São Bartolomeu de Messines
A hillside market town in inland Silves, birthplace of the poet João de Deus, with a striking parish church.
São Bartolomeu de Messines is a small inland town in the north-east of the Silves municipality, built across rising hills away from the coast. Its economy rests on farming, forestry and local trade, and it has a working, everyday feel.
The parish church, built in the sixteenth century and remodelled in the eighteenth, is known for its twisted sandstone columns, said to be unique in the Algarve. The town is also the birthplace of João de Deus, the poet and educator whose reading primer taught generations of Portuguese children. It suits travellers interested in the quieter interior.