Vila Nova de Foz Côa
municipality in Portugal
Vila Nova de Foz Côa (European Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈvilɐ ˈnɔvɐ ðɨ ˈfɔʃ ˈkoɐ] ) is a city and a municipality at the confluence of the rivers Douro and Côa in the district of Guarda, Portugal. The municipality covers an area of 398.15 square kilometres (153.73 mi2) and it hosted a population of 6,304 people in 2021, while around 3,300 people lived in the city.
The municipality includes part of the Côa Valley Archaeological site, declared by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site and is a part of the Douro wine region.
History
The Côa Valley has yielded significant archaeological findings that trace the origins of its inhabitants to the Paleolithic period, approximately 20,000 years ago. Evidence indicates that early humans inhabited the region, engaging in fishing and hunting for sustenance. They left behind notable rock engravings on the durable schist rock along the valley’s banks. Archaeological sites such as Canada do Inferno, Vale de Figueira, Vale de José Esteves, and Vale Cabrões contain engravings from this period and later, marking a continuous human presence throughout successive generations, including the Mesolithic, Neolithic, Chalcolithic, Bronze, and Iron Ages.
The area also shows substantial evidence of ancient settlement structures, notably at Castelo Velho in nearby Freixo de Numão, where archaeological investigations uncovered remains from a fortified settlement dating back to the Chalcolithic era. This site featured two lines of walls and a central tower, suggesting a small fortified community that may have housed around forty people. After what was likely a period of abandonment, the site was reoccupied in the 2nd millennium BCE, during the Bronze Age, as indicated by the discovery of decorated ceramics and structures made of wood and clay.
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This entry incorporates text from “Vila Nova de Foz Côa” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.