Last modified: 2006-09-30 by antónio martins
Keywords: aljustrel | coat of arms (fountain) | fountain | cross: saint james (purple) | order of santiago | crescent: points up (golden) |
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It’s flag is a typical quarterly flag of purple over white. My sources show
the flag with a reddish purple, but this is not indicated in the decree that
established it. It has the municipal coat of arms in the center, as always. The
coat of arms has a 4-towered mural crown, a typical
scroll that reads
"VILA DE ALJUSTREL" and the shield is black charged with
a fountain and in chief a golden crescent facing upwards, sided by two purple
crosses of the Santiago Order. A more recent source shows these arms with a
thin white border around the shield and a different shape of the fountain.
Jorge Candeias, 16 May 1998
Guessing the meaning of the coat of arms, I’d say that this territory was
attributed to the Order of Santiago after it’s
conquest to the moors (an educated guess, since most of the territory in
today’s southern Portugal was at that feudal times attributed to this or
that order). The crescent reflects the moor inheritage, and the fountain
relates perhaps to some thermal location. This is a total guess, because I’m
not aware of any thermal places in Aljustrel. However, fountains in portuguese
heraldry usually refer to that, and there are a number of springs in the
municipality’s territory, so I may not be too wrong.
Jorge Candeias, 16 May 1998
Aljustrel is a town that belongs to the district of Beja,
old province of Baixo Alentejo. The municipality has 455,7
sq. km of area and about 11 800 inhabitants in 5 communes. It is a very poor
municipality, with an economy based in agriculture and mining industries, although
these are facing a huge crisis right now, thus there is a lot of unemployement there.
Jorge Candeias, 16 May 1998
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