Sanctuary of Peninha, Sintra

The Sanctuary of Peninha (Portuguese: Santuário da Peninha) is situated in the Sintra Mountains in the Sintra-Cascais Natural Park. It stands at an altitude of 448 metres on top of a rocky outcrop, which provides views over the coastline and inland areas. In addition to a baroque chapel, completed in 1710, the location contains the Palace of Peninha, which dates from 1918, as well as remains of a hermitage. The interiors of neither the chapel nor the palace can presently be visited.

The Peninha hills had been the location for a small hermitage ever since the foundation of Christianity in Portugal. Evidence of the physical foundations of a medieval hermitage can still be seen and archaeological excavations carried out by the Sintra–Cascais Natural Park uncovered a necropolis made up of graves excavated in the rock, with burials dating from the end of the 12th century, together with a cistern dug into the rock. The Hermitage of San Saturnino was built on the site in the mid-sixteenth century, added to in the seventeenth century and used by monks until the dissolution of the monasteries in Portugal in 1834. It was still occupied by farmers until the 1960s, when it passed to being used as a barn.