Portugal · 17th century
The fortress Fortaleza de Nossa Senhora da Conceição do Ilhéu existed on an islet in the bay by the harbour of Funchal on Madeira.
The first proposal to build a fortress on the islet appeared as early as 1553. The main reason was the defence of the harbour against pirates. The work dragged on for almost a hundred years. It was accelerated by the war for Portugal's independence from Spain (1640–1668).
After the First World War the harbour was enlarged. Today the former islet is part of the pier and the harbour's control station is located on it.
Machine-translated from “Forte do Ilhéu (Funchal)” on the Czech Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Fortaleza de Nossa Senhora da Conceição do Ilhéu ranks #8,554 of 9,079 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #210 of the 212 mapped in Portugal. Founded c. 1700, it is older than 21% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 721 atlas entries founded in the 17th century. 4 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. See how Portugal compares in the castle statistics.
View on the interactive castle map →