The Promontory of Sagres, which includes the fort, is already a classified monument but now has been selected, along with the Mértola Village Museum, to be put forward for consideration as a European Heritage site.
These sites are approved if they define and epitomise European values and civilisation as a celebration of European integration, ideals, values and history.
Sites are carefully selected for their symbolic value, the role they have played in the European history and the activities they offer in order to bring the European Union and its citizens closer together.
The Promontory of Sagres, or Sagres Point, has been put forward by the Regional Directorate of Culture of the Algarve which is responsible for the site.
The application outlines the European significance of the site and details future information and educational activities especially aimed at children and young people.
Other goals are to raise the visibility and attractiveness of the Sagres site, in particular using digital media, and organising artistic and cultural activities.
The application states that the idea is to ‘reflect the uniqueness of this national monument, due to its geographical importance and historical context within the subject of the Portuguese Discoveries,' and to boost tourism at the site.
The proposal goes hand in hand with the completion of the rehabilitation and improvement of the site and is part of a wider programme to at last offer tourists a coherent explanation of Portugal's period of discoveries which are centred at the School of Navigation developed by Prince Henry the Navigator in the 15th century.
This school is believed to have been situated on the headland within the walls of the forteleza which were rebuilt after the 1755 earthquake.
The only building still surviving from Henry's day is the church within the fortress.
The school of navigation drew the best brains in Europe concerned with nautical sciences. Under Henry's patronage, a community of scholars came here to teach, study and correlate nautical knowledge brought back by captains of successive voyages to hitherto unknown places.
