Diana Lima

@dianalima1671188923 · 20 Apr 2022

Follow Following

The big Earthquake of 1755

It was just another All-Saints holiday on the 1st of November 1755 in Lisbon. At about 9.40 am the citizens were happily celebrating the holiday in church when a a big Earthquake brought everything crashing down. Its magnitude was about 9 on the Richer scale. Buildings and churches partly collapsed onto the heads of the worshippers, fires broke out, and many lives were lost.

However, the biggest threat was still to come.

Because the epicenter was around 150 to 500 Km South-West of the Portuguese capital, and located deep in the ocean, a Tsunami was created. The massive waves, the biggest of which calculated be to around 20m high, arrived soon after the Quake to submerge the lower areas of the already stricken city (penetrating about 250 meters inland).

The Portuguese Royal family luckily escaped unharmed, because the royal princesses had asked their father, King Joseph I, to spend the holiday out of town; the family had left soon after early mass. After this catastrophe, King Joseph I developed a phobia of enclosed spaces and lived the rest of his life in a luxury tented complex in Alto da Ajuda.

The Earthquake-Tsunami of 1755 is mostly remembered for the destruction it caused in Lisbon, but the entire coastline of Portugal and Spain was also affected, and the shockwaves reached other regions of Europe and North of Africa. This traumatizing event in a way replaced in the collective memory of the Portuguese citizens the previous deadly combo (quake and wave) of January 26th, 1531.

The Lisbon earthquake had an enormous political and socio-economic impact on 18th century Portuguese society, giving rise to the first scientific studies of the effect of an earthquake on a wide area, thus marking the birth of modern seismology. The event was also widely discussed by Enlightenment philosophers, such as Voltaire, inspiring them to further develop their theories.

The rebuild efforts were lead by the Marquis of Pombal, a challenge that gave him the historic role of architectural renovator of the city. #history #earthquake #lisbon