputy… a real polemic one. Who hasn’t any approval from the catholics…
posted by tuga on 11-13-2009 at 5:20 pm
So, Ana Gomes is the equivllent to John Doe then :/
People back then had a very different view on morbidism, hu.
posted by Sam on 11-14-2009 at 11:04 pm
ahhh yes, the idiotic things people do in the name of religion!
posted by Sean Nieuwoudt on 11-15-2009 at 6:38 am
This chapel was build because all graveyards in Évora were full, not because some crazy monk remember to freak people. If you go there, it’s all but creepy, it’s a bit “theatrical” in my opinion, you simply don’t realize that you’re surrounded by what used to be thousands of people! :P
posted by schroder on 11-15-2009 at 8:36 am
Yes, churches here seem to take human suffering to a whole new level. They are not however much different from the rest of roman catholic europe xD
Ok so the literal translation of the entrance sentence maybe is missing a bit of meaning to it since its from medieval portuguese, but I guess its the best translation that can be done.
“One thing I learned in Portugal: everything interesting that happened in Portugal happened in the 16th century”
gee thanks :( … we do like our antient empire but there is also much more than that! xD
posted by Pedro on 11-15-2009 at 9:41 am
@tuga: re: heretics: source please?
posted by Elijah on 11-15-2009 at 9:58 am
What a great idea! I’d love my bones to be used in a ossary for decoration. OK that one you showed is a bit depressing but the Czech one is OK.
Here is a panarama of it
http://www.360cities.net/image/sedlec-ossuary-kutna-hora-the-bone-church.
posted by Slatts on 11-15-2009 at 11:52 am
Fantastic place – I was in there in 2008:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chilli-dog/2857582474/in/set-72157607267648125/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chilli-dog/2857584116/in/set-72157607267648125/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chilli-dog/2857586236/in/set-72157607267648125/
posted by Chillidog on 11-15-2009 at 4:23 pm
Cool pictures! I’d love to find out more about this chapel.
posted by Leslie on 11-16-2009 at 2:08 pm
Oh my goodness.. That’s so strange and freaky..
posted by Ana on 1-25-2010 at 6:13 am