Jerónimos Monastery

The Jerónimos Monastery in Belém is the most complete surviving monument of Manueline architecture — Portugal's late-Gothic style that fuses structural ribs with maritime ornament: ropes, anchors, armillary spheres, and tropical flora carved in limestone. King Manuel I commissioned the building in 1501 on the site of a small chapel where Vasco da Gama spent the night in prayer before his 1497 voyage to India; the entire project was bankrolled by revenues from the spice trade, a provenance legible in every nautical motif on the facade. Inside the church of Santa Maria de Belém, the tombs of Vasco da Gama and King Sebastião rest in elaborate Renaissance sarcophagi. The double-story cloister, with its layered filigree arches, is widely considered the technical apex of Iberian stonework. The complex has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1983, and its west wing houses the National Archaeology Museum.

Begun in 1502 by Manuel I, the pinnacle of Portuguese Manueline architecture — UNESCO heritage, Vasco da Gama's tomb.