11 Facts About Cascais

Cascais is a town and municipality in the Lisbon District of Portugal, located on the Portuguese Riviera.

Cascais is known for the many members of royalty who have lived there, including King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom, when he was the Duke of Windsor, King Juan Carlos I of Spain, and King Umberto II of Italy.

Roman interventions in the area occurred with the settlement of the villae of Freiria and Casais Velhos, evidence for which includes a group of ten tanks discovered along the Rua Marques Leal Pancada in Cascais, which was the location of a salting factory for fish.

Development of Cascais began in earnest in the 12th century, when it was administratively subordinate to the town of Sintra, located to the north.

The toponym "Cascais" appears to derive from this period, a plural derivation of cascal which signified a "mountain of shells", referring to the abundant volume of marine mollusks harvested from the coastal waters.

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Castle of Cascais was likely constructed during this period, since by 1370, King Ferdinand had donated the castle and Cascais to Gomes Lourenco de Avelar to hold as a seigneurial fiefdom.

Cascais benefited from the construction of a better road to Sintra, a bullfight ring, a sports club, and improvements to basic infrastructure for the population.

In 1882 Cascais installed one of the first tide gauges in Europe in order to assist with navigation into the port of Lisbon.

Cascais is situated on the western edge of the Tagus estuary, between the Sintra mountains and the Atlantic Ocean; the territory occupied by the municipality is limited in the north by the municipality of Sintra, south and west by the ocean, and east by the municipality of Oeiras.

Cascais has a Mediterranean climate with mild, wet winters and warm, dry summers.

Cascais is easily reached from Lisbon by car on the A5 Lisbon-Cascais highway, or alternatively on the scenic "marginal" road, as well as by frequent inexpensive commuter trains.