Administrative divisions of Portugal
The legal status of a city or town is granted only for ceremonial purposes, typically with smaller boundaries than municipalities.
Starting in 2003, Eurostat has defined regions and subregions in the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS) standard.
But these divisions bely the inadequacies and disparities that exist within the country: the distribution of population and gross domestic product between territorial units is markedly different.
[2] Portugal was primarily a seafaring nation, and traditionally human settlement has congregated along the coastline, so much so that the coastal districts, while being relatively small, were disproportionately larger by population.
Since 1976, Portugal conceded political autonomy to its North Atlantic archipelagos (Madeira and Azores) due to their distance, isolation, geographical context and socio-economic circumstances.
The Azores (Açores) is an archipelago of nine islands and several islets that were discovered and settled by the Portuguese in the late 15th century.
[1] Since 1976, Portugal conceded political autonomy to its North Atlantic archipelagos (the Azores and Madeira) due to their distance, isolation, geographical context and socio-economic circumstances.
[10] Preceding the nation's independence, the oldest of the larger municipalities still in existence Coimbra and Santarém were founded in 1085 e 1095, respectively.
São João da Pesqueira (in the district of Viseu) is the oldest Portuguese municipality, founded in 1055.
Unlike other European countries like Spain or France, the Portuguese territory was settled early, and maintained with stability after the 13th century.
[2] By the end of the third century, Emperor Diocletian administratively reordered Tarraconesis, dividing it into three separate territories (Tarraconensis, Carthaginensis and Callaecia), the latter comprising the northern Portugal, Galicia and Asturias.
During the period of Al-Andalus and Muslim caliphates, the Iberian peninsula was divided administratively into provinces (kuwar) and municipalities (kurar), along the lines of the Roman-Visigothic delineations.
[2][10] Historically, the institution of the foral system was a way to divide the territory and to establish local administrative control (and not regional or hierarchical continuity).
During the reign of King Dinis (1279–1325), the monarch instituted a series of inquiries throughout the kingdom which resulted, a few years later, in the configuration of the territory into provinces and municipalities.
[2][10][15] Between the reign of Afonso IV and the 20th century there were numerous alterations to the limits of the nation, a consequence of development and population growth.
[16] But, until 1832, the provinces did not serve an administrative function, although they did mark the differences in habits, linguistic peculiarities and socio-cultural characteristics.
[3] The debate over the importance of provinces only arose from fears that there would be an excessive concentration of power in the hands of governmental officers (prefeitos).
[17] Yet, the Districts continued to define administrative and political control, much like the organization of public security for the State, limiting the powers of local government.
In the beginning of the 20th century, most of these territories started to be referred as colonies, although the term overseas provinces continued also to be used.
[18] But the history of extra-local territories (colonies or provinces) within Portuguese administration dates back to the first settlements along the African coast, South-east Asia and Brazil, and were instituted as part of the 1832 reforms.
The initiatives envisioned a comprehensive series of provinces that would have included European Portugal, archipelagos and extra-local dependencies in Southeast Asia, Africa and India.
These colonies included:[19] Initially the population of these overseas territories were made to exploit resources (minerals, spices, wood or slaves), but later there was a sense of evangelisation or lusotropolicalism, that facilitated the colonization of these lands.
