Guimarães Municipality (Portugal)

Last modified: 2005-04-29 by
Keywords: guimarães | coat of arms | saint mary | jesus | wreath: olive | quina: 11 bezants | sao torcato |
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• About the flag
• Presentation of Guimarães
• Commune flags

• Municipalities of Portugal
• Portugal

• Page about the municipal flag and coat of arms of Guimarães at Sérgio Hortaʼs website (in Portuguese).
  reported by Jorge Candeias, 29 Feb 1999
• Municipal website | arms page: here is a text on and a picture of the municipal flag. The text is merely a description of the flag and coat of arms (in portuguese). However, the image is not accurate (the description is) because it is way too dark: the flag should be green and white gyronny.
  reported by Jorge Candeias, 11 Feb 1998
• Page about Guimarães at the Portuguese Municipalitiesʼs Association website (incl. image of the arms)
  reported by António Martins, 18 Nov 2001

About the flag

It is a quite typical portuguese municipal flag, with the coat of arms centered on a background gyronny (meaning city rank) of white and green. The arms are or, the Virgin Mary holding Jesus propper, both crowned or (no nimbus), above a wreath of olive bounded argent, and between two escuteons in chief, azure, eleven bezants argent placed 3+2+3+2+1 (“quina” — the eschuteons are like those found on the poruguese royal arms of 1185-1211, a period during which, Guimarães Castle was the usual residence of the Kings of Portugal). Mural crown argent with five visible towers (city rank) and white scroll reading in black upper case letters "CIDADE DE GUIMARÃES".
António Martins, 31 Jul 1999

Presentation of Guimarães

Guimarães municipality had 160 710 inhabitants in 1990, and it is divided in 73 communes, covering 258 km². It belongs to the District of Braga and to the old province of Minho.
António Martins, 31 Jul 1999

Guimaraes was our first capital city back in the XII century, when Lisbon was still under arab rule. I think itʼs downtown is protected by the UNESCO. The football team has seen better days, though.
Jorge Candeias, 18 Jan 1999

Commune flags