São Vicente (parish)

It is unquestionably the most important, the most populous and the largest of all the parishes (freguesia) of northern Madeira. The only town (vila) established on the north coast of this island was the one created there around the middle of the 18th century; it has also been the seat of a municipality (concelho) since 1835 and of a judicial district (comarca) since 1875 (1921).

As with the great majority of the parishes of this archipelago, it is now impossible to determine with any approximate accuracy the year in which the settlement and colonisation of the lands that today make up this parish began. As is readily believed, farming and the clearing of the forests that went with it did not begin on the north coast in the years immediately following the discovery. In the south of the island the first settlers had more than enough land, more fertile and with milder climates, on which to exercise their energy and give free rein to their enterprising spirit. It was only when the colonists grew in number, drawn by the fame of the remarkable fertility of the soil and the abundance of its crops, when the grantees of land (sesmeiros) found in the African slave their chief helper in working the fields, and when sugar-making became a powerful source of wealth, that colonisation gradually spread out across the distant valleys, over the ridges and slopes of the inland mountains, and at times even into trackless and almost inaccessible places.

It is said that the first lands cultivated in the north of the island were those of Faial and Porto da Cruz (‘harbour of the cross’), but it may be supposed that, at the same time, other lands were being worked at various points in the northern part, above all at Ponta Delgada, São Vicente, Seixal and Porto Moniz.

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The parish of São Vicente,’ says the annotator of the Saudades, ‘is held, in the manuscripts we have consulted, to have been founded in 1440, which can be admissible only as regards the building of the first church and the institution of the chaplaincy; for the parish of Machico, the principal one of the captaincy, was constituted only in the year 1450: we therefore take the view that the parish of São Vicente dates from some years after this.’ There can be not the slightest doubt on this point if we carefully examine the dates on which the most important parishes in the south of this island were created. We are of the opinion that this parish was created only in the last quarter of the 15th century.

In 1590 Frutuoso wrote of this parish: ‘A league beyond Ponta Delgada lies the parish of São Vicente, of two hundred and fifty households (fogos, literally ‘hearths’), with large lands of grain crops and livestock; much fruit, of chestnut, walnut and other kinds; many vineyards and much water, and two water-powered sawmills.’ The royal decree (alvará régio) of 18 September 1575 assigned the parish priest an annual salary of 25,000 réis (old Portuguese money of account; 1$000 = 1,000 réis, 1:000$000 = one conto = 1,000,000 réis), which was raised to 25,000 réis, half a moio (dry measure of grain, 60 alqueires) of wheat and a quarter of wine by the royal decree of 20 April 1589, and was further increased by a royal decree of the same month and year with half a moio of wheat and one pipa (wine cask and measure, c. 400–500 litres) of wine.

Dr Rodrigues de Azevedo is mistaken when he states that this parish had only a vicar. In fact the very Memórias do Estado Eclesiástico that he cites, and which we have now consulted, mention the royal decree of 2 January 1606 establishing the creation of the curacy (curato), a document also cited in the Índice Geral da Provedoria... to which we have so often turned. This decree fixes the curate’s annual stipend (côngrua) at 20,000 réis.

For the convenience of the people of the island, the parish of São Vicente became the seat of a vicariate forane (vigairaria da vara), that is, a deanery (arciprestado, group of parishes under an archpriest). It was created on 2 September 1812 by the diocesan prelate Dom Friar Joaquim de Meneses e Ataíde, and the first vicar forane or archpriest was Father Francisco Borges de Sousa e Melo, then parish priest of the parish, with jurisdiction ‘over all the parish priests, clergy and other persons of the said Town and its district’. By a warrant (provisão) of the vicar-general of 14 January 1814, this jurisdiction was extended to the parishes of Porto Moniz, Ribeira da Janela and Seixal, since he had learnt ‘that it is often better for them to go to the said Town than to that of Calheta (‘small cove’)’. We do not know what the powers of this vicar forane were, nor when the functions of the office ceased to be exercised, though it is certain that no such ecclesiastical authority has existed for some decades. Only very recently did the present diocesan prelate, within the powers conferred on him by the Code of Canon Law now in force, create the deaneries of Funchal, Calheta and São Jorge (1921).

A small chapel dedicated to St Vincent gave its name to the place where it had been built, and later to the new parish. We do not know the name of its founder or the year of its construction, but it must date from the time of the first agricultural settlement there. The seat of the parish was established in it when the parish was created in the last quarter of the 15th century. Over time it must have undergone various repairs and enlargements, as happened with all the chapels that were later turned into parish churches. An order of the Council of the Treasury (Conselho da Fazenda) dated 12 January 1664 directs that the sum of 560,000 réis (old Portuguese money of account; 1$000 = 1,000 réis, 1:000$000 = one conto = 1,000,000 réis) be paid to the parish priest for the enlargement of the church, the document stating that the people should contribute whatever they could towards the same purpose. From this it seems that the present church was enlarged or underwent considerable repairs in the third quarter of the 17th century.

The parish has the chapels of Our Lady of the Rosary, Our Lady of Deliverance and São Vicente; that of Our Lady of Pity no longer exists. We have already given a brief account of them.

The main localities of this parish are Fajã da Areia, Vila, Terra-Chã, Fontinha, Poiso, Pé do Passo, Passo, Ribeira do Passo, Lanço, Feiteiras, Ginjas, Saramago, Loural, Vargem, Estreito da Vargem, Ribeira Grande, Achada do Til, Achada dos Judeus, Fajã dos Vinhaticos, Aviceiro, Ribeira do Rato, Lameiros, Cascalho, Limoeiro, Laranjal, Pé da Corrida and Cardais.

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The parish of São Vicente,’ an educated person who has lived there for years tells us, ‘wedged at the foot of towering mountains, cut almost sheer, which surround it for dozens of kilometres like gigantic ramparts and leave it open only on the seaward side, is one of the loveliest places in Madeira, for its rugged look of grandly wild beauty. To the east it borders on Ponta Delgada; to the west its limits run as far as the Ribeira do Inferno (‘hell’s stream’), which nature thus sets between it and Seixal; to the north lies the sea; to the south stretches the plateau of the Paul da Serra (‘upland marsh’), which divides it from Serra Alva (‘white upland’), and, where the high backbone of the mountains dips, the gorge of the Encumeada (‘ridge pass’). Its lands are thick and dense, and in them abound the richest woods of leafy laurels, til (Ocotea foetens, Madeiran laurel), vinhático and heather, which at present are held, beyond dispute, to be the finest in Madeira.

A kind of saying was once much in vogue here and is still known and quoted: ‘from São Vicente, neither donkey, nor wine, nor people’. It is not only a disparaging reference to that parish but also a glaring and grave injustice to the character, the sober ways and the open hospitality of its inhabitants, which it gives us great pleasure to emphasise here, as a well-deserved tribute to the truth. On this subject we may add that our great satirical poet Monteiro Teixeira (volume II, page 390) spent a fortnight in São Vicente in 1826 and wrote from there a letter in verse, published in the 2nd volume of his Obras Poéticas. In it, giving free rein to his poetic imagination and his marked leaning towards satire and epigram, he refers to this parish in terms that are not exactly flattering, but in which one clearly sees an itch to be witty rather than a wish to belittle or offend. This parish has 5,462 inhabitants (1921).

On 6 March 1929 this parish was the scene of a great tragedy that caused the deepest dismay throughout the island. After heavy rains, an extensive landslide took place, carrying away many dwelling houses in its fall, and thirty-two people met a terrible death. This great catastrophe occurred at localities not far from the chapel of Rosário, seat of the parish’s curacy (curato).