“If these stones could talk…”

Prepare to be amazed.

No, not at my ordinary looking vacation pictures and certainly not at my lack-luster blog writing. Nothing amazing with these, even though the pictures might help a little. But the place I’m talking about today is worthy of a few ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’— Citânia de Briteiros.  “Citânia” means fortified town and “Briteiros” is the name of parish, a small country village in northern Portugal, about halfway between Braga and Guimarães. It dates to the Atlantic Bronze Age, about 1000 years B.C., and it had its gilded age between II B.C and I A.D., which means it goes back even before the Roman occupation. Can you imagine the history of such a place? It’s truly amazing.

In chapter 13 of The Secret Life of Daydreams, Josh takes a little trip there and he invites Sofia to go with him. Of course, it’s a really cute scene, but I realize I say that about all the scenes between Josh and Sofia. What can I say, I’m kind of partial to them. Right before they leave, they stand overlooking the Citânia and Josh says “If these stones could talk…”, to which Sofia replies— what do you think she says? 😉

I couldn’t remember the last time I visited Citânia de Briteiros, so I had to go there to take some pictures, of course, but mostly to make sure that I got the description and spirit of the setting right. I keep using the word amazing but that’s how I felt to be there. To think I was walking on those stone paths where this ancient  people had walked thousands of years before—it was very humbling. The ruins include main roads, city walls, rectangular and circular houses, and village walls.
But enough talk already. Let’s see some of these pictures.

One of the main roads:

Can you believe this tree?

 

This is just a very small sample of this place. If you want to see more, and in a really cool way, here’s a link to a site with a virtual tour of it:

https://citania.csarmento.uminho.pt/default.asp?language=2
(the music is a bit annoying, you might want to turn it off)

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