Descubridores Monument

 

The first thing I noticed about this monument is its size. Looking at the second photo you can see its size in comparison to the people around it. It is a massive, eye catching structure that makes you feel insanely small in comparison. The scale of this monument shows us its importance because it makes it impossible to ignore the monument. When you get up closer to the monument you can see the figures and the detail in each one. One of the specific figures that we learned about was Henry the Navigator, who is depicted at the very front of the monument holding a ship. He leads the men behind him, just as he lead Europe with new sailing technology. This leads into how the site plays into this monument. This monument is placed in a plaza next to the ocean and it is the main attraction. Henry the Navigator looks out over the ocean as if he is surveying his conquests.

One of the reasons this monument is so important is because it depicts Henry and immortalizes his achievements. He pioneered many important things for the age of sail, including the technology of caravels that allowed them to tack into the wind. This new technology allowed a lot of wonderful new things to come into Europe such as ivory, sugar, and spices. However, it also allowed some not so good things to come to Europe, such as slaves. It is interesting to reflect on the two sides of history - it is never black or white. Another interesting thing about this monument is the circumstances under which it was built. The Portuguese people were losing their colonies and Salazar, the Prime Minister at the time,  wanted to prevent this from happening. He decided to build this monument in order to show off Portugal's achievements.

This monument contributes to Portugal being a cultural capital because it stands as a symbol of Portugal's achievements in sailing technology and their success in helping bring Europe into modernity at the time. A large part of being a cultural capital is about legitimacy, and this is a way in which Portugal shows their legitimacy, and that they deserve to be a center of culture. However, like I mentioned before, I think that there can be two sides to this. This monument immortalizes not only the positive achievements of Henry the Navigator and the other men on this monument, but also the fact that he made slave trade possible in Europe. We can see that there is a shadow in Lisbon's history, just as there is for all of our cultural capitals.