Albergaria-a-Velha

Albergaria-a-Velha is a town and a municipality in the Aveiro District in Portugal. The population in 2011 was 25,252, in an area of 158.83 km². It had 19,687 eligible voters in 2006.HistoryIn 1117, D. Teresa, Countess of Portucale, and mother of Afonso Henriques the first king of Portugal, donated to the nobleman Gonçalo Eriz the lands that constitute Albergaria-a-Velha. As part of the donation the nobleman was obligated to maintain open a hospice for poor travels. The document referred to this shelter for the travelling poor, or albergaria, and thus the area was known as Albergaria.Later, the Carta do Couto de Osselôa was discovered that definitely identified both the first document to refer to Portugal as a Kingdom and at the same figured in the identification of Albergaria-a-Velha as an administrative unit of the country. The Bishop of Coimbra, D. Egas, in 1258, ordered this document to be transcribed in order to conserve it. Also, because it was the older Albergaria, owing to the existence of Albergaria-a-Nova, the community began to be referred to as Albergaria-a-Velha (meaning Portuguese for older).The first references to Albergaria as town, developed in the 16th Century, with the erection of an obelisk in the municipal square, around the location of the first hospital. It was ordered erected at the hospital by the Lisbon government on 27 May 1629.The municipality was created in 1834, when the older municipality of Aveiro was dismembered, and the new administrative divisions Loure, Albergaria-a-Velha and Vale Maior reconstituted. Just after this reconstitution, the parish of Alquerubim (Paus) was annexed to Albergaria-a-Velha, and later the parishes of Branca, Ribeira de Fráguas ( both around 1855), Angeja and Frossos (in 1854) were incorporated.