Cape Verde’s oldest church, built in Cidade Velha about 30 years after the discovery of the archipelago, reopened today, after 20 months of rehabilitation works financed by the Cape Verdean state, with support from Portugal.
The rehabilitation of the secular church of Nossa Senhora do Rosário was concluded today, with the handing over of the keys to the diocese, by inserting the temple in the center of the Old City, which was classified by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as a World Heritage Site on May 10, 2009.
During the ceremony, the Prime Minister, Ulisses Correia e Silva, said that this is an intervention that “clearly increases the value of the world heritage of humanity, which is the Cidade Velha”, the “cradle of Cape Verdeanity”.
The work on that church, on the island of Santiago, over 500 years old and where Father António Vieira preached and where Vasco da Gama and Cristóvão Colombo passed by, started in December 2018, under the national plan for the rehabilitation of historic buildings and religious, being financed by the Cape Verde Tourism Fund.
Built in 1495, the church of Nossa Senhora do Rosário, in the municipality of Ribeira Grande de Santiago, integrates one of the rare examples of Gothic architecture in sub-Saharan Africa, having typical characteristics of 16th century architecture.
